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moving on
Is Tyra Banks Ready To Tell 'Top Model' To Kiss. Her. Fat. Ass?
In a stunning development that could throw into jeopardy the jobs of millions of blue collar Americans working in the top-model-refining industry, Tyra Banks may have finally had it with the reality TV competition that effectively launched her star, OK! magazine reports. Things have reportedly gotten "so bad" on the set between Tyra and photo-shoot taskmaster Mr. Jay (who—little known fact—can control the weather by merely rolling back his eyeballs!) that the two "aren't speaking." Even more disturbing, Tyra "only wants to show up on judging day," waiting for the camera's red light to come on before phoning in trademark advice like, "There's a big difference between [wild-eyed facial expression] and [totally fierce facial expression]."
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citizen paparazzi
Defamer Exclusive: JC Chasez And Chace Crawford's Cabana Rendezvous...With Photo!
Chace Crawford, the Gossip Girl star so pretty that one bat of his lashes is enough to instantly knock crowds of his tweenage fanbase clear unconscious, has been linked quite a bit lately to former NSYNC member JC Chasez. Not even a suspiciously timed and worded Page Six item describing the actor as being "surrounded by women" seemed to quell the rumors regarding these frequent bunk buddies. Now, via cameraphone-equipped operative, we bring you this latest addition to the Defamer Citizen Paparazzi files. It's an eyewitness account of what Chase and J.C. (can we just give them a celebrity couple's name already? Chésee it is!) were up to over this unseasonably warm L.A. weekend:
Spotted at the Roosevelt pool, Friday PM:More »
like a virgin
Tori Spelling Will Work For Lunch At The Peach Pit
News that The CW would be shooting the pilot for a Beverly Hills 90210 spinoff was undoubtedly met with conflicted feelings by the sporadically employed cast of the original series, even going so far as to cause Ian Ziering to wake up repeatedly in cold night sweats, shouting into the darkness, "But will they remain true to the original show's vision of eight best friends who pledge over countless lunches at The Peach Pit to remain together, through thick and thin, whatever life throws at them?!"
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defamer punditry
Meet The Mills: Analyzing The '90210' Spinoff Breakdowns
Stumbling, bastard network The CW is reaching back for inspiration—all the way back to teen drama prehistory, that magical moment when single-celled organisms of privilege sprouted legs, slithered onto the Malibu shore, and eventually stood upright to become the cast of Beverly Hills 90210. There they flourished, living by the harsh natural law of survival of the tannest, and shopping and fucking the prime years of their lives away, with only the occasional rape and meth addiction to slow down the evolutionary process. Would lighting strike twice? That certainly is what The CW is hoping with its 90210 spinoff series. Variety has gotten their hands on the casting breakdown for a show centering around "the Mills family," who relocate from St. Louis to the titular postal service area. The primary players:
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trade roundup
'One Tree Hill' Makes It To 100 Episodes You Haven't Seen
· One Tree Hill celebrates its 100th episode with a very special one in which Chad Michael Murray slips into autopilot while secretly fantasizing to himself about how nice it would be to break free of The CW ghetto for the feature movie career he so richly deserves. [Variety]
· Peter Berg signs on to direct Dune for Paramount, presumably righting whatever wrongs were committed against the sacred source material by David Lynch's Sting-in-a-licorice-thong version. [Variety]
· McLovin works! The voice talents of Christopher Mintz-Plasse, along with Superbad buddy and child insult comic Jonah Hill, will be employed to thrilling effect in Dreamworks's computer-animated fantasy, How to Train Your Dragon. [THR]
