Dawn Ostroff, the onetime chief programmer at Lifetime, must wish sometimes that she'd stayed in cable. By now she'd probably be in charge of the whole Lifetime empire and come into work every day to overnight ratings that look a helluva lot better than those of the CW, the so-called broadcast network she runs.
I'm guessing, of course. Ostroff doesn't reveal her true thoughts about working for the CW — or anything else about the CW, for that matter. No broadcast executive is more evasive, more unwilling to say anything that would seem committal or decisive or even remotely candid about the challenges facing the fifth-rated network (sixth if you count Univision). Sitting in a CW executive session is the closest we TV critics will come to knowing what David Gregory felt like as he shadow-boxed a hapless Scott McClellan.
1. "Generation Kill." I don't know how "realistic" it is, but it's certainly faithful to Evan Wright's book about a band of Marines' harrowing duty in Iraq.
2. "Psych" on USA. The most underrated comedy on TV (now that "30 Rock" has its Emmy) returns Friday.
3. Sami Al-Haj back at Al-Jazeera. Needlessly detained at Gitmo for six years, the cameraman will now head up the Arabic channel's new human rights desk.
... AND WHAT'S NOT
1. "The Cleaner." Ben Bratt's new A&E drama shows what happens when you cross the "Intervention" reality show with cheese classic "The A-Team": You get a mess.
2. Press restrictions in China. The Olympic hosts will allow live coverage from Tiananmen Square six hours a day — including 9-11 p.m., when protests are unlikely to embarrass officials.
3. Tony Snow, RIP. He was a bright spot at a time when Republicans and the White House were under an ever-present dark cloud.
"How To Look Good Naked" (9 p.m. CT Tuesday, Lifetime) returns in a new, expanded format, an hour long and with more of a “Queen for a Day” feel to it. Carson Kressley hosts this reality series about plus-sized women who learn to feel better about not being model-thin. Of course, the professional makeovers and fabulous prizes Kressley gives away on the show would make most women feel better.
"Heidi Fleiss: The Would-Be Madam of Crystal" (8 p.m. CT Monday, HBO) comes to us from the same duo that chronicled the last years of Tammy Faye Messner and made a documentary with Monica Lewinsky -- a certain type of damsel-in-distress is their specialty. When we join the Hollywood Madam, she is trying to get back in the game, only this time as the proprietor of a legal, all-male brothel in Nevada. It is a distinctly low-budget affair, however, and Fleiss exercises such questionable judgment at times that you wonder how she kept an illegal racket going for so long.
MSNBC president Phil Griffin spoke with me earlier this week, a few hours after he was promoted to his new post (see my earlier story). Because of what the techies call a "catastrophic failure" of my hard drive (a strange phrase, since nobody died or even got hurt), I couldn't produce a podcast from our interview. So I'm going old school and writing down the quotes.
I was curious to know how Griffin would react to statements made by Fox News executive John Moody when I interviewed him earlier this week at press tour. (Here's my story from Friday's Kansas City Star.) Moody said that MSNBC's rise was attributable to the "messianic ranting" of its anchors. First, Griffin issued a disclaimer: "You brought this up," he said. "OK," I said. And then he let loose.
There’s a new pit bull at Fox News Channel, and, no, it’s not recently hired contributor Karl Rove.
It’s Chris Wallace, the onetime mild-mannered moderator of NBC’s “Meet the Press,” now host of “Fox News Sunday,” who bared his fangs at the liberal media during a panel this week to promote the top-rated cable news channel’s upcoming election coverage.
The Emmy nominations were announced before sunrise Thursday here, and
as usual they offered their share of pleasant surprises and huge
disappointments. If one chronic problem ails the Academy of Television
Arts and Sciences more than any other, it is the voting body's
inability to recognize TV shows that are aimed at viewers under the
age of 40.
At a party Thursday night thrown by ABC, which plays host to the Emmy
Awards Sept. 21, I bumped into John Shaffner, the Academy's chairman
and CEO, and buttonholed him on this.
