Question: I've been searching the Net to find out what happened to Standoff and I came across your column. I think Rosemarie DeWitt is the star of this show and if Standoff doesn't make it, someone ought to grab her for another part. That girl can act. She has a rare (it seems) talent of acting and reacting in such a natural and convincing way. Ron Livingston is so-so, but he looks better playing off Rosemarie.
Answer: Standoff didn't make it. The episodes this summer were burn-offs, and it wasn't renewed. But Rosemarie DeWitt has already bounced back: She's on one of the summer's best series, AMC's Mad Men, playing Midge, the bohemian illustrator who's having an affair with the show's married lead. (And I respectfully disagree about Ron Livingston. He might not have been seen at his best in Standoff, but I still feel he's a TV star waiting for the right vehicle to put him on the map. ...
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With the Fox network, it's often all about the mid-season, the time when shows like American Idol and 24 come along to rescue the network from its fall doldrums. Not that it's impossible for any of Fox's September newcomers to catch on. The Kelsey Grammer/Patricia Heaton sitcom Back to You looks very commercial. The situation is admittedly tougher for the downbeat New Orleans crime drama K-Ville or the murky supernatural crime drama New Amsterdam (about an immortal detective) to buck the odds and be a factor come January. While it's possible one or both may hit its mark, you can't help but feel that they might as well be titled "Placeholder 1" and "Placeholder 2" (shades of last fall's Vanished, Justice and Standoff).Once again, Fox is holding back one of its biggest guns (literally) for January. Easily the most anticipated show on the network's lineup is The Sarah Connor Chronicles (look for the word Terminator to be added to the title before it premieres): a high-octane, big-budge...
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According to a fresh release from Fox, Season 3 of Hell's Kitchen will premiere three weeks sooner than planned, on Monday, June 4, at 9 pm/ET. For a lead-in, the Gordon Ramsay-fronted competition will have Steven Spielberg's On the Lot, which will regularly air Mondays at 8 starting June 4. The freshman rom-dram Standoff, meanwhile, which was to resurface April 6, has had its return pushed back to Friday, June 8, at 9 pm.
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Although originally scheduled to return to the air on Mar. 30, Standoff's comeback has been pushed back to Apr. 6. That means that throughout the month of March, House reruns will be the lead-in for freshman series The Wedding Bells, which bows Mar. 7. NBC's guessing game Identity returns to the lineup on Mar. 16 at 9 pm/ET (following the season finale of 1 vs 100). Thereafter, Identity will air (is anyone still reading?) on Fridays at 8.
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Question: If you had to make a prediction right now, what do you think are the five freshman series that have the greatest likelihood of making it to a second season?
Answer: The one no-brainer is Heroes, which has already been picked up for next season. Five other sure bets: Ugly Betty and Brothers & Sisters on ABC, Shark and Jericho on CBS and probably 30 Rock on NBC (preserving the "comedy night done right" lineup). I'm hopeful for Men in Trees and praying for Friday Night Lights (hands-down this season's "Best Show You're Not Watching"). Anything currently on indefinite hiatus is toast. Which leaves Studio 60, The Class, Knights of Prosperity, The Game, 'Til Death and Standoff (which is expected to return on Fridays in the spring) as the iffiest of the ifs. I would frankly be surprised to see any of those return next fall, although anything's possible ...
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