Today of course, the pitch would be all about the “reality” of a Boston walk-down bar. A vehicle designed to allow viewers to follow along as real-life customers chew on the Red Sox, the Patriots, the Bruins and billionaire Frank McCourt.

But 30 years ago, the sitcom still ruled the prime time TV airwaves. And as the October issue of GQ wonderfully celebrates, there was no better example of the artform than the show launched on September 30, 1982. There is so much great stuff in the mag’s Cheers oral history. Here are just a couple of bar-nut size teases:

James Burrows: When I got the first draft of the pilot from Les and Glen [Charles], I said to my wife, “Oh, my God, these guys have brought radio back to television.” They had written this smart, intellectual story. I’d never seen anything like that on TV before—just guys sitting around, talking.

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As a journalist who has done a Q & A or two in his career, this Fishie hates to say it, but we’re pretty sure the traditional journalistic Q & A is nearing its demise. Because Reddit’s Ask Me Anything question sessions tend to be so much better these days. Yes, that goes for the Woody Harrelson debacle too, which made for great theater.

The Atlantic‘s James Fallows did a great AMA today where he answered questions on everything from home brews to China to the Gawkerization of his magazine. His answer to the latter we found particularly interesting.

Obviously this is a question we take very seriously here, and think about every day.

I have worked for the Atlantic longer, probably, than most people asking questions here have been alive. I started when I left the Carter Administration (when I was in my 20s) in 1979. What I’ve learned over that time is the balance between, on the one hand, the way the magazine HAS to keep changing, continually — and on the other, the crucial importance of its standards, intelligence, judgment, and so on. If you look back through our bound volumes, you see how dramatically the magazine has changed, and how often, through its existence. While still having some sensibility that makes us think: here is an Atlantic treatment, and not one from (name your other mag).

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And Harrelson, perhaps smarting from the most embarrassing “Ask Me Anything” in Reddit history, was a total jerk to Vice‘s Annette Lamothe-Ramos. She writes about what she witnessed on the press junket for the film Rampart just prior to her own interview:

Before they went into Woody’s hotel suite, I met the girls who were conducting the AMA. They seemed sweet, so I didn’t mind the additional wait—imagining that they might butter him up with a light-hearted Q&A before Woody and I got down to business.

Ten minutes later, a stampede charged the waiting room, each person whispering furiously and cupping their mouths in horror. I didn’t hear everything but I knew it wasn’t good. The only fragments I could make out were something about “de-virginizing a high schooler” and “really angry.” I immediately broke out in hives and my mind went blank. Seconds later I was called into the next room to chat with a visibly irritated Woody Harrelson.

The interview was not a success. Harrelson was rude, dismissive, and more than a little inappropriate. After a few minutes, he stopped answering questions and just sat staring Lamothe-Ramos up and down. The two were alone in his hotel room, and Lamothe-Ramos was so uncomfortable she ended the interview early.

There’s nothing quite like the wrath of reddit.com users.

As reported today by techeye.net, a Friday reddit PR stunt to promote Woody Harrelson‘s new drama Rampart has thoroughly backfired. In concept alone, the idea of squeezing the former Cheers star’s wisdom into a 15-minute reddit answer window was doomed to fail. Per techeye.net, sailormooncake may well have said it best:

Mr. Harrelson/Mr. Harrelson’s PR agents:

You answered a total of four questions here today, and when I say “answered,” I mean that loosely. You have also embarassed Mr. Harrelson in the process. Please inform the rest of Hollywood that reddit is not a publicity outlet and that redditors don’t tolerate this kind of crap.

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We know Hollywood is the place for dreamers and the high aspirational. But ten nominations for best picture seems greedy and self-congratulatory. “There’s just so much WONDERFUL, QUALITY work we just couldn’t chose.”

As we’ve seen with politics, twice the candidates doesn’t make them better choices. Just more.

The complete list of the noms:

Best picture

“Avatar”
“The Blind Side”
“District 9″
“An Education”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire”
“A Serious Man”
“Up”
“Up in the Air”

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Gen Art‘s screening series in L.A. landed in Santa Monica with Brad Anderson‘s new film, “Transsiberian” at the Laemmle Theaters. Anderson didn’t make the screener, nor did stars Ben Kingsley, Woody Harrelson or Emily Mortimer. The only “star” to show up at the party at South on Wilshire was Kate Mara, who raved on and on about Anderson and the film.

“He was great and it’s great,” she lauded, while fending off offers of free Saki and bad white wine.

The thriller, shot in various parts of Eastern Europe and possibly Russia, had some amazing footage of the train that runs the TransSiberian express route from China to Russia. Not quite sure how Anderson was able to scrounge this together on what we’re sure is a limited budget. But the result is a fascinating, invigorating look at an Americanized view of life behind the former steel curtain. And the film includes a torture scene of the aforementioned Mara that is so vividly sickening, it makes even the most hardened viewer squirm.

An unusual film for Anderson, whose earlier efforts like “Next Stop Wonderland,” were less brutal and dark-toned. But his “Machinist” was very much in the Transsiberian vein. Tough stuff from a nice Boston boy.