Tom McGowan Movies

KACL station manager Kenny Daly (Tom McGowan) is down in the dumps over his failing marriage. Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) tries to help Kenny deal with this situation -- only to inadvertently go out on a date with Mrs. Daly (Illeana Douglas). Elsewhere, Daphne's "binge eating" is getting out of control, forcing her to take drastic action. This last subplot was cooked up to explain away the noticeable weight gain of actress Jane Leeves, who was pregnant at the time of filming. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Filmmaker Terry Zwigoff, who enjoyed breakthrough success with his 1994 documentary Crumb, shifts gears as he examines the lives of two young women on the verge of leaving their adolescence behind in his first dramatic feature. Enid (Thora Birch) and Rebecca (Scarlett Johansson) are two close friends who've just graduated from high school, and are trying to decide what to do with their lives. Enid is a dark-haired arch cynic who is tired of living at home with her ineffectual dad (Bob Balaban) and his annoyingly perky girlfriend Maxine (Teri Garr), while Rebecca is prettier and a bit cheerier, but no more certain about her future. While the two girls have vague plans of getting an apartment together, they seem content to while away their summer hanging out and indulging in their shared infatuation with Josh (Brad Renfro), a friend from school who works at a convenience store and doesn't seem to be especially attracted to either of them. Enid discovers that in order to get her diploma, she'll have to take an additional class over the summer, where she winds up studying art with Roberta (Illeana Douglas), who is determined to encourage Enid's creative impulses, whether Enid likes it or not. More significantly, Enid meets Seymour (Steve Buscemi), a geeky record collector more than twice her age, and while they would seem to have little in common (and Rebecca thinks he's a creep), Enid discovers a kindred spirit in fellow misfit Seymour, who shares her disgust with the world around them, and a relationship begins to develop between the two. Ghost World is based on the award-winning graphic novel by comic artist Daniel Clowes, who also wrote the film's screenplay. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Kim Coles returns as "Dr. Mary" Thomas, the sassy radio-advice-show rival of Frasier Crane (Kelsey Grammer). When Mary and Frasier are assigned to co-host Seattle's Christmas Parade, Frasier is none too happy about it -- especially since Mary had started out as his temporary employee and ended up as his chief competition. Even worse, the public clearly "loves" Dr. Mary more than Dr. Crane, a fact that leads to an uncharacteristic stream of over-the-air venom from Frasier just at a time when his audience was primed for a bit of Yuletide warmth and cheer. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Weaver (Laura Innes) is suspended by Romano (Paul McCrane) for defying his orders not to operate on a severely retarded
girl. Elizabeth Corday's (Alex Kingston) medical treatment of Greene's dad (John Cullum) causes a falling out between herself and Greene (Anthony Edwards). Kovac (Goran Visnjic) is dissatisfied when one of several people is chosen as a kidney recipient. A patient whom Carter (Noah Wyle) was forced to discharge returns in terrible shape. And Cleo (Michael Michele) and Benton (Eriq La Salle) make love. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

"Togetherness" is the theme of the evening, as Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) and Roz (Peri Gilpin) attend an out-of-town conference, while Niles (David Hyde Pierce) joins his former-cop father Martin (John Mahoney) on a private-eye surveillance session arranged by Donny (Saul Rubinek). Not unexpectedly, nervous Niles drives his dad crazy throughout the stakeout. As for Frasier and Roz, "craziness" of another kind ensues when they are forced to share a room -- and a few other things. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Christine Baranski makes her first series appearance as Seattle radio therapist Dr. Nora Fairchild, a spoof of a certain well-known, ultraconservative talk-show host. Dr. Nora's outspoken, bullying and predominately homophobic "my way or the highway" radio personality is extremely irritating to many observers, including Frasier (Kelsey Grammer), who to his everlasting regret recommended Nora to the KACL management. Even so, the outrageous Nora dramatically increases the station's ratings -- setting the stage for a riotous showdown between the Doctors Crane and Fairchild. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The Christmas Season is also a time of contemplation for Daphne (Jane Leeves). As she prepares for her marriage to Donny Douglas (Saul Rubinek), Daphne wonders if the time has come to clear the air concerning Niles' pent-up feelings for her. As for Niles (David Hyde Pierce), it may be a bleak holiday indeed when his current "significant other" Dr. Mel Karnofsky (Jane Adams) tumbles to a lie he has handed her. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

