No, not quite?Yeah, same deal as every year. The press check-in for the Emmys is 1 pm/PT, many hours before the telecast begins. So here am I, laptop all set up, Red Bull No. 1 half empty, and... and I wait.While Nina and Ben will be blogging live about the preshow and the Emmycast, respectively, I will be here sharing the reactions and choice sound bites of the winners as they come backstage, gold in hand.I must say, it's rather pretty in the "tent" this year. (See photo.) Purple "crystal" chandeliers! A cool backdrop on the winners' stage. And did I mention the unlimited Red Bull? I drink Red Bull one night a year, and this is it.But perhaps the bestest part of this year's Emmys, no matter who wins? Free Primetime Emmys baseball caps! And in a gym-friendly black.With so much time to kill, I may venture back to the red carpet, but honestly it is deathly hot out there, and it takes a good 30 minutes back in the press room to cool/"dry" off. While I swear by my Gillette deo, it must ...
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It's easy, sometimes even enjoyable, to disparage reality TV, a genre so notorious for bottom-feeding it just asks for abuse. (When I heard someone was shopping a show reuniting Amy Fisher with the Buttafucos, I thought about early retirement.) Despite all the soul-numbing creepshows we've witnessed — Anna Nicole Smith, the Gottis, Danny Bonaduce, we know ye too well — there is a gratifyingly popular trend to deliver shows with one goal in mind: to entertain, leaving you with a grin instead of a grimace for having wasted your time. Here's my ranking of the current crop.
American Idol Tuesdays and Wednesdays, 8 pm/ET, FoxThe hook: Watching someone’s musical dreams come true — eventually. But not before we endure weeks of painful auditions by people who are way t
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Nathan Griffen
He succeeded where affable Adam Mesh and Beantown's Brian Worth couldn't. In the third round of NBC's Average Joe, former Air Force missile technician Nathan Griffen, of Tampa, got the high sign from Las Vegas model Anna Chudoba, leaving Rocky-the-jock to lick his chiseled wounds. But was this Cinderella story too good to be true? TVGuide.com chatted with Nathan about his big "W," his bigger ear studs and the even bigger shock about his current love life.
TVGuide.com: You got the big "W" for average Joes everywhere!Nathan Griffen: I definitely wouldn't consider it a "W" because it wasn't a football game, but I made it to the end, and that's an experience in and of itself.
TVGuide.com: Did the fact that a Joe has never won temper your expectations?Nathan: All I hoped to gain was the chance to me
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Anna Chudoba
Reality-TV history was made last week when Average Joe's Anna Chudoba chose Nathan Griffen, a former Air Force missile technician — need we spell it out any further, not one of the pectorally gifted hunks — to be her beau. But how did Anna fall for a third round of Joe's "Surprise, we're hitting you with geeks!" gag? Did NBC have a hand in her landmark decision? And are she and Nathan still an item? At least one of these answers will shock you.
TVGuide.com: Your NBC bio says you weren't familiar with Average Joe, so you never suspected you'd get a busful of misfits?Anna Chudoba: I took night courses for years at UNLV and never watched any reality show, so I had no idea. They told me that it was a dating game show, and that I'd have 20 guys compet
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Or, for that matter, lonely at the middle. Lloyd Levine, a Democratic assemblyman from Van Nuys, Calif., has been asked by the producers of The Bachelor to submit an application to be the show's next one-man florist, the Los Angeles Daily News reports. From what the paper says, he'd be perfect for the job, too: He's 36, 6-foot-3 and believes in physical fitness. On a related note, unmarried politicians who endorse tubbiness are being encouraged to sign up for Average Joe.
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Fans of NBC's first installment of Average Joe knew Jason Peoples as the handsome, occasionally employed student who lived with his parents and still managed to win Melana Scantlin's heart. "I'm disappointed it didn't work out," he says. "At the same time, it's cool we met the way we did. I wanted more. I think we both did."
Peoples is currently dating a woman he had met before going on Average Joe. Was that an obstacle for him and Scantlin? "My girlfriend now wasn't in the picture," he insists. "We started dating after I did the show."
No doubt his main squeeze disapproved of those make-out scenes. "She watched the show, and I gave her a heads up before each one," he recalls. "She had a tough time with the last episode. Melana and I looked so happily in love, and she had to turn it off. She was great through the whole thing, but I'm sure it was a little tough."
It's safe to say fame hasn't gone to his head. "I'm st
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Now that Average Joe: Hawaii is on the air, you'd expect Melana Scantlin to go away and make room for other reality TV "stars." But no. Like Joe Millionaire's Evan Marriott, the original Average Joe bachelorette has found work on GSN (formerly known as Game Show Network). Starting March 15, she'll host World Series of Blackjack.
What's her connection to gambling, you ask? The former Kansas City Chiefs cheerleader claims it's in her genes. "My grandfather's name is Howard Huffley; his nickname was Ozark Monk," she told reporters at the Television Critics Association press tour in Hollywood. "He's from Arkansas, [so] I am a quarter hillbilly. But he is a card shark.
"You can give him any deck of cards, five decks if you want, and he could pull out anything," Scantlin says enthusiastically. "He's quite amazing with cards." In fact, some casinos have banned her granddaddy f
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If we learned one thing in 2003, it's that we can't count on our televisions to keep our best interests in mind. How else to explain the unfortunate incident in which TiVo decided that, since we watched Bachelor kissing bandit Bob try out for the Olympic tonsil-hockey team, we must also want to see every single program on the Playboy Channel! So, as we brace for the year ahead, we have elected to make a few resolutions — for our constant companions, our TVs. (What? You didn't think we needed any improving, did ya?) What's more, we suggest that you do the same. After all, an indiscriminate viewer could wind up watching anything! Our solemn vows (and fondest wishes):
The O.C. will air daily. Maybe more often than that, because it is the coolest primetime soap in, like, ever. Way wittier than 90210 even aspired to be, Fox's smash
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Look out, reality TV addicts. NBC's Average Joe 2: Hawaii debuts Jan. 5 at 10 pm/ET. Can producers Stuart Krasnow and Andrew Glassman top our surprise at Melana picking Jason the pretty boy over Adam the underdog? They hope so. Here, we pump 'em for dish on how Joe's second edition will be dramatically different.
Like Melana, Larissa Meek has done the beauty pageant thing — but that's where the bachelorettes' similarities end. "She's not an actress-model wannabe, let's put it that way," Krasnow says with a smirk. "She's an artist. She is intelligent and sophisticated."
Also, expect Larissa to react more strongly (and honestly) at the first sight of her schlocky suitors. "Pure anger is a good description," Krasnow says. Adds Glassman: "You know how people are on Punk'd? That moment right before they find out they were punk'd — that's what we were dealing with."
Unlike those prank show
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