trade roundup
Keeping Up With The Lohanians
· It's official! E! has picked up eight episodes of Living Lohan, a realitainment showcasing the highs and lows of everyone's favorite momabler, Dina Lohan, as she moves the family from Long Island to Las Vegas for little Ali's career. Ali records an album, the two live in a suite at the Palms (coincidentally owned by exec producer Phil Maloof), and we get a shattering glimpse into the heart of momabling darkness. Be afraid. [Variety]· Confused about what the hell the Warner Bros.-ingested New New Line is going to wind up looking like? Guess what—so is Warner Bros.! [Variety] More »
in axings
The Day The CW Laughter Died
Bastard toddler network The CW has had a bit of a rough time rebounding after the writers strike, its slate failing to find traction with an audience comprised almost entirely of easily distracted tweenagers and confused elderly disappointed to learn they hadn't found a new home for Hee Haw reruns. Six of their series recently learned they had been spared the guillotine, including the always-dependable America's Next Top Model, the under-performing Gossip Girl, and the hanging-by-a-thread Everybody Hates Chris; sadly, however the same could not be said for 25 ill-fated staffers just handed their pink slips—curiously enough, printed on the netlet's branded green. From Variety:
More than 25 staffers have been let go — including Kim Fleary, the CW's exec VP of comedy development, and her No. 2, senior VP of comedy Steve Veisel.More »
trade roundup
The Emmys Didn't Totally Ignore 'Studio 60'
· While underappreciated Aaron Sorkin masterwork Studio 60 was not, as we falsely represented earlier, a nominee for the Best Drama Emmy, the show did pull in a respectable five nods, including one for Eli Wallach in the role of Blacklisted, Alzheimer's Afflicted Writer Who Tries to Steal a Photograph That Has Meaning to Him. [Variety]
· Hollywood NepotismWatch: Shari Redstone, daughter of semi-mummified Viacom overlord Sumner Redstone, may leave the board of the company over a "falling out," though her spokesperson denies she's going anywhere, "even if she has to wait another 300 years for the old man to collapse into a pile of dust in his desk chair" to finally get control of his empire. [THR]
· Ray Liotta now old enough to play Jessica Biel's father. Oh, how the years fly by! [Variety]
· A two-hours So You Think You Can Dance handily defeats ABC's talent-show block of Do People Really Do Celebrity Impressions Anymore? and Insane Asylum Show and Tell: The Search For America's Next Top Inventor. [THR]
· Emmy voters virtually ignore network abomination The CW, which earned a single nom for sound editing in Smallville. [Variety]
trade roundup
Upfronts Afterthoughts: The CW Will Also Feature New Shows This Fall
· Oh, right: The CW also announced its Fall schedule. Veronica Mars fans, grab your pitchforks and torches, because your favorite show's not on it. But maybe the pick-up of Gossip Girl will make you feel better about things? [Variety]· 300's Gerard Butler will star in Game, a near-future dystopian thriller in which people control other people in "mass-scale, multiplayer online" games, with Butler playing a warrior who tries to "regain his identity and bring down the system that has imprisoned him." Pitch: The Running Man meets The Matrix meets Second Life, sort of. [THR]
· Remember those scenes in Heat where Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro appeared together? If that gave you a moviegasm, you're probably not going to be able to handle Righteous Kill, a feature-length act-off between the stars of Two for the Money and Meet the Fockers. [Variety]
· David Fincher circumvented his "no more serial killer movies" rule for Zodiac by thinking of it as a "newspaper movie in which I get to torture Jake Gyllenhaal for the last two hours." [THR]
· Cannes attempts to spice up its opening night by eschewing its usual sit-down dinner in favor of allowing guests to roam the room with their cocktails, ingesting finger foods as needed to avoid passing out. [Variety]