In the overall scheme of things, the five-week lag between my profile of Rachel Maddow and the New York Times finally paying attention to her with a nice story today ... isn't really that long to wait. And I know Jacques Steinberg had better things to do — like wiping the slime off his clothing — but still, when you wonder who was paying attention to Rachel first, my name's in the URL.
Phil Griffin, the newly minted president of MSNBC, also has noticed Rachel. In an interview I had with him late yesterday, and which I would have posted except my hard drive is down, Griffin confirmed for me that Maddow is indeed the new permanent fill-in anchor for Keith Olbermann on "Countdown," replacing Alison Stewart.
However, the premise of Steinberg's piece, which is that Maddow could step into a prime-time show of her own any day now, seems a little premature to me. Much as I love watching her a guest, as she would be the first to acknowledge, moving to the other side of the desk is easier said than done.
Holy smokes, did USA TODAY today bury the lede. Inside a cover story on its Life section about Jay Leno's garage (three airplane hangars, actually) is this killer quote nine paragraphs in: "I am definitely done next year -- with NBC." This is news to anyone who has been buying NBC's line that they are in negotiations with Leno about doing something else for the network.
I think these might be the saddest words in the English language: "This is Howie Mandel's first Emmy nomination."
This morning's announcement of the 60th Emmy nominees started with the big news but quickly moved on to the conventional. The full list of categories, however, is packed with eye-openers starting with this one: AMC, 20 nominations!
UPDATE: Bill Oakley and Ken Keeler are the two writers who did not agree to the deal, say sources not named Nikki. This is an interesting development as up until now I've thought of Oakley and Josh Weinstein, who created "Mission Hill" together for the WB, as pardners. But Weinstein played ball with Sony and Oakley walked away. The Writers Guild is not pleased. I've included its response below.
Four weeks after I first tried to explain the labor impasse that had halted progress on a new and much anticipated hybrid live-animated sitcom for Fox called "Sit Down, Shut Up," the impasse has been broken.
A roomful of Writers Guild writers wanted the guild's labor agreement — the one its members struck 14 weeks to obtain earlier this year — to apply to this show. They thought that Sony had agreed to that. Sony hadn't. Sony said that the "Sit Down" shop would be an IATSE shop, under its animation guild that doesn't have nearly as good of an agreement with the studios as the Writers Guild does. The WGA, which represents every prime-time animation show on TV, gathered signatures from some its heavyweights earlier this month to support the out-of-work writers.
No sooner did ABC entertainment chief Stephen McPherson open the floor for questions than "Tom Weinerman from the Sarasota Star-Herald Tribune" asked, "There are rumors that ABC is actively courting Jay Leno for 11:30. Is there any truth to those rumors?" From the peals of laughter coming from the network seats it didn't take long to figure out that Jimmy Kimmel was holding the mike.
Phil Griffin, the smart, amiable longtime NBC news executive who has worked with Keith Olbermann off and on for more than 25 years and is his most outspoken champion in his current incarnation at MSNBC, takes over the whole network today, NBC News has announced.
Griffin (whom I interviewed below) has been at the cable channel since the outset; before that, his jobs included NBC's "Today" show, the syndicated "USA Today" show (remember that?) and before that, three years at CNN where as a producer, he worked for the first time with Olbermann.
"How to Look Good Naked," the Lifetime show in which fashion tipster Carson Kressley helps women accept their less-than-model-thin bodies, returns for its second season, sporting a makeover of its own.
"Naked," which signed on in January, took Kressley's dual message of self-improvement and self-acceptance and applied it to women instead of men. Operating solo instead of as part of a quintet of lifestyle experts, Kressley focused solely on helping plus-sized gals stop loathing their bodies and start loving them. By the end of each half-hour episode, his subject invariably was delighted to pose for the cameras in lingerie that flattered their figures — then take even those coverings off for a discreet, TV-safe cheesecake shot.
First, the JibJab — remember them? Take away the clever animation and this is just another dumb Mark Russell/Capitol Steps song parody. But it's really clever animation...
And by the way, if you go here you can insert your picture (or anyone else's) in the place of the white guy who's "probed" in the video.
But if you'd just like to watch something funny, here is another amazing live-feed grab Harry Shearer's minions made. How they get these out of the Fox News bunker I have no idea, except that someone there might have it in for Laura Ingraham.
