price is right
‘Price Is Right’ Horny For Younger Eyeballs
5:55AM Seth | ·First they try to Poochie-up Ebert & Other Guy, now this: In a bid to appeal to a younger audience, Beauty and the Geek host Mike Richards has been hired to take over showrunning duties on The Price is Right. Which strikes us as just plain wrong: white trash grandmas and TPIR go together like mayonnaise and cold hot dogs. (But if that’s really the plan, they might want to start with canning Drew Carey, who we literally noticed nodding off during a not-particularly-gripping round of Mountain Climber recently.) [Variety] ·The TCA—whom we’ve suggested might best be taken off life-support and sent to that all-expense-paid junket in the sky—will come three weeks later next year, in the hopes of giving the critics attending some idea of what it is they are covering. [Variety] · E! has paid New Line $7 million for rights to broadcast the Sex and the City movie, The Women, and He’s Just Not That Into You, with an eye towards launching a new weekly program entitled Ryan Seacrest Presents: My Favourite Movies of All Time. [Variety] · Disney purchased the rights to Monster Attack Network, a graphic novel set on a tropical island inhabited by giant monsters which they assure us will be adapted into a kick-arse monster island movie, not “the artsy farty Spike Jonze thing over at Warner Bros.” [THR] · Fox has picked up another season of So You Think You Can Dance, and EP/judge/longwinded-speechifier Nigel Lythgoe has reportedly left American Idol after seven seasons to concentrate solely on it. [THR]
Drew Carey Already Working Miracles On His First Day On The ‘Price Is Right’
7:00AM Defamer Hollywood | Everything after the final notes of its familiar theme, from the playing out of a highly suspect “perfect game”, to the friendly sign-off reminder to “help control the sex-worker population: Have a hooker spayed or neutered today”, suggested a new era has dawned at The Price is Right. Gone is Bob Barker’s well-calibrated “atmosphere of terror”. In its place is new host Drew Carey’s atmosphere of congeniality, where every contestant is referred to as “buddy” or “man”, and where new cars are given away with a frequency that would make Oprah blush. In honour of his first day on the job, Carey sat down with another emcee of a CBS show featuring a wide array of dimwitted Americans doing impossibly stupid things for cash and prizes, Julie Chen, to relay first-hand what it feels like to shepherd a congregation of Plinko-board-worshiping revivalists. The Price is Right [CBS] More »
Lawsuit Reveals Price Is Right’s ‘Atmosphere Of Terror’
7:00AM Defamer Hollywood | Even after his departure from a 35-year tenure hosting the Price is Right, cat-sterilisation fanatic Bob Barker still finds himself party to yet another in a long string of harassment lawsuits from disgruntled female employees: nine in 13 years, to be exact, with all plaintiffs represented by the same guy – attorney and mutesmodels’ rights advocate, Nick Alden. The latest complainant suggests she was demoted from P.A. to the far more demeaning rope-and-pulley-tugging duty after she testified against Barker in an earlier lawsuit: [Deborah] Curling, whose job was initially screening contestants for the show, said she was in a “pleasant working environment” for many years. But after she testified in the wrongful termination suit of a former production assistant, she was moved from that job to one working backstage, she claims in her court filing. More »Trade Roundup: Brian Grazer To Play Cowboys N’ Aliens
9:13AM Defamer Hollywood | · Imagine’s Brian Grazer will superproduce an adaptation of the graphic novel Cowboys and Aliens for DreamWorks and Universal, a project the spikey-haired seeker described as the “perfect realisation of all the cowboys-meeting-aliens-related ideas I’ve been quietly developing since I was a hyperactive six years old locked in my bedroom with a chest full of toys.” [Variety] Fox’s show about people who think they can dance continues to shame their one about people who think they can direct movies, pulling in more than triple the viewers of the last On The Lot installment. [THR] · Another famously overweight TV personality rumored to be under consideration to replace Bob Barker is Drew Carey. [Variety] Advertisers give a $US2.4 billion upfront vote of confidence to Steve McPherson’s vision for ABC, with one Madison avenue booster gushing, “Have you heard about this Cavemen thing? It’s like a sitcom and car insurance commercial all rolled into one! Think of what they could do with that Coke ad with the polar bears.” [THR] · Stripping off his shirt and smearing his entire body in warpaint, CEO Howard Stringer whipped 7,000 employees into a frenzy at a shareholder ceremony in which he dramatically declared himself the “Sony Warrior.” [Variety] More »
Bob Barker: Not So Fast With The O’Donnell Stuff
4:29AM Defamer Hollywood | Backtracking from recent remarks that have been construed in the media as an endorsement of Rosie O’Donnell’s candidacy to replace him on the The Price Is Right, retiring emcee Bob Barker today clarified what he meant when he said he had “no doubt” O’Donnell would make a good host, telling the AP, “I have not been asked for my opinion, nor have I expressed one. I think there are several candidates who could do the show, and Rosie is certainly one of them.” (To his credit, the discreet Barker made no reference to a heated, closed-door meeting with Les Moonves earlier today in which the CBS Corp. head promised “to sew the balls back on every neutered dog and cat in town [himself] if [Barker] said another word about handing over the show to that [woman of below-average attractiveness].”) O’Donnell has yet to publicly comment on this seeming blow to her chances of landing the job, but Defamer has exclusively obtained the ad she is placing-in tomorrow’s Variety to address onetime idol Barker’s unexpected withdrawal of support, one that echoes her earlier attempt at currying favour with the gameshow legend: More »
