tca
Live From NBC’s TCA Panel: ‘Heroes’ Spared, Ben Silverman In Hiding
7:30AM Seth | NBC potentate Jeff Zucker and loyal henchperson Ben Silverman’s had the aura of proud parents watching their 30 Rock children collecting Globes—but they made the unusual decision to avoid the podium entirely at TCA.
‘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]
Jay Leno Bravely Leaves Hairpiece At Home To Confront His NBC Executioners
3:15AM Seth | At NBC’s TCA press conference yesterday, network co-chairs Ben Silverman and Marc Graboff confirmed their plans to eject Jay Leno from The Tonight Show via jerry-rigged catapult device on May 29, 2009. That gives them only three rushed days to erect a new set and change the dressing room door names from “Kevin Eubanks” to “Masturbating Bear” for the premiere of replacement host, Conan O’Brien. There to press the executives on the questionably motivated decision to fire the highest-rated name in late night (Graboff insisted they’d like to keep Leno at NBC Universal, but give us a break): Leno himself, disguised in a bald wig, goatee, and glasses: More »
5:45AM Seth | Made to address rumours that Grey’s Anatomy writers’ room dartboard pinup-girl Katherine Heigl might not survive the coming season, ABC head Steve McPherson had this to say: “”She won an Emmy last year, she’s a fantastically talented actress,’ McPherson says. ‘I think it’s unfortunate when there’s any kind of turmoil on that show. There’s so many people who work so incredibly hard to make that show the No. 1 show in the country. I never like to see when any of them take it lightly. She’s absolutely staying with the show. There’s an unbelievable story line for her next season. Shonda Rhimes is excited about that, she actually crafted it.’” That’s good news for Izzie Stevens fans, but doesn’t entirely rule out the possibility that this personally crafted storyline won’t involve the character being mauled beyond recognition by a freak deer attack while sleeping quietly at home. [James Hibberd's The Live Feed, Photo Credit: INF] More »
Kevin Reilly Will Go To The Ends Of The Westside To Take Your Sitcom Pitch
2:00AM Seth | As we well know, former NBC president Kevin Reilly was thrust aside in a bloody coup in May of 2007, with original programming gangsta Ben Silverman installed in his place, crown cocked B-boy style to one side of his head and tossing Benjamins at assistants’ desks as he strutted towards his corner office to the beat of Notorious B.I.G.’s “Ten Crack Commandments.” Reilly would quickly land back on his feet, however, appointed FOX’s president of entertainment. Buoyed by a little something he likes to call “American Fuck Idol You Money,” he’s been playing around with the dusty concepts of a rigid development season, telling reporters at TCA that the network plans on dividing theirs in two. What’s more, with finding the next hit comedy a top priority, Reilly is throwing all office-bound pitching notions out the window, instead pulling the equivalent of when your 3rd grade teacher used to announce, “It’s such a beautiful day outside, I thought we’d hold class in the park!” THR reports: More »
Hellos and Goodbyes
12:00PM Defamer Hollywood | Sacha Baron Cohen’s Bruno exploits took him from Israel to Arkansas; his Sherlock Holmes adventures to come may or may not include the missus. AFTRA ratified its new contract, but SAG didn’t let that spoil its appetite for destruction. Harvey Weinstein is now officially going door-to-door to finance his films. Psst! Buddy! Wanna buy a Tarantino? The TV Critics Association Press Tour is dead. Long live the TCA Press Tour! Lest major Dark Knight spoilers aren’t up your alley, there’s always Michael Bay’s unproduced Awesome Knight screenplay to hold you over another week. After a long string of compatibility issues, Drew Barrymore is on the market for a Mac huckster upgrade. This Week In Magazine Cover Hell: Blake Lively gets the blown-out Skeletor treatment, while the pasty youths of Twilight make EW safe for chest hair. Here’s the story of a lovely lady, who was bringing up three very lovely RRRAAALLLLPPPHHHHH Defamer’s readers joined Matthew McConaughey in welcoming a bouncing Bongo Romcom to the world. Meanwhile in France, stinky, salmon-devouring, “high-maintenance beetch” Angelina Jolie prepared her post-twinbirth conditioning regimen. Two words: Hula hoop. Pick your reality TV poison for 2009: America’s Greatest Dog or The Ashley Dupre Governor Boink Variety Hour. We wished a healthy recovery (literally) to the rat-friendly Newsroom Cafe, and bid a fond farewell to J-Lo’s slice of Pasadena paradise, Madre’s.
Defending ‘Cavemen’ II: The Racial Insensitivity Question
2:05AM Defamer Hollywood | As if ABC president Steve McPherson’s apparent willingness to scrap with NBC’s Ben Silverman [Ed.note - Have an intern lay down $US200 on Silverman going down in the second round. Dude's got a glass jaw, I know it.] wasn’t enough fun for a single day of TCA panels, the network’s Cavemen event managed to generate still more excitement, as some of the assembled critics confronted the show’s producers about how the pre-troubled, primetime-paradigm-shifting sitcomfomercial race-parable might be construed as insensitive in the way it appears focused on hilariously deconstructing the stereotypes of just a single group. Reports TV Week.com’s TCA blog: The show is supposed to explore race relations by the trials and tribulations of the cavemen characters, but some critics say all the “Cavemen” stereotypes – athleticism, sexually prowess, laziness, etc. – remind them of one race’s stereotypes in particular. Critics ask the panel if “Cavemen” is actually a show about African Americans. “We never saw them as a stand in for any one group,” says executive producer Josh Gordon. More »
