There’s really not a lot of TV news this afternoon, so I’d like to take this opportunity to say rest in peace to Etta James. The legendary singer passed away today at the age of 73. For anyone like me who grew up with soul and R&B music playing in the house on a steady loop, her songs were a necessary part of the rotation. Few could sing like her while she was alive, and few will be able to sing like her going forward. The lady could wail.

After the jump, I’ve posted a clip of her performing her signature song, “At Last,” on a 2009 episode of “Dancing with the Stars.” Even in her early 70s, she killed it dead. We should just go ahead and retire that song. Ain’t no one gonna do it better.

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Former “Saturday Night Live” writer, “Kids in the Hall” producer, and “Wayne’s World” developer Joe Bodolai passed away over the weekend, and authorities believe the cause of death was suicide, according to TMZ. Bottles of antifreeze and Gatorade were found near him in his Los Angeles hotel room, and things only get more depressing from there: on December 23, he posted an article to his blog entitled, “If This Were Your Last Day Alive, What Would You Do?” which basically amounted to a suicide note. After bullet points on things that he was proud of in his life, including “Lorne asking me to produce Kids in the Hall,” Bodolai ended the post with:

I don’t need replies or comments or anything. I need to feel the good that I did and whatever good I have ever done for you is enough for me. May you all have the happy lives you deserve. Thank you all for being in my life.

Here’s hoping he and Charles Rocket are cooking up one heck of a funny sketch together.

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Ken Ober, the comedian best known as the host of MTV’s “Remote Control” from 1987 to 1991, died this week of unknown causes. He was 52.

Mr. Ober was last heard from on Saturday night, when he spoke to a friend and complained of a headache and flu-like symptoms. Mr. Ober told the friend that he was going to take something and would see a doctor as soon as possible…

That show, which was the network’s first original series to focus on non-musical content, tested participants on their knowledge of television, music-video and pop-culture trivia. The show… drew much of its sarcastic, self-mocking spirit from the culturally obsessive Mr. Ober, who ran the program like a late-night talk show (or frat party) and gleefully teased players who gave wrong answers. [NYT]

As you can see from the clip above, the show was also the first big gig for Adam Sandler and Colin Quinn, and it also featured a young Kari Wuhrer, who was delightfully naked on Cinemax for most of the ’90s. Between the careers it launched and the era it began (the end of music on MTV), that’s a pretty damn influential game show. The only thing “Jeopardy” ever gave us was Ken Jennings and anal bum covers.

Novak was a brilliant “journalist”

Former “Crossfire” co-host and conservative columnist/commentator Robert Novak died yesterday of brain cancer.  He was 78.  (If you never watch cable news, it’s possible you’re unfamiliar with Novak’s oft-agitated and pessimistic style, so here’s a particularly charming clip from 2005.)  The Hollywood Reporter says:

He was diagnosed with a brain tumor in July 2008, less than a week after he struck a pedestrian in downtown Washington with his Corvette and drove away.

In recent years, Novak ended up actually being a part of a big Washington story, in ways he likely never intended, becoming a central figure in the Valerie Plame CIA leak case. Novak was the first to publish the name of CIA employee, and he came under withering criticism and abuse from many for that column…

Novak had been dubbed the “prince of darkness” by a journalist friend early in his career, and he embraced the moniker. He wrote in that 2007 memoir that he became proud of the label derived from his “unsmiling pessimism about the prospects for America and Western civilization.” [...]

Novak wrote in his book about often giving politicians the choice of being a source or a target, a strategy that often produced scoops for his column.

Charming fellow.  He will be missed.  By someone.  His wife.  Probably.

(Much warmer and fairer remembrances of Novak at The Plank and the Washington Post.)

On Saturday, legendary comic actress Bea Arthur succumbed to cancer.  She was 86.

Arthur was most famous for the caustic wit and baritone voice she brought to Dorothy Zbornak in “Golden Girls” and the scene-stealing Maude Findlay in “All in the Family” — a role that was spun into the hugely popular “Maude” a year later.  She won Emmys for both roles, and the New York Times called those characters “two of the most endearing battle-axes in television history.”  Prior to that, Arthur had enjoyed a lengthy Broadway career that began in the ’50s, and she served as one of the first female Marines during World War II.

What I find most interesting about Arthur is the traction she maintained in the acerbic world of Internet culture, as the banner picture and nude paintings of her attest.  The woman who once said, “Nobody ever asked me to play Juliet” always maintained a sense of humor about herself, volunteering to participate in Comedy Central roasts and starring in a memorable Sex and the City parody.

She will be missed.  Especially by people who liked to say they wouldn’t F people with her dick.