trade roundup
Second Prize Is a Set of Steak Knives. Third Prize Is You Get Tim Allen In Your Martial Arts Movie
· Tim Allen? David Mamet? Together on a "mixed martial arts drama"? Has the world gone totally fucking insane? [Variety]· TV casting crisis! Close the borders! Foreigners are stealing roles on new Fall series that could be going to American actors. [THR]
· Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson team up to produce three digital 3-D features based on the Belgian cartoon Tintin. They'll direct one installment each, with the last going to Brett Ratner, guaranteeing the franchise will not live past their original vision for a trilogy. (Relax, we're kidding about Ratner. But in a world where Tim Allen and Mamet can collaborate, nothing seems impossible.) [Variety]
· The success of Ugly Betty earns budding TV mogul Salma Hayek a 2-year overall deal with ABC Studios. [THR]
· Adorable netlet The CW makes like the big-people channels, picking up the dramas Gossip Girl, Reaper, and Wild at Heart; Veronica Mars, however, remains on the bubble. [Variety]
trade round-up
'Gilmore Girls' Finally Silenced
· Rory and Lorelai will banter adorably no more forever: The CW announces that Gilmore Girls will air its final episode on May 15. We're not too sad, as we're sure the network has alternative MILF-related programming ready to take its place in the Fall. [Variety]· Chris Von Goetz and Kevin Crotty are named co-heads of the TV lit department at ICM., which had been leaderless since the merger with BWCS. All we really care about: How nice are their shoes? Are we talking Whitesell nice or WMA nice? [THR]
· George Clooney and producing BFF Grant Heslov will co-write a dramedy, about how the CIA used Hollywood to stage a fake movie project (which was so well-faked Var and THR wrote about it) to sneak hostages out of Tehran in 1979, for Warner Brothers. [Variety]
· 28.1 million Idol fans tuned in to watch the final performances of The One Who Thinks He's Justin Timblerlake—As If! and The One Now Free From Being Forced To Wear Funny Hats By Cruel Wardrobe Assistants on Wednesday night. [THR]
· HBO will air a concert featuring the real Timberlake (suck, it Richardson!), its first one in four years. [Variety]
pilots
Network Execs' Dart-Throwing Technique Leads To Unexpected Employment Windfall For Lee Majors
The LAT takes a look at the roughly 12,000 network pilots currently in development, trying to make sense of any trends that emerged from last season. What we know: Serialized storytelling is out, except when it's in; viewers love a heavy dose of lighthearted quirk with their hour-long, fashion-centric dramas; and the public's appetite for the plight of fundamentalist Christian sketch comedy actresses was vastly overestimated. There is also the predicament of the half-hour primetime comedy, a languishing format that can only claim Charlie Sheen paycheck-generator Two and a Half Men as its single entry in the Nielsen top 20. It's a problem executives have approached with the kind of no-fail solution that results in a grab-bag pilot crop littered with Geico Cavemen shows and Lee Majors's triumphant return to TV: Greenlight everything and hope someone laughs. More »
cancellations
Shows You Probably Haven't Watched Go Down In Network Slaughter
In what Var has dubbed Bloody Monday, but which we will counterdub Mercy-Killing Monday to emphasize the networks' compassionate desire to euthanize a handful of shows languishing in a Nielsen coma from which they are unlikely to ever awaken, Fox's The Wedding Bells, ABC's Six Degrees, The CW's 7th Heaven, and NBC's The Black Donnellys have all entered different phases of the always complex cancellation process. This morning, heavy-handed Donelleys creator Paul Haggis is using his pair of stolen Oscars to wipe away the tears he's shedding over the loss of his primetime baby, his pain compounded by Var's swift kick to the gut during this moment of vulnerability: More »
trade roundup
Trade Round-Up: Leo And Marty Getting Together. Again.
