Skip to main content

Channel Surfing: Starz Orders New Rob Thomas Series, Doherty Returns to "90210," More "Gossip Girl,"

Welcome to your Tuesday morning television briefing. I hope you all tuned in to watch the third episode of Chuck last night as well as a pretty soggy installment of Gossip Girl in which the laws of college applications, logic, and, well, sense of any kind sort of went out the window. But at least the kids looked fabulous, right?

Rob Thomas is proving himself to be quite prolific, in the post-Veronica Mars universe. Pay cabler Starz has ordered ten episodes of half-hour comedy series Party Down, written by the Veronica Mars creator, who is set to executive produce with John Enbom, Paul Rudd, and Dan Etheridge. (Enbom will act as the series' showrunner.) Series follows the lives of six Hollywood wannabes as they attempt to pursue their dreams while trying to get by day by day with their shared catering company. Party Down will likely launch in March 2009. (Variety)

Brenda will be returning to 90210. Yep, Shannen Doherty has agreed to appear in two additional episodes of the teen soap, with the possibility that she will return for more installments at a later time. Look for Brenda to cross paths with Jennie Garth's Kelly in the series' 11th and 12th episodes, set to air next month. (Los Angeles Times)

Prince Charles has turned down an invitation to appear on Doctor Who, a fact that made outbound Doctor Who showrunner Russell T. Davies very unhappy. (Davies called HRH "a miserable swine" for turning his nose up at the offer.) (New York Times)

Production has been shut down on Easy Money and Valentine, Inc., the two hour-long dramas produced by MRC for the CW's Sunday night block. Both series will go on a "planned" hiatus for four to six weeks in order to "give writers time to catch up on scripts." Both series are, however, expected to fulfill their 13-episode commitments and shooting will continue on the eight segments already written. (Hollywood Reporter, Variety)

Andy Richter will guest star on the current season of Bones in an episode, slated to air in January, that will follow Brennan and Booth as they work undercover as a "knife-throwing team named Buck and Wanda" at the circus. Richter will play the circus' owner and ringmaster. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Jason Jones and Samantha Bee (The Daily Show with Jon Stewart) will co-write and star in an untitled CBS comedy series about the behind-the-scenes world of a celebrity chef (Jones) and the two women (one of whom will be played by Bee) who run his culinary empire. The duo have signed separate talent holding deals with CBS and CBS Paramount Network Television. (Variety)

CW has ordered two additional episodes of Gossip Girl, bringing its season total to 24 episodes. If you feel like you've read this item before, it's because the CW had ordered 24 episodes this season back in May... but then allegedly changed their mind and only ordered 22 segments but seemingly have changed their minds again. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Showtime has ordered a pilot for dark comedy The End of Steve, written by and starring Matthew Perry (Friends). Project, from Sony Pictures Television, revolves around an egomaniacal talk show host who is forced to work on an afternoon series in Rochester and seeks personal and professional redemption. (Variety)

Jonathan Prince (Cane) has signed a two-year first-look deal with CBS Paramount Network Television to develop series for cable, network, and new media. Prince already has set up an untitled medical drama at CBS about college grads who enroll in a medical school that throws its students into a teaching hospital rather than have them study. Project was co-created with Elle Johnson (Ghost Whisperer) and Fred Einsman (Private Practice). (Hollywood Reporter)

Spike has ordered six half-hour episodes of Worldwide Biggie's videogame-spoofing comedy MoCap, LLC, a mockumentary about a motion-capture studio. The network plans to launch the series--based on a series of web shorts--in January. (Variety)

Sci Fi has promoted Thomas Vitale to EVP of programming and original movies. (Variety)

Stay tuned.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Gossip Girl was pretty ridiculous last night. You have to have some suspension of disbelief with characters like Blair and Chuck, but are we really supposed to believe that Dan wouldn't be able to get a second letter of recommendation for his college application? Or that the Dean at Yale reads WWD? Just seems like sloppy writing to me.
Anonymous said…
@susie: Yeah the college stuff was completely ridiculous last night on GG. I am in the process of applying to school now and the stuff they were talking about was stupid and wrong. Dan really doesn't have a single teacher at St. Jude's that could write him a recommendation? I somehow doubt he'd get into Yale then if his teachers think so little of him that they don't write a letter for him. At least the Serena and Blaire stuff was fun even if Serena is somehow being nice again.

Is it just me or does the Rob Thomas show sound kinda lame?

Popular posts from this blog

What's Done is Done: The Eternal Struggle Between Good and Evil on the Season Finale of "Lost"

Every story begins with thread. It's up to the storyteller to determine just how much they need to parcel out, what pattern they're making, and when to cut it short and tie it off. With last night's penultimate season finale of Lost ("The Incident, Parts One and Two"), written by Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse, we began to see the pattern that Lindelof and Cuse have been designing towards the last five seasons of this serpentine series. And it was only fitting that the two-hour finale, which pushes us on the road to the final season of Lost , should begin with thread, a loom, and a tapestry. Would Jack follow through on his plan to detonate the island and therefore reset their lives aboard Oceanic Flight 815 ? Why did Locke want to kill Jacob? What caused The Incident? What was in the box and just what lies in the shadow of the statue? We got the answers to these in a two-hour season finale that didn't quite pack the same emotional wallop of previous season

Pilot Inspektor: CBS' "Smith"

I may just have to change my original "What I'll Be Watching This Fall" post, as I sat down and finally watched CBS' new crime drama Smith this weekend. (What? It's taken me a long time to make my way through the stack of pilot DVDs.) While it's on following Gilmore Girls and Veronica Mars on Tuesday nights (10 pm ET/PT, to be exact), I'm going to be sure to leave enough room on my TiVo to make sure that I catch this compelling, amoral drama. While one can't help but be impressed by what might just be the most marquee-friendly cast in primetime--Ray Liotta, Virginia Madsen, Jonny Lee Miller, Amy Smart, Simon Baker, and Franky G all star and Shohreh Aghdashloo has a recurring role--the pilot's premise alone earned major points in my book: it's a crime drama from the point of view of the criminals, who engage in high-stakes heists. But don't be alarmed; it's nothing like NBC's short-lived Heist . Instead, think of it as The Italian

The Daily Beast: "How The Killing Went Wrong"

While the uproar over the U.S. version of The Killing has quieted, the show is still a pale imitation of the Danish series on which it is based. Over at The Daily Beast, you can read my latest feature, "How The Killing Went Wrong," in which I look at how The Killing has handled itself during its second season, and compare it to the stunning and electrifying original Danish series, Forbrydelsen , on which it is based. (I recently watched all 20 episodes of Forbrydelsen over a few evenings.) The original is a mind-blowing and gut-wrenching work of genius. It’s not necessary to rehash the anger that followed in the wake of the conclusion last June of the first season of AMC’s mystery drama The Killing, based on Søren Sveistrup’s landmark Danish show Forbrydelsen, which follows the murder of a schoolgirl and its impact on the people whose lives the investigation touches upon. What followed were irate reviews, burnished with the “burning intensity of 10,000 white-hot suns