DAVID MILLS: We all have been enriched through the years from the work of David Mills, whether through his Undercover Black Man blog (and his occasional commenting here, esp. during Bee season) or his superior television writing -- NYPD Blue, The Wire, The Corner, Homicide: Life on the Street, ER and the upcoming Treme. As Isaac wrote last May when David temporarily shut down the blog to focus on Treme, "A guy who spends a decade writing for some of the best-written shows on television needn't waste his talent and time blogging. It's more important that he generate great stuff that we amateurs can blog about." And yet, soon enough, David was back blogging again, and we'd email back and forth on discoveries of new Misidentified Black People and Giant Negroes in the NYT archives.
So I am stunned and saddened beyond words to have to report that on the eve of Treme's premiere, David has died of brain aneurysm in the city of New Orleans at the age of 48.
Just a few weeks ago, David told the New York Times: “I’m a fan of TV. I can even watch an episode of ‘Hawaii Five-0’ and appreciate the way it’s constructed to satisfy you. People used to think, It’s HBO; you get to curse; it’s gotta be better. But I wrote for The Washington Post. Just because there are certain words you can’t use in The Post that, say, you can in The Village Voice, does not mean that the writing in The Village Voice is necessarily better than The Post. The liberty you have with HBO has nothing to do with the quality of storytelling. You have to earn it.”
His resume as a storyteller speaks for itself, and we will always have his tv shows and the archives writing to enjoy. Still, what a terrible loss. So, so sad. Alan Sepinwall has much more, calling Mills "the very first friend I made in the TV business, and one of the few for whom I wouldn't have to put quote marks around the word."
