Tyler Perry's House of Payne by Andrew Eccles/TBS
TBS' half of Turner's Wednesday upfronts presentation kicked off with renewal news for Tyler Perry's House of Payne (returning in June) and 10 Items or Less. The laugh-centric cabler then announced a development slate featuring:• National Banana Already in Progress, a late-night sketch show exec-produced by Jerry Zucker (Airplane!).• A scripted comedy produced by Def Jam's Russell Simmons and starring Run DMC's "Run."• A half-hour laffer exec-produced by and starring William H. Macy.• A late-night reality series which returns middle-aged men to their frat boy days. (And you thought all it took was a case of Pabst.)• An improv show exec-produced by Jamie Foxx.• Top Ten, which claims to "pit comedians against each other."Bookmark our FALL TV GRID | Review All of Our FALL TV NEWS
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Ladies and gentlemen, my new hero: In the wake of the Don Imus brouhaha, Def Jam cofounder Russell Simmons has released a statement suggesting that the music industry erase the words "bitch," "ho" and "n-----" from its vocabulary. Furthermore, he and the advocacy group Hip-Hop Summit Action Network support the formation of a Coalition on Broadcast Standards to debate other "extreme curse words." I think what I'm most excited about is the possibility of 200 new rap songs coming out about "harlots," "strumpets" and "nerds."
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