Mary McNamara

Nepotism Broadcasting Company: NBC's Peter Pan Promotion Reveals 'The Tackiest House on the Street'
By Tim Graham | December 8, 2014 | 11:39 AM EST

Washington Post TV critic Hank Stuever didn’t hate NBC’s three-hour “Peter Pan Live” musical. Allison Williams as the flying title character was fine (after becoming become the most promoted stage musical actress in decades, just by being on an NBC stage.)

Stuever turned the second half of his review into disgust at how relentlessly tacky NBC-Universal is in promoting its own products that it takes the smell out of Brian Williams pushing his own daughter in America’s face, since well, he makes a fraction of what Jon Stewart takes home. NBC is now "the tackiest house on the street."

L.A. Times Loves Diane Sawyer, 'Katharine Hepburn of the Newsroom'
By Tim Graham | February 7, 2010 | 1:27 PM EST

Los Angeles Times TV critic Mary McNamara sounded like she had stars on her eyes as she reviewed the new World News with Diane Sawyer on Friday:

In a world dominated by YouTube moments and professional hysterics, Sawyer exudes an alarming level of elegance.

You can hear the Times, like an echo of Charlie Gibson clucking "let the cables" do the ugly scandal news. Sawyer, the new face of the liberal media aristocracy, exudes class and intellect and verve, unlike the Perky One:

ABC Serves Up 'Family' with PC Message
By Colleen Raezler | September 24, 2009 | 3:59 PM EDT

For all that critics have hailed ABC's "Modern Family" for its non-stereotypical portrayal of a gay couple, the show itself is stereotypical Hollywood propaganda.

"Modern Family," filmed in a mock-documentary style, examines the lives of  three couples from one family. Patriarch Jay (Ed O'Neill) is married to a much-younger, feisty Colombian woman. His daughter Claire is married to Phil who treats parenting like playtime. Jay's son Mitchell, is gay, and when the show began, has just adopted a baby with his partner Cameron.

Producers treated the 12.7 million viewers who tuned in Wednesday night for the premiere to a pro-gay adoption speech within the first two minutes of the program.

LAT Claims George Washington Only Served One Term in Office
By Lynn Davidson | April 21, 2008 | 12:47 AM EDT

Official White House portrait of Gorge Washington

UPDATED: 

Journalists love reporting that Americans are stupid, and they salivate at the thought of asking us to find the United States on a map or who we fought in the American Revolution. That's why it is rather amusing that the Los Angeles Times mistakenly claimed that George Washington only served one term in office as US president. 

LAT television critic Mary McNamara made the slip up in this April 19 article about HBO's surge in popularity when she began describing the cable network's “John Adams” miniseries (via Patterico) (all bold mine):

In his portrayal of our second president, Paul Giamatti creates a man perpetually dissatisfied, disgusted by the preening ambition of politics even as he is infected by it... [S]etting up a new government is a bureaucratic nightmare, with oversized personalities disagreeing over things both petty and fundamental. George Washington (David Morse) so quickly tired of the infighting among his Cabinet and vagaries of public opinion that he stepped down from the presidency after a single term. "I know now what it is like to be disliked," he says to Adams, his perpetually disliked vice president.