Timothy Bottoms, currently seen on ABC's Gideon's Crossing, will play George W. Bush in the upcoming Comedy Central series That's My Bush!, from South Park's Trey Parker and Matt Stone, USA Today reports. The show debuts April 5... A musical about the life of country music star Tammy Wynette — entitled Stand By Your Man: The Tammy Wynette Story — will make its premiere this fall at Nashville's Ryman Auditorium. — Michael Ausiello
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Even the most casual Oscar observers knew Julia Roberts would garner a best actress nod for her title role in Erin Brockovich. The multiple nominations for Gladiator (which snared 12) and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (with 10 total) were pretty predictable, too. But some surprising shutouts — Michael Douglas, anyone? — and a few mighty close races have set industry heads spinning. To help cope with the controversy, TV Guide Online asked film critic Richard Roeper (Ebert & Roeper and the Movies) and Movie Awards author Tom O'Neil to talk us through each of the top categories.
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Viewers turned out in droves to catch Kelly Ripa's first day as Regis Philbin's new sidekick. According to overnight ratings, the debut of Live with Regis & Kelly on Monday earned the show its best overnight numbers since its first day without Kathie Lee Gifford last summer.
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A guest on the The Jerry Springer Show has been arrested after authorities watched him appear on the program with his pregnant 15-year-old girlfriend. According to The Associated Press, Brandon R. Parks, 19, was taken into custody last week at his trailer park home (insert joke) and charged with criminal sexual abuse of a minor. During the episode, Parks admitted having sex with the girl.
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Considering that Denis Leary didn't give up cigarettes for his movie career, any TV network exec who asked him to do so would simply be blowing smoke.
"I did quit, actually, for about a year," Leary told reporters while promoting his new ABC Wednesday night cop comedy, The Job (premiering March 14 at 9:30pm/ET). "[But] I think given the horrifying array of all the things that this character [is] doing, smoking was never even remotely thought about."
Leary's referring to Mike McNeil, the hard-living, pill-popping Manhattan police detective he plays on the show, for which he also serves as an executive producer. Quips the seasoned stand-up comic: "Can he smoke more and just take less drugs, I think, was probably what [the network was] hoping for."
"Mike is actually a pretty weak guy when it comes down to solving his personal problems," he continues. "You know, a good cop, but his personal life is a [expletive] mess." So much so, Leary adds, that "in the pilo
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Well, probably not... But according to gossip guru Liz Smith, Moonstruck — the 1987 film that earned Cher an Oscar — is headed to Broadway as a musical. Henry Krieger (Dreamgirls, Side Show) will be in charge of the music and Susan Birkenhead (Triumph of Love, Jelly's Last Jam) will write the lyrics. The show reportedly is slated to debut during the 2001-02 season. So, who will assume Cher's role? "I promised not to reveal [her identity]," Smith teased.
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A woman posing as Fight Club actress Helena Bonham Carter had to be "forcefully ejected" from the set of Saturday Night Live over the weekend after she managed to make it past security, MSNBC reports. "She didn't look exactly like her, but stars don't always look like themselves in life," a source said. "But she was acting kind of weird and hanging backstage and making a nuisance of herself." The impersonator made several references to "Kenneth," as in actor Kenneth Branagh, Bonham's ex. "Nobody wanted to accuse her of lying about who she was because if they were wrong, it would be really embarrassing," the source added. "Finally, when she wasn't around, a producer went through her purse and found out she was an imposter." (Don't let Survivor's Mad Dog find out about that.)
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Ed Harris — a surprise lead actor Oscar finalist for his portrayal of artist Jackson Pollock in Pollock — was fast asleep at home in Malibu when Academy Award nominations were announced Tuesday morning. "I woke him up," his publicist, Catherine Olim, tells TV Guide Online. "He got in very, very late last night from New York City. He was there on business."
Harris, who also directed and co-financed the modestly budgeted pic, recently told TV Guide Online that although making Pollock was a labor of love, he probably won't be pouring his own money into another film anytime soon. "It's just not smart," he said. "Hopefully I'll be able to make that money back within a few years."
Geoffrey Rush, a 1996 Oscar winner for Shine, spent his entire Tuesday on a plane travelling between Berlin and Melbourne and didn't get confirmation of his lead actor nod for Quills until the aircraft stopped to refuel in Singapore. "I
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Anyone who gets their kicks watching a pig being brutally slaughtered will be disappointed to hear that this week's episode of Survivor: The Australian Outback — featuring contestant Michael Skupin butchering a hog — has been edited due to graphic content. According to the New York Daily News, CBS, concerned about how younger viewers would react to the sequence, asked producer Mark Burnett to make some minor edits. "We haven't lost any of [the] drama, and at the same time, the scene is more sensitive to the 8 o'clock hour," Burnett told the Daily News. "I'm happy with it." PETA, are you taking notes?
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Though shamed at her own traitorous game last week, Maralyn "Mad Dog" Hershey, the 52-year-old retired police officer from Wakefield, Va., waxed philosophical about being the third contestant voted off Survivor: The Australian Outback.
"Some may view it as poetic justice," she told The Early Show's Jane Clayson. "The Washington Post portrayed me as shooting Kel [Gleason] in the back about a week ago. So after Tina [Wesson] shot me right between the eyes, I had to give myself a little first aid, but I'm recovering."
Though stunned by Tina's vote, "Mad Dog" bears no ill will toward her "conjoined twin" for severing their outback ties and says they'll stay friends stateside. Ever blunt, she declared: "What every single person who played the game and is still playing the game has got to remember, once they're no longer playing the game, [is] that it was a game. You cannot take what happened to heart."
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