Ye olde local news and notes thingy

Putting on my Barry Garron eyeshade for a moment, here are a few miscellaneous tidbits from the wonderful world of broadcasting (and webcasting). In today's edition: A "Shield" star's winning film entry; an unconventional Royals road trip; Ashton comes to town; new Time Warner channels; last chance for WTP 08 tickets; and more.

• "I see that you mentioned 'The Atom Smashers' in your post about the new season of Independent Lens," writes Lee Ingalls. "Thought you might like to know that there's an interesting local connection. Clayton Brown, the director, grew up in Liberty. 'Smashers' is quite a coup for his budding film collaborative (137 Films), but he's an interesting story unto himself. In addition to teaching in Northwestern's documentary studies program, he's a really talented musician and plays more instruments than most people have limbs. In fact last winter he subbed in on stand up bass for the Wilders on several shows."

From Crackle: Draw the Pirate

Above is the winning entry in the Spring 2008 Short Film Contest at Crackle.com -- it's from Kansas City native Jeff Hopkins and stars David Rees Snell, who did a lot of acting in KC before heading to Hollywood, where he's currently seen on "The Shield."

Kansas City Royals fans may recall an interview that FSN's Joel Goldberg did during a Colorado Rockies game with two fans who had bicycled across Kansas -- on a tandem no less -- to attend a game in July. Now they've written about it, a 9,400-word Whitmanesque travelogue of the blue highways of Kansas as seen at very slow speeds. This account works for me on two levels, both as someone sharing in a Royals season ticket, and thus the ups and downs of what I'm praying is the next incarnation of the Tampa Bay Rays, and as the husband/driver/photographer of a Kansas author who has visited many of the same small towns and cities that our boys did on their tour of the Sunflower State.

• Time Warner Cable is adding more HD channels: ABC Family (ch 1048), Disney (ch 1070), Toon Disney (ch 1243), and Hallmark (ch 1283). Also the standard-def Reelz (ch 269) on the digital tier. For those of you who were enjoying USA HD during the Olympics, well, sorry, but that was a Beijing-only offering from NBC (which owns USA). A Time Warner spokesman said they're trying to get something long-term worked out for USA. Sorry, no update on the Time Warner Cable set-top class-action lawsuit.

• "Rachel Jones, a stay-at-home mom from Kansas City, Mo., will be on the September 10 episode of 'Wheel of Fortune.' Jones, who is a self-proclaimed bargain hunter and 'frugal queen,' has been watching the show for 20 years," CBS PR informs us.

• The Ashton Kutcher executive-produced insty-game-show "Opportunity Knocks" will be in town September 4th for a special promo tour. "They will be setting up the stage and everything at the home of a Weatherby Lake family," says a KMBC rep, who says this will be a visit, not an actual episode taping, part of a national promo tour.

• And sorry, but all seats are taken at the Screenland Armour for Watch the Pilots with Aaron 2008. I'll have a giveaway for the last four passes here at TV Barn the day before the event, so visit here early on Sept. 3 for the details!

Comments

[Chrtis]

Can you check with Time Warner about keeping on Universal HD? It came on for the Olympics, but it also shows Firefly and Battlestar Galactica in HD and those would be great to see/TiVo in HD. Plus they rerun a lot of old NBC/Uni programming.

Thanks!

[Kris Ketz]

"Barry Garron !!!" There's an oldie but goodie. So where is the old Star TV/Radio Correspondent from the 80's (I think) these days??? Thanks AB. Ketzer.

[The Hollywood Reporter, plus that blog.--AB]