WHAT makes a woman sexy?
On TNT, it’s lunacy – plus a few other attributes.
Tonight, the strongest female characters on TV – tough, edgy and unstable – return to start their new seasons.
At 9 p.m., it’s Kyra Sedgwick, 42, as LAPD Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson, back for a fourth season in “The Closer.” She’s still brittle, brilliant Brenda – unsettled (and also unpacked) in a new rented apartment with her fiancé (FBI agent Fritz Howard, played by Jon Tenney), and fretting (as usual) that they’ll be evicted if the landlord who forbids pets discovers her cat.
TV BLOG: Kyra’s Show Hits Close To Home
She’s also sleep-deprived, stemming from tonight’s big investigation into the source of a fire that roared through LA’s Griffith Park, killing several firefighters and leaving the charred body of an unidentified young woman.
Brenda’s so manic that you begin to wonder why affable Fritz even puts up with her, until the scene in their bedroom where she changes clothes, revealing there’s more to Brenda than (usually) meets the eye.
Then, at 10 p.m., it’s Holly Hunter, 50, as Oklahoma City Police Det. Grace Hanadarko, back for her second season in “Saving Grace.”
Hard-bodied and hard-boiled, Grace is a 5-foot, 2-inch Dirty Harry, heroically running down a wanted fugitive through city streets while off-duty on a sunny day, resulting in the perp leaping to his death in the episode’s opening sequence.
In the instability department, Grace has Brenda beat. While Brenda Leigh Johnson is merely chronically nervous (stemming in part from her craving for sweets), Grace Hanadarko is an unapologetic guzzler of hard liquor who is occasionally visited by a tobacco-chewing redneck angel named Earl (Leon Rippy) whose timely counsel prevents her from acting on her darkest impulses.
Tonight, those impulses include her desire to punish a priest (guest-star Rene Auberjonois) who raped her when she was a child – a back-story that helps explain her extreme behavior in adulthood.
Both “The Closer” and “Saving Grace” are at the top of their games in tonight’s premiere episodes.
They are two quality drama series (strictly for adults only) that might once have been picked up and developed by CBS, NBC or ABC.
But like so many of TV’s better one-hour dramas these days, these two wound up on cable – in this case TNT, which now can lay claim to the sexiest (and also craziest) women on television.
“The Closer”
New season premiere
Tonight at 9 on TNT
“Saving Grace”
New season premiere
Tonight at 10 on TNT