Felicity Steals Creek's Thunder

The back-from-the-brink resurgence of Felicity this fall — in terms of ratings, and some say, quality — has come at the expense of its WB lead-in, Dawson's Creek. Although the North Carolina-taped saga attracted a larger viewership than its Wednesday night cousin last fall (Felicity, currently on hiatus, returns April 18 with the first of six new episodes), there's no denying that in terms of buzz and critical acclaim, Keri Russell &#038 co. have emerged the clear winners.

In fact, many critics, in their praise of Felicity, took the opportunity to bash Creek as nothing more than its inferior Wednesday night companion. TV Guide's Matt Roush called the college drama, "By far the gem in that network's assembly line of youth-oriented serials... especially when you consider the creative decline of the WB's tiresomely self-aware Dawson's Creek."

"I tend to disagree with [the critics], and I think the fans do as well," Creek executive producer Greg Berlanti tells TV Guide Online. "I think if one was to look at both the writing stable that comes out of the show and the things that those people go on to do and what our actors go on to do outside of the show, I think it sort of all speaks for itself.

"But I try and ignore all of that stuff," adds the filmmaker behind last year's indie hit The Broken Hearts Club. "I think posterity is sort of what measures the scope and success of a show."

Meanwhile, Berlanti reports that the status of his next big-screen venture — the comedy Why Can't I Be Audrey Hepburn — has been temporarily shelved. "It's sort of been pushed to post-strike status," he says. "We were incapable of acquiring both all of the funding and all of the cast prior to this potential strike, so it's given me time to write instead and sort of focus on some other things."