The lightly distributed cable network owned by the National Football League said goodbye to potentially hundreds and hundreds of new female viewers by taking the safe route and picking Giants play-by-play announcer Bob Papa to call the handful of games played on the NFL Network later this year.
I argued in these pages that Pam Ward would be a great choice to replace Bryant Gumbel as the first play-by-play caller on a national NFL broadcast, and I thought sentiment was turning my way. Indeed, when Deadspin editor Will Leitch dared to challenge my selection of Ward, he was forced to backpedal. And then he was replaced by a new editor. Coincidence?
These similarities between "Mad Men" and "The Sopranos" can get overworked. Sure, both shows were offered to HBO by David Chase. Both were immediately embraced by TV critics (who spent much of the off-season ginning up comparisons between the two). And yeah, both were slice-of-life dramas that challenged comfortable notions of the American dream ... and both were advertised on New York City transit.
But beyond that? Did "The Sopranos" ever emblazon its logo on hundreds of Zippo lighters? Did it issue specially branded GAF ViewMasters with slide wheels of its stars, like "Mad Men" did (pictured)? I think not. Did Michael Kors pay homage in his fall collection to the fashion style of Paulie Walnuts? Did House Beautiful feature Carmela's remodeling work in its June issue? I think not.
There was a TCA party for Fox and FX talent at the Santa Monica Pier last night. I interviewed "Shield" creator Shawn Ryan and various cast members for an upcoming piece. I got an update on "Dollhouse" from its lord and master, Joss Whedon.
Spike Feresten, seen here making a promotional reel for the affiliates with "24" executive producer Jon Cassar, chatted with me about the upcoming season of his "Talk Show," which hasn't aired a new episode since January because of the writers' strike. He's got a 22-episode order for this season, but since Fox makes him shoot all the shows way in advance, he's already dreading scenarios like the one last season with Adam Carolla, which reaired in the spring as Carolla was appearing on "Dancing with the Stars" -- a fact Feresten never mentions on the show because it had been taped in the fall.
I spoke with Baltimore broadcasting legend Steve Rouse, who was filling in for Shari Elliker on WBAL today. We talked about last night's Fox party, yesterday's Fox News panel, and how I was outfoxed by a certain music legend.
"Fox News Sunday" anchor Chris Wallace, who cut short a vacation to pay tribute to Tony Snow on Sunday's show (my tribute to Tony), flew out here to TCA to play straight man on a panel that features "Outfoxed" villain John Moody, Bush advisor Karl Rove and Hillary's bulldog Howard Wolfson.
Before the panel, he chatted with me about Rove and expanded on his previous criticism of a certain other cable channel. He also — happily — put to rest conflicting reports about Mike Wallace's supposed retirement.
Dawn Ostroff, the onetime chief programmer at Lifetime, must wish sometimes that she'd stayed in cable. By now she'd probably be in charge of the whole Lifetime empire and come into work every day to overnight ratings that look a helluva lot better than those of the CW, the so-called broadcast network she runs. 
"How To Look Good Naked" (9 p.m. CT Tuesday, Lifetime) returns in a new, expanded format, an hour long and with more of a “Queen for a Day” feel to it. Carson Kressley hosts this reality series about plus-sized women who learn to feel better about not being model-thin. Of course, the professional makeovers and fabulous prizes Kressley gives away on the show would make most women feel better.
The Emmy nominations were announced before sunrise Thursday here, and
as usual they offered their share of pleasant surprises and huge
disappointments. If one chronic problem ails the Academy of Television
Arts and Sciences more than any other, it is the voting body's
inability to recognize TV shows that are aimed at viewers under the
age of 40.
In the overall scheme of things, the five-week lag between 
"How to Look Good Naked," the Lifetime show in which fashion tipster Carson Kressley helps women accept their less-than-model-thin bodies, returns for its second season, sporting a makeover of its own.
The lightly distributed cable network owned by the National Football League said goodbye to potentially hundreds and hundreds of new female viewers by taking the safe route and 
"Fox News Sunday" anchor Chris Wallace, who cut short a vacation to pay tribute to Tony Snow on Sunday's show (