The Mentalist Off-Site News / Articles Roundup #1

“The Mentalist” Appears Unstoppable
By Sam Sloan
sliceofscifi.com

"The new CBS series “The Mentalist” is this new season of shows first bonafide consistent ratings hit. While all other new shows, including the successful Fox venture called “Fringe,” are fluctutaing week to week or downright tanking, the Simon Baker starrer has seen nothing but a steady climb in its ratings with each new episode.
Its sixth episode since premiere night was its best to date clocking in with an astounding 16.1 million viewers which equates to around a 3.9 rating — or — 9 share in TV-exec-speak. That’s an 8% rise over its showing just last week, which in itself was a head-turner."

Full Article:
http://www.sliceofscifi.com/2008/10/30/the-mentalist-appears-unstoppable/


The Best New Fall Shows Come Down To Casting
By Jeff Simon
Buffalonews.com

““The Mentalist,” at long last, is the perfect role for Simon Baker after many years of trying to find one in movies and TV shows. He’s the kind of handsome, blond hunk that almost anyone would assume would flutter female hearts and be big star material, and yet there’s always been something just a wee bit off about him that keeps him from becoming the common council president of George Clooneyville. To his credit, he can do creepy exceedingly well and has often had enough edge and performing feistiness to want to.

Casting him as the star on “The Mentalist” was an act of off-hand network genius. He plays a refugee from the slimier realms of show business — a sort of matinee-idol Kreskin — who now employs all of his slipperier talents to help the cops, which hits everything that might have been dubious about Simon Baker dead center and turns it into extremely witty and canny casting in prime time TV.”

Full Article:
http://www.buffalonews.com/entertainment/story/481515.html


Baker Likes What He Sees in 'Mentalist'
By David Kronke
la.com

“One hardly needed psychic abilities to predict the success of "The Mentalist," CBS' newest crime procedural. Simon Baker has popped as the season's hottest new star: the droll and dashing Patrick Jane, who once posed as a TV psychic but left such chicanery behind when his bravado triggered a personal tragedy.

Jane now works as a consultant for the California Bureau of Investigation, in a unit led by Teresa Lisbon (Robin Tunney), where his unorthodox skills at perception and playing mind games help him crack open cases.

Patrick Jane joins a group of eccentric TV detectives, including Jim Rockford, Theo Kojak and Columbo.

"Popular TV characters are defined by the signature choices that they make, knowing how a situation will arise in the procedure of the show, and knowing how he's going to react," Baker notes on the set of the series the day after CBS announced it had been picked up for the entire season.”

Full Article:
http://www.la.com/tv/Baker_Likes_What_He_Sees_in_Mentalist.html

'The Mentalist': Crime Pays for CBS
By Alynda Wheat
ew.com

“The temple of harmony is a sham. It's just the shell of a house on a studio lot, with a sign promising ''wellness through clairvoyance'' (whatever that means). The Mentalist's Patrick Jane (Simon Baker) knows it's bunk, as he's about to insinuate to the woman who runs the joint (Leslie Hope). But first, Baker has to stop yammering. The director has called for sound, the cameras are rolling, but there Baker goes, chatting away with Hope in his Australian cadence, right up until ''Action!'' Instantly, the American accent kicks in, lines roll off his tongue perfectly, and he nails his take.

The star's comfort on set is understandable — this is his third CBS series, after all. The difference between The Mentalist and Baker's other two shows (Smith and The Guardian), however, is a big one. CBS' freshman drama about a man with extraordinary powers of perception who consults for the California Bureau of Investigation has done something no other new entry this season has been able to do: become a bona fide top 10 hit. Averaging 15.6 million viewers, The Mentalist not only holds its own against the Tuesday-night Dancing With the Stars results show on ABC, it also easily trounces Fox's much more heavily hyped Fringe in total viewers.”

Full Article:
http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20234178,00.html?xid=rss-feed-todayslatest-20081021-%27The+Mentalist%27%3A+Crime+pays+for+CBS

Tags: Articles, The Mentalist