· Pretty boy shingle fight! Warner Bros. and Leonardo DiCaprio's Appian Way defeat Paramount and Brad Pitt's Plan B for the rights to adapt upcoming autobiography The Wolf of Wall Street. The resulting project will allow for the continued collaboration of muse DiCaprio and master Martin Scorsese (is this whole thing creepy yet? Sort of, right?) at an undisclosed future point in the director's busy schedule. [Variety]· Harry Potter stars Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, and Emma Watson are officially signed to do the last two movies in the franchise, allowing all pervs to feel closure about
· Short on original programming to celebrate with cheerful posters that might distract their
employees from the drudgery of their half-network existence, The CW has instead decided to commission some artwork to enliven their workplace. Pictured: an installation placed near the development department entitled, "We Will Splatter Your Fucking Brains On Your Cubicle Wall If You Don't Start Coming Up With Some Show Ideas, And Fast." [Variety]
· Bill Clinton admits that TV Land is the only thing that can dull the pain of loneliness while Hils is out on the campaign trail. [THR]
· The cash-strapped, East Coasted Daytime Emmy-givers of NATAS announce that winners will have to pay $350 each for their statuettes if there's more than one recipient in their category, while its West Coast counterpart promises to reimburse any Emmy victors from its jurisdiction unlucky enough to get stuck with a bill from their cheap peers. [Variety]
tyra banks
Santa Monica Bans 'Top Model' Bus Ads Over Concerns It May Send Wrong Message To Its Population Of Aspiring Starlets
You may have noticed city bus ads rolling around town touting the latest season of America's Next Top Model. On it, host Tyra Banks poses dramatically by a waterfall, surrounded by the latest batch of aspiring models/ catfight - experts/ bi-curious lust-objects vying for the ANTM crown. (The photo is rendered all the more impressive when you consider that just out of camera range were approximately two dozen hungry alligators and a school of piranha hungrily snapping at the models' feet, as Mr. Jay shouted, "I don't care how many toes you have left! Look sexier!") The residents of Santa Monica, however, were none too pleased by the traveling hoochie-show on display: More »
trade roundup
Trade Round-Up: Screener Pirates Subdued; Hollywood Temporarily Safe From Financial Ruin
Two people have been arrested for stealing an Academy member's awards screeners and illegally posting them online. The DA has yet to file charges, but is expected to ultimately deny the MPAA's request that the pirates be summarily stabbed in the kidneys and left to bleed to death on the sidewalk in front of the Kodak Theatre. [Variety]ABC shuffles its Wednesday schedule, sacrificing new comedies Knights of Prosperity and In Case of Emergency to the Nielsen gods by putting them up against the return of American Idol, hoping that better-loved hit Lost might be spared their wrath in its new 10 pm timeslot. [THR]
George Clooney's production company tries to help re-ignite Hollywood's stalled love affair with legal thriller typist John Grisham, buying the movie rights to produce the book The Innocent Man: Murder and Justice in a Small Town for Warner Independent. [Variety]
The IATSE/WGA feud over reality jobs heats up, as IATSE president Thomas Short accuses the WGA of "irresponsibility and incompetence" for delaying producer talks. Only nine more months left of bickering over accusations of Guild posturing and de facto studio work stoppages! Enjoy them while they last. [THR]
The week in ratings: NBC takes the weekly 18-49 demo victory, The CW posts its strongest numbers yet, ABC has the week's most watched show, CBS remains the overall most watched network, and Fox is just happy they're not being beaten by Telemundo. [Variety]
trade roundup
Trade Round-Up: Fox Looks Into Feasibility Of Taking Thursday Nights Off For The Rest Of The Season
Fox's post-World Series line-up is battered by all comers, with new sitcoms Til Death and Happy Hour begging to be put out of their Nielsen misery and the The OC bombing in the post-Coop era. And in a result that makes even NBC executives snicker, "Oh, that shit is embarrassing," Fox was beaten by Univision (who had the Latin Grammys) on the night. [Variety]· Another way to describe The OC's premiere ratings is "awful." [THR]
Fox gives a series order to David E. Kelley's hour-long wedding planner drama The Wedding Store, which replaces previously announced series The Wedding Album and allows the network to maintain its FCC-mandated levels of nuptial-related programming. [Variety]
The relentlessly publicized Borat is finally opening in 837 theaters, with THR boldly predicting that there's no way the Kazakh can compete with The Santa Clause 3's multiplex-jamming release at 3,458 venues. [THR]
Because what television really needs is more sitcoms about emasculated men: The CW buys Beta Males, about "a trio of guys coping with their lives as domestic caretakers while their girlfriends and wives serve as the breadwinners." [Variety]
