It's usually a busy time for television programming, but the ongoing actors strike has continued to slow things down. Yes, late night talk shows have resumed. And sure, "Saturday Night Live" is back on the air.


But unless programming was completed and ready to go, there is not much else besides sports and some unscripted shows that don't need actors. And when there are shows to promote, the stars can't speak with media.


But there are a few cases where celebrities can talk. Take Sting, legendary musician and frontman for The Police. He is out promoting "Message in a Bottle," which is coming to PBS and features his music. Tennis legend Billie Jean King is also talking about her projects, along with pickleball.


So the co-hosts talk about that limited programming, the movie theater as an event and the state of the strike. And they look ahead to next week's episode where they will discuss "Lawmen: Bass Reeves," which is coming soon to Paramount+.


Where to watch and more coverage


"Message in a Bottle" on PBS (https://www.pbs.org/wnet/gperf/messag...)
'Message in a Bottle' finds new meaning in Sting songs (https://siouxcityjournal.com/life-ent...)


Contact us!


We want to hear from you! Email questions to [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) and we'll answer your question on a future episode!


About the show


Streamed & Screened (https://omny.fm/shows/just-to-be-nomi...) is a podcast about movies and TV hosted by Bruce Miller (  / siouxbruce  , a longtime entertainment reporter who is now the editor of the Sioux City Journal (https://siouxcityjournal.com/) in Iowa and Terry Lipshetz (https://madison.com/users/profile/ter..., a senior producer for Lee Enterprises based in Madison, Wisconsin.



Episode transcript


Note: The following transcript was created by Headliner and may contain misspellings and other inaccuracies as it was generated automatically:


Terry Lipshetz: Welcome, everyone, to another episode of Streamed and Screened and entertainment podcast about movies and TV from Lee Enterprises, I'm Terry Lipshetz, a senior producer at Lee and co-host of the program with Bruce Miller, editor of the Sioux City Journal, longtime entertainment reporter. And I suspect he's bringing us a little message in the bottle this week. What do you say about that?


Bruce Miller: Message in the bottle? Yes, our dear friend Sting. But, I got to tell you, this is the strangest time. We talk about the actors striking and they're not working, and everybody's worried about that. We're not getting content. But there also is a whole other area that's being ignored, and that's the selling of all these shows. We don't get those actors doing interviews about the product that they do have out there, because that's part of the deal with the guild, is that you are not going to promote something that will bring money into the producers until they settle this strike. So, as a result, they don't offer up, actors to me to interview like they have in the past. It'll be people like producers, directors, costume designers, a whole raft of people that you probably don't hear from, which is great. It's interesting. It's a new wrinkle in all of this. But it does hurt some of those people who have spent a long time working on something. David Oyelowo has been trying to get a passion project about Bass Reeves done for eight years. And he got the money from Taylor Sheridan, the Yellowstone producer who's behind all of this. And no, it is not connected with any of the Yellowstone series. People, want to say that it's 1883, it's tied in, it's not. But he got his support in this. They hired a writer. They have other directors and producers and people behind it. And he is kind of the galvanizing force behind this whole thing. And now, because they're selling this, this is coming out the early part of November, he can't say anything, which I just isn't that just disheartening here? You your life working on this, and then others have to talk about it for you. And all those people are very open and generous about giving him credit for what he did and what he wants to say with this. It has a very special message. But this is like down the line. You are seeing different series like this where they'll offer up people to talk to you. There's a movie, coming out limited, this month, and then wide in November, the, Holdovers It stars Paul Giamatti and Da'Vine Joy Randolph, and it's directed by Alexander Payne. And this is going to be a big Oscar contender. The actors, they're not talking, they're not able to say anything about this. But again, that's one of those says, you know, it just kills me that I can't talk with them here and they can hear all these things because they're not available to promote the film. And so I think that's one of the things we don't think know....