By now convinced that her friend Dr. Lawrence (Alan Alda) is in the early stages of Alzheimer's, Weaver (Laura Innes) dolefully conspires with Greene (Anthony Edwards) to force Lawrence to face his problem. A nursing-home fire brings in a multitude of patients and heap of trouble for Carter (Noah Wyle). Carol (Julianna Margulies) goes out on a limb to help the pregnant, heroin-addicted Meg (Martha Plimpton). Dr. Dave (Erik Palladino) may have caused the explosion that has been blamed on Cleo Finch (Michael Michele). And Jeanie Boulet (Gloria Reuben) bids goodbye to the ER. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Season five of Frasier begins with the entire KACL staff looking for new jobs after the station installs a "salsa" music format and fires them en masse. This situation is particularly painful for radio psychologist Frasier Crane (Kelsey Grammer), especially since it was he who was largely responsible for his co-workers' plight. As he sends out resumes and vainly awaits for potential employers to beat a path to his door, Frasier tries to lessen his grief by spending his spare time in such pursuits as cooking and furniture design -- while everyone around him wonders how much of Frasier's anger, denial, and frustration they will able to withstand. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Director Mike Nichols teams up with his former partner/screenwriter Elaine May for the first time in many years and for the first time together in films to create this sophisticated, remake of the phenomenally popular French musical farce La Cage aux Folles that stars Robin Williams, Nathan Lane, Gene Hackman and Diane Wiest as two dramatically disparate couples who manage to reconcile their vast differences for the sake of their children who are getting married. Williams plays Armand Goldman, the owner of a popular South Beach drag club known for putting on elaborate showcases starring his long-time lover/wife Albert (Lane) who appears as "Starina." Lately poor flamboyant, flighty Albert has been in crisis over the inexorable onset of middle age. He has been moody, paranoid and unbearably. When he gets too inconsolably distraught, handsome but clumsy houseboy Agador quietly slips Albert "Pirin" tablets (which he explains to Armand are simply Aspirin tablets with the "as" scraped off). Still though Albert can be a royal pain, Armand dearly loves him and the two live happily in their splendiferous apartment above the club. One day Armand's son Val (the result of Armand's single foray into straight sex) comes visiting with joyous news: he has found his dreamgirl and is getting married. The only trouble is, Barbara Keeley's father is the blustery ultra-religious right-wing Senator Keeley (Hackman), the founder of the Coalition for Moral Order. Senator Keeley and his colleagues are not as upright as they seem and when his closest associate is found dead beside a black, underage prostitute, Keeley finds his house surrounded by ravenous newshounds, hungry for dirt. Knowing that they are poised to ruin him, Keeley and his proper but slightly addled-wife (Wiest) decide that a big, elaborate, church wedding will be just the ticket to save his reputation. Barbara has neglected to tell them that Val's parents are gay, preferring to claim that they are members of the South Beach social elite. In a panic, she panics and calls Val who breaks the bad news to Armand and begs him to make the apartment less flamboyant and worst of all to hide Albert (who functioned as Val's mother while the youth grew up) during the visit. Armand is angry, but loving his son, finally, reluctantly agrees, knowing that he will deeply wound his companion. Unfortunately, Albert finds out and as a compromise tries to learn how to be macho so he can pretend to be Val's uncle, he is too much the Great Dame to ever pass as one of the guys and so is banned from the party. Armand then locates Catherine and asks her to masquerade as his wife. She agrees to show up later that evening. Meanwhile their friends busily redecorate the apartment until it looks as if it were done in "Early Inquisition." During the fateful dinner party, Catherine is late and Albert gets uproarious revenge. Achingly comic chaos ensues as Armand tries to hold the increasingly tenuous evening together while outside the newshounds bay and threaten to make even more trouble for Senator Keely. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Jennifer Jason Leigh offers an acclaimed performance as humorist Dorothy Parker, who together with such 1920s luminaries as Robert Benchley, Alexander Woollcott and George S. Kaufman, was a charter member of the legendary Algonquin Round Table. The story is related in flashback form, as Mrs. Parker, in Hollywood to cowrite the 1937 feature A Star is Born with her second husband Alan Campbell (Peter Gallagher), recalls her glory days as an Algonquinite. A great deal of attention is afforded Parker's vituperative bon mots, her alcoholism, her self-destructiveness, her suicide attempts, and her affairs with such literary contemporaries as Charles MacArthur (an uncharacteristically unsympathetic Matthew Broderick) and Robert E. Sherwood (Nick Cassavetes). The one person Parker truly seems to care about is humorist Robert Benchley (Campbell Scott), who prefers to keep their friendship platonic. Director Alan Rudolph attempts to convey the ambience of the 1920s by having dozens of that decade's luminaries appear in fleeting cameos, from Will Rogers (Keith Carradine) to Harpo Marx. Also featured in Mrs. Parker are Tom McGowan as the waspish Alexander Woollcott and Andrew McCarthy as Dorothy's near-invisible first husband, Eddie Parker. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Searching for Bobby Fischer was inspired by the life of chess prodigy Josh Waitzkin, as written by his father Fred Waitzkin. Josh (Max Pomeranc) is a "regular kid" who begins evincing signs of being a genius at chess. His father (Joe Mantegna) encourages this, hoping that it won't fundamentally change his son's healthy outlook on life. But Josh is taken under the wing of cold-blooded chess instructor Bruce Pandolfini (Ben Kingsley), who indoctrinates the boy in the "Bobby Fischer" strategy. Unfortunately, Pandolfini emphasizes all of Fischer's negative traits, especially his contempt for his opponents. Josh is in danger throughout the film of sacrificing his essential decency, but in a rousing conclusion, the boy is able to successfully blend ruthless competition with good sportsmanship. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Director-producer Peter Maris directed this suspense drama based on a script by Frank Kerr. James Macalla (Chris Robinson) is a prominent university researcher whose mysterious death is not investigated to the satisfaction of his distraught wife, Laura (Linda Purl). Laura sets off to find the real killers and discovers that they are linked to a shadowy band of government operators. The group, Viper, is backed by the CIA in its mission of combatting terrorists. But the group has become a rogue operation whose goal involves the killing of university staffers in order to enrich themselves. Laura risks her own life to expose what is happening. ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide