美國電視節目的出新 The Small Screen Gets Bigger

This month Harvey Weinstein, the famed (and sometimes feared) Hollywood film producer and studio boss, has been on a promotional roll. No wonder. In the coming days, one of Weinstein's new films, The Intouchables, will go on general release in the US.

本月，好萊塢著名（有時也讓人害怕）的電影製片人、電影公司老闆哈維•溫斯坦(Harvey Weinstein)忙於宣傳。這毫不奇怪。未來幾天，溫斯坦的新片之一《無法觸碰》(The Intouchables)將在美國公映。

As stories go, the film is undoubtedly heartwarming; it features a quadriplegic who strikes up an unlikely friendship with a black immigrant in Paris. But the film is in French, with subtitles. And while Weinstein has had some unlikely wins before (think of the silent film The Artist, which won five Oscars), it could be a challenge to persuade American audiences to watch a subtitled, arty film about physical disability. Especially when it competes with films such as Spider-Man 3, when Americans are on vacation.

就情節而言，這部電影無疑暖人心房；本片講述的是巴黎一名四肢癱瘓者與一名黑人移民建立起似乎不可能的友誼。但這部片子的對白是法語，配有字幕。雖然溫斯坦以前贏得過一些意料之外的獎項（如榮獲五項奧斯卡獎的默片《藝術家》(The Artist)），但說服美國觀衆觀看一部關於身體殘疾的帶字幕的文藝片可能是一項挑戰，尤其是這部電影要在美國人度假期間和《蜘蛛俠3》(Spider Man 3)展開競爭。

But as Weinstein embarks on his trendy gamble, there is something else equally intriguing at work in the visual entertainment world. A couple of weeks ago, I attended the New York premiere of the HBO series The Newsroom, a television series based on a CNN-style newsroom. This was a glitzy, fascinating affair, full of big names in the media and arts, who duly purred with pleasure when Aaron Sorkin, the series' creator, silkily declared that his show was intended as a "love letter" to the media world.

但在溫斯坦走上他的時髦賭博之路之際，在視覺娛樂世界裏還有一些同樣耐人尋味的動態。幾周前，我參加了HBO的電視劇《新聞編輯室》(The Newsroom)的紐約首映式。這是一部以美國有線新聞網(CNN)新聞編輯室爲原型的電視連續劇。這是一場令人目眩神迷的盛會，到場的全是媒體和藝術界的大腕。當這部電視劇的創作者阿倫•索爾金(Aaron Sorkin)溫和地宣佈，這部作品是給傳媒界的"情書"時，來賓們發出會心的輕笑。

But what was most memorable about the event was not the actual show (which in my view was somewhat patchy), but the fact that a television series was generating so much intellectual buzz and frisson in the first place. After all, these days it is popular for pundits to decry the dumbing down of the US media in general, and television in particular. And in statistical terms, the majority of the output on American network and cable screens these days is indeed dominated by reality shows, sports, partisan news and popular films.

首映式令人印象最深刻的不是電視劇本身（在我看來有點拼拼湊湊的），而是一部電視系列劇竟能引發這麼多知識界人士的評論與興奮。畢竟，如今評論人士喜歡譴責美國媒體總體水平低俗，尤其是電視。從統計數據看，如今美國傳統和有線電視臺的大部分節目的確是真人秀、體育、黨派觀點的新聞和流行電影。

But what non-Americans generally do not appreciate, and what even American pundits often ignore, is that amid this allegedly dumbed-down landscape, a new genre of intelligent and creative television is flowering too. The Newsroom is one example of this (although, as I noted above, not the most inspiring offering seen this year). But other examples include Game Change (the brilliantly portrayed tale of the rise of Sarah Palin), Homeland (about security services), Veep (about the White House) and Mad Men (1960s advertising jungle). To be sure, these programmes are not necessarily highbrow - or not compared to your average trendy French art-house film.

但是，非美國人總體上尚未領悟、就連美國評論人士也往往忽視的是，在這個被指低俗的格局中，一種睿智、富於創造力的新的電視體裁正在開花結果。《新聞編輯室》就是一例（儘管如上所述，它並非今年最精彩的節目）。但其他例子包括《規則改變》(Game Change)（講述莎拉•佩林(Sarah Palin)崛起的精彩電視劇）、《國土安全》(Homeland)（關於安全機構）、《二當家》(Veep)（白宮題材）以及廣告狂人(Mad Men)（講述20世紀60年代的廣告業）。沒錯，這些節目不一定高雅，至少沒有一般流行的法國藝術劇院的電影高雅。

But they are subtle, intelligent and off-beat, and they are creating a buzz. If you want to find the "cool" factor in visual entertainment today, in other words, you increasingly need to look at television - not art house movies - at least among America's creative classes.

