Thea Andrews
Variety is the spice of TV life for Thea Andrews.
Currently holding forth as host on Top Chef Canada, the Toronto-born beauty has tried out nearly every broadcast vocation imaginable over the years. Andrews kicked off her TV career in the late nineties as a producer for the venerable style series Fashion Television.
Not long after she hosted the culinary game show Cooking for Love, followed by turns on TSN's Guys TV and eTalk Daily. A jock in her own right, she next became a fixture on the U.S. cable channel ESPN, where she helmed the morning show Cold Pizza. Andrews also moonlighted as an actress on the ESPN series Playmakers and took on small roles on The Young and the Restless and in the film Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle. Among other gigs, she's served as correspondent and host of Entertainment Tonight and CMT's Next Superstar.
Any spare time Andrews finds in between her Top Chef duties and taking care of her three-year-old son is usually devoted to watching TV, including these three current faves.
Spartacus: Blood and Sand
My husband and I both love this show. There's blood, sex and violence, but it's also really intelligent and visually spectacular. John Hannah takes the story to another level, and Lucy Lawless has emerged as this wonderful actress. Every time I watch this show, I wonder: How did they get this on television? If this show was playing in a theatre, it would probably get an NC-17 rating.
60 Minutes
Still the best reporting on television. After all these years, 60 Minutes keeps doing that wonderful investigative journalism there's so rarely time for in the modern cable-news cycle. It's amazing that it's still the show where you can watch a story that can change your entire perspective on an issue. If you have only one hour each week to spend watching television, you should watch 60 Minutes.
Survivors
My friends tease me about the fact that I love postapocalyptic dramas. I've been watching this BBC series on Netflix and it's a little treasure. It's set outside London at a time when 1 per cent of the population has survived a superflu virus. Resources are dwindling, there's anarchy and the survivors aren't necessarily the best people. It's the kind of show that sticks in your head all day. It's like The Walking Dead, without the zombies.