today
Small Screen
11:00AM Jess McGuire | Friday was not the greatest day of Richard Wilkins’ career as an “entertainment guru”. After breaking the news to the nation that both Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson had passed away, it seems Richard needed something more to talk about in order to pad out the extra three hours of airtime Channel Nine gave him with their extended Today coverage of the Grim Reaper’s rampage through the world of showbiz. More »
Jeff Goldblum And Stephen Colbert Unite To Mock Richard Wilkins
11:00AM Jess McGuire | Friday was not the greatest day of Richard Wilkins’ career as an “entertainment guru”. After breaking the news to the nation that both Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson had passed away, it seems Richard needed something more to talk about in order to pad out the extra three hours of airtime Channel Nine gave him with their extended Today coverage of the Grim Reaper’s rampage through the world of showbiz. More » 
Everything Tom Cruise Knows About Bush, He Learned From the ‘Today’ Teleprompter
2:32AM Kyle Buchanan | Tom Cruise reunited with Matt Lauer on the Today Show this morning, and fortunately for the audience, Cruise’s strategy appeared to be, “Bring the crazy up front and as early as possible.” More »
Kathie Lee Gifford: Pooped Out Of The Anals Of 30 Rock
2:45AM Seth | Kathie Lee Gifford, Cheyenne Jackson-certified bitch and vocally miserable co-host of the fourth hour of Today, was in rare form again this morning. Discussing a performance of Etta James’s “At Last” by Beyoncé in the earlier, non-farm-league portion of the broadcast (and surrounded by half-empty wine bottles, as if that really bears mentioning), Green-Eyed Monster Gifford expanded her 20-foot demon wingspan before launching into her own version of the song. Co-host Hoda Kotb responded by giggling nervously, as if to say, “Yes, just like that, Kathie Lee, but—you know—less dried-out, desperate, and utterly soulless.” Gifford then launched right into what she does best: complaining. “You thought there was action up above?” she segued into her gripe-of-the-minute. “Well, down below, in the anals of Rockefeller Center—her…guy wouldn’t let me in!” Sasha Fierce—we don’t know who your bodyguard is, but we think you owe him a performance bonus for keeping the backstage bowels Kathie Lee-free. [Today] More »
Grumpy Kathie Lee Gifford Admits She Needs To Be Drunk To Make ‘Today’ Tolerable
4:07AM Seth | We admit to having been somewhat flabbergasted to learn that holiday-album-pimping anti-Christ Kathie Lee Gifford had scored a plum gig hosting the new, completely essential fourth hour of The Today Show alongside Hoda Kotb. Credit where it’s due, however—Gifford provides near-constant entertainment, mostly because she is vocally and visibly miserable 98% of the time. There was a classic moment on this year’s Halloween episode, when she came out in a Big Bad Wolf costume that must have taken hours to put on. Noticing the younger, prettier Today girls were dressed as princesses, she launched into an angry tirade right in 30 Rock plaza, pointing to her and Meredith Vieira’s horrifying Pinocchio costumes as proof that the show was “ageist and sexist.” It was loud, awkward…and kind of spot-on. More »
Coming Up On ‘Today’: Boobs! Er, Carla Bruni!
4:37AM Kyle Buchanan | Except for the simmering, hate-fucky annoyance that Matt Lauer dishes out to Ann Curry on a daily basis, Today had always existed in a G-rated realm of sexuality until this past fall, when the gloves — and the blouses — came off. First, Marcia Brady revealed touching tales of family-bred syphilis, then the bastard son of Jay Thomas doffed his shirt to reveal some silky lingerie. Today, though, Lauer had to contend with a producer who blew his throw to commercial with a rather distracting, extreme close-up of French First Lady Carla Bruni’s rack. It was while watching this show that Barack Obama turned to Michelle and said, “You’re only doing GMA from now on.” [Today] More »ABC2’s News Breakfast Stealing Viewers From Sunrise And Today!
11:06AM Jess McGuire | Check out my positive spin! Yes, the brand spankin’ new ABC2 breakfast news program – cleverly titled News Breakfast – has launched, and the Sunrise and Today teams should be quaking in their boots, as the show is already stealing their viewers! Sure, only 8000 for now… but we’ve all gotta start somewhere, right?
What if they launched a live three-hour TV breakfast news show and nobody watched? It was a question the ABC2 News Breakfast team were digesting yesterday. Ratings showed only 8000 people nationally tuned in to watch the digital channel show.
According to OzTam figures (which are not to be questioned), absolutely no one in Melbourne, Brisbane, and Perth bothered to tune in. More » 
Bastard Son of ‘Cheers’ Alum Wears Bra on ‘Today’ Because, Why Not?
7:41AM Kyle Buchanan | We’ve heard of casual Fridays and we certainly treasure the last day of the work week as a time to let loose, but rarely have we seen both concepts mixed with such bizarre fervor as they were on this morning’s Today show. After striking pay dirt with Marcia Brady’s syphilis stories this month, producers dug up another, pre-TiVo relic: Jay Thomas. The actor (who played Carla’s husband Eddie on Cheers) and his son John were on the show to discuss how the former gave the latter up for adoption twenty years ago. These days, though, John is the lead singer in a band, and in a bit of bald self-promotion, he stripped off his t-shirt and finished out the segment wearing a bra. As one does. Nice try, John, but you’ll have to work a little harder to top the image of our potential next VP attempting to drown Elaine to win the daytime surreality sweepstakes. Today [NBC] More »
Friars Roast-Crashing Tom Cruise Reunited with Glib Tormentor Matt Lauer
6:40AM Kyle Buchanan | If Brooke Shields and Tom Cruise could patch things up after Cruise called her a pseudoscience-worshiping devil-thetan incubator (we’re paraphrasing), then surely, we thought, Cruise and Matt Lauer could eventually let bygones be bygones. You may remember how the actor and anchorman tussled back in 2005 when Cruise accused Lauer of not personally, personally understanding either Ritalin, postnatal depression, or why the son survived in War of the Worlds. Now, we hear, the Friars Club Roast of Lauer that just concluded in New York featured a surprise, couch-jumping guest. Says KTU reporter Paul Westcott: More »
Channel Ten Skips Breakfast
9:47AM Clem Bastow | Despite the fact that most ordinary humans (i.e. the Defamer Australia team) aren’t awake early enough in the day to watch it, breakfast television is probably second only to the Friday and Sunday night ratings in terms of one-eyed network rivalries. With Seven’s Sunrise and Nine’s Today currently in battle, and ABC2’s Virginia Trioli vehicle on the way, Channel Ten has stayed reasonably tight-lipped – and they’re sticking to that stance, despite word that they are about to enter the field.
A Ten spokeswoman yesterday denied the network was dumping its kids line-up for news entertainment. “We were shooting for the regular 6am bulletin. I don’t know where this talk of a breakfast program has come from,” a Ten news publicist said.
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