Zach McGowan
Jody will be dishing up more sausage on Shameless.
The Showtime series has promoted Zach McGowan to a series regular for Season 3, Deadline reports.
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Downton Abbey
But did Downton Abbey cover the spread? The PBS series finished second to Super Bowl XLVI among TV viewers.
The Emmy-winning program attracted 4 million viewers at 9 o'clock Sunday, outpacing reruns of CBS' CSI Miami (3.13 million), Fox's animated tandem of Family Guy (2.41 million) and American Dad! (2.29 million) and ABC's The Middle (1.76 million) as the broadcast networks virtually forfeited the night. Those were paltry numbers for those shows, while Downton Abbey wasn't off by much (its first three episode averaged 4.3 million and the fourth 4.8 million before Sunday's 4 million).
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David Caruso
As mid-season shows debut over the next three months, it will be crunch time for a number of series that haven't been tearing up the Nielsen charts. Here's what network insiders say are the shows on the bubble as execs look to set their schedules in May.
ABC
A second-year ratings fade may mean it's time to pull a sheet over the Dana Delany-led Body of Proof. While the network ordered an extra episode of Pan Am in order to keep a hold on the cast until May, its chances of returning next fall are as likely as an airport going a full day without a flight delay. Comedy Happy Endings doesn't do a great job retaining the lead-in from the mighty Modern Family, but ABC parent Disney has an ownership stake in the show and it's a favorite within the network's entertainment division — so a pickup for another season is considered a lock. And fan fave Cougar Town will get a final shot for renewal if it performs well in its new Tuesday time period starting February 14.
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Terry Kinney, Adam Goldberg
CBS' new police drama NYC 22 will premiere on Sunday, April 15 at 10/9c, the network announced Wednesday.
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Rick Tigner
Maybe because it qualifies as fantasy fare in the Great Recession, Undercover Boss grabbed its biggest audience since January 2011, according to Nielsen overnights. Meanwhile, the implosion of Kim Kardashian's marriage to Kris Humphries set series records for E!.
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Chuck
Castle is closed. The Buy More has gone out of business. The time has come to think of life after Chuck.
For the cast of NBC's spy dramedy, the two-hour series finale Friday (8/7c, NBC) is the last vestige of the life they knew for five years. Denial will not be an option for long, and many of the cast have already started planning for a future that's alternately exciting and daunting because of the numerous possibilities.
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Good Wife, Parks and Recreation, CSI: Miami
Every week, editors Adam Bryant and Natalie Abrams satisfy your need for TV scoop. Please send all questions to mega_scoop@tvguide.com.
I need Good Wife scoop! Tell me what happens when Alicia is asked about her relationship with Will in court? — Geena
ADAM: First things first: Alicia and Peter will finally have "the capital-T Talk" about Will. But despite the last-ditch efforts of an unlikely ally, Alicia will still have to testify. But it's not as dire as it seems: This time, Alicia's humiliation will be somewhat private.
I love Paul Rudd on Parks and Recreation? Is it bad that I'm secretly rooting for Bobby Newport to win just so he'll stick around? — Marcus
NATALIE: No, we're all thinking it. But...
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Eli Manning of the New York Giants
Fox's NFC Championship that saw the New York Giants beat the San Francisco 49ers in sudden-death overtime grabbed a huge audience that's becoming typical for the conference championship game that airs in prime time, according to preliminary Nielsen data.
Dan Bell, a Fox Sports vice president, tweeted that the game was the highest rated NFC title game in 17 years (going back to the 1995 game when the 49ers played the Dallas Cowboys).
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Ricky Gervais
Viewership for the 69th Golden Globe Awards ceremony declined slightly to 16.8 million vs. last year's 17 million, according to time zone-adjusted, preliminary Nielsen figures.
The show also fell a little in the industry-coveted demo of 18-to-49-year-olds — to 5.0 from 5.2 (last year's final figure).
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Josh Lucas, Molly Parker
No terra firma for The Firm. Its two-hour debut stands on this shaky ground — 46 percent below the demo rating of The Cape's premiere a year ago, making it the worst all-time start of an NBC regular season drama. Quite telling: the show lost viewers with each succeeding half-hour. Surely, the network is missing Sunday Night Football already.
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