但這些節目細膩、睿智、別具一格，並且引發了熱議。換句話說，如果你想在當今的視覺娛樂業找到"酷"的因素，那麼你越來越需要把目光投向電視屏幕，而不是藝術劇院的電影，至少在美國的創作階層是如此。

Why? In part, this shift reflects the changing nature of lifestyles and technology. Three decades ago, if you wanted to watch a television show you had to sit on a couch at a specific time; these days, recording devices and mobile gadgets mean that you can watch television whenever and wherever you want. Watching a "cool" series, or something that your friends consider to be cool, has thus become dramatically easier, and easier than a film.

何以如此？部分原因是，這種轉變反映出生活方式和科技的性質在變化。30年前，如果你想要看電視劇，就必須在特定時段坐在沙發上。現在，錄製設備和移動小玩意的問世意味着，不管何時、不論何地，你都可以看電視。於是，看一部"酷酷"的電視連續劇，或者你朋友認爲很酷的東西，已經變得非常簡單，比看電影簡單多了。

But Weinstein himself cites another factor. As he explained to me this week in New York, on the sidelines of a TV show where he was promoting The Intouchables, "fragmentation" matters too. These days, Hollywood studios face growing pressure to produce blockbusters that will sell not just in the US, but the rest of the world too. To make commercial sense, storylines must play in Shanghai, Mumbai and Sao Paolo, as well as Ohio. That makes it tough for Hollywood writers to embrace subtle plots or characters, particularly in a 90-minute format; although car chases and cartoons translate across borders, irony does not. Television, however, offers enough time and space to develop more complex and thoughtful characters and stories. And precisely because technology now allows producers to tap specific target audiences, entities such as HBO are increasingly willing to target that intelligent sub-niche of viewers. They no longer feel wedded to the mainstream.

但溫斯坦提到另一個因素。最近他在紐約參加一檔推廣《無法觸碰》的電視節目，期間他在後臺向我解釋，"碎片化"也很重要。如今，好萊塢製片廠面臨與日俱增的壓力，要求它們製作在美國以及世界其他國家都賣座的的大片。爲了取得商業上的成功，電影情節在上海、孟買、聖保羅以及（美國內陸的）俄亥俄州都讓觀衆喜聞樂見。這讓好萊塢編劇很難塑造細膩的情節或人物，尤其是在一部長度只有90分鐘的影片中。雖然飛車追逐和動畫可以跨越國界，但諷刺就不一定了。然而，電視可以提供足夠的時間和空間，來發展出更加複雜和豐滿的人物和故事。正是因爲現代科技允許製片人滿足特定目標觀衆的需求，HBO等頻道越來越願意瞄準知識分子觀衆這個細分市場。它們不再覺得必須緊貼主流。

In some senses, this fragmentation is pernicious; after all, as I have noted in columns before, what is happening to television reflects a bigger pattern of social and economic polarisation. But one unexpected side benefit is that rising level of creativity in certain niches; and that means, as Dustin Hoffman told my colleague Matthew Garrahan earlier this year, many American actors and writers now think that television - not film - is the place to be. So when The Intouchables opens in New York later this month, I will certainly try to catch it (and wish Weinstein the very best in promoting his subtitled tale). But if Weinstein ever remakes the film for a US audience (as he wants to do), it will be interesting to see which format he chooses; "Hollywood" is no longer quite the Hollywood that our parents knew.

在某種意義上，這種"碎片化"危害嚴重。畢竟，正如我以前在專欄中所言，電視反映出社會和經濟兩極化的整體格局。不過，一個出人意料的好處是，某些細分領域的創作水平越來越高。這意味着，正如達斯汀•霍夫曼(Dustin Hoffman)今年早些時候告訴我的同事馬修•加拉漢(Matthew Garrahan)的那樣，很多美國演員和作者現在認爲，能夠大顯身手的地方是電視劇，而非電影。當本月末《無法觸碰》在紐約上映之際，我當然將試着去看看（並希望溫斯坦在宣傳他的這部帶字幕的片子時一切順利）。但如果溫斯坦有朝一日打算爲美國觀衆重拍此片（他正想這麼做），他會選擇哪種形式將是很有意思的。如今的"好萊塢"已經不是我們父輩熟悉的好萊塢。