Now playing on the Mitovich Mega Minute, my video Q&A with Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, aka 366-year-old John Amsterdam on Fox's New Amsterdam. Enjoy! (The female coworkers he brushed up against in the hallway here sure did.)New Amsterdam airs its second episode Thursday, March 6, at 9 pm/ET, before settling into its regular Mondays-at-9 time slot.
This Wednesday, as American Idol delivered 28.67 million total viewers across its two-hour run (up four mil week-to-week):8 pm/ETBehind AI and Deal or No Deal, Wife Swap placed third with 5.6 mil (up 230K), followed by Big Brother (5.24 mil, down 570 thou). Top Model premiered to 3.8 mil, a 26 percent plunge from last cycle's opener.9 pmBoth Law & Order: CI (7.7 mil) and Supernanny (5.96 mil) suffered big blows as Idol's final hour swelled to 30.37 mil.10 pmLaw & Order did 10.85 mil, a 600K gain. Cashmere Mafia (4.77 mil) slipped 490 thou.
Or: "OMG, Zan and Jayna Were Super-stupid!"I, as you know, have twins myself. Truly wonderful 5-year-old boys. And for a few months now, they have been super-obsessed with superheroes. It started with Spider-Man, segued into the Fantastic Four, and then hit new heights with the X-Men. Their dad was smart, limiting this wealth of new data to the Marvel universe. Cue the in-laws, who one day brought my worst nightmare to life by introducing Batman and Superman into the mix. No, I didn't already have my evenings and weekends filled enough with fielding the boys' questions about Spider-Man's array of girlfriends, the Thing's weight and Wolverine's No. 1 enemy. No, now I had to school them on everybody frickin' else.This DC Comical side trip ultimately brought a pair of Super Friends DVDs into the home. Both bring back memories from my own glued-to-the-tube childhood. Super Friends: Attack of the Legion of Doom features four episodes pitting Batman, Superman, Flash et al against a bevy o...
Roy Scheider, who was perhaps best known for his role in the original summer blockbuster, Jaws, died on Sunday at age 75. Though a cause of death has not been released, Scheider for the past two years had been treated for multiple myeloma at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences' Myeloma Institute for Research and Therapy.Scheider received two Oscar nominations over his career, for 1971's The French Connection (best supporting actor, as Gene Hackman's police partner), and for 1979's All That Jazz (best actor).Related:• FlickChick remembers Roy Scheider
Repeat scene partners Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson topped the weekend box office as Fool's Gold drew $22 million in its debut. Coming in second was Martin Lawrence's Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins, which opened with $17.1 mil.Rounding out the top five were Hannah Montana & Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert ($10.5 million), The Eye ($6.6 mil) and Juno ($5.73 mil). Paris Hilton's The Hottie and the Nottie bombed with a take of just $25,000 on 111 screens, or an average of about $225 (20 people?) per screening.
Now , casting would appear to be rather complete on J.J. Abrams' Fringe pilot for Fox. Dawson's Creek alum Joshua Jackson — who when last heard from was to visit Grey's Anatomy's Seattle Grace, but... strike happens — will play Peter Bishop, the son of the institutionalized scientist teamed with a female fed (Aussie actress Anna Torv) to investigate unexplained phenomena. Oh, Peter is also a high-school dropout/gambling addict with an IQ of 190.Filming is now under way in Toronto.
I interrupt this news blog to offer a heads-up that after a minor technical snafu, the new Mitovich Mega Minute vodcast is up and running on my page. (Who even knew I had "a page"? Shh, don't tell Oz.) There, you'll find a big ol' tease from The Girls Next Door's Kendra, my take on tonight's season premiere of Lost (read it quickly!), and a little somethin' on Sunday's Big Game.Next week: My video Q&A with Michael Emerson, aka Benjamin Linus.
Tuesday's ratings recap:• American Idol was of course the night's most-watched program, delivering 28.1 million total viewers — a week-to-week dip of a mil, and off 15 percent from a year ago.• Leading out of Idol, a fresh House drew 22.5 mil, the series' best audience since March 6, 2007, and more than double the closest competitor. • Biggest Loser, averaging 8.3 mil over its two-hour run, was down 640K.• One Tree Hill slipped 250 thou, to 2.8 mil.
Lest anyone be disappointed in 55 hours.... Alas, I have been alerted that Eric Kripke has stolen away on vacay, and will not be able to answer your burning questions in time for this Thursday's new episode. Instead, look for us to publish Kripke's As to many of your previously submitted Qs by Feb. 7.Remember, I'm just the messenger.
Supernatural returns with its first new episode in what feels like forever on Thursday, Jan. 31. If we hurry, The Man can maybe get us answers to your burning questions in time for the big day. Post them here, two per customer, and I'll do the best I can. Since you're an avid bunch, I'll probably have to "close the door" on this request around 5 pm/ET Friday. OK, I'm ducking out of the way now!UPDATE: OK, forget 5 pm, the solicitation is over now (9 am/ET), LOL. Thank you, as always, for the response, and stay tuned!
Truly a sad weekend for classic television. Suzanne Pleshette, who was best known for her role as Bob Newhart's wife on television's long-running The Bob Newhart Show, died on Saturday of respiratory failure. She was 70.Pleshette began her career as a stage actress and met her future husband, Tom Poston, when they appeared on Broadway in the 1959 comedy The Golden Fleecing — though they wouldn't marry until 40 years (and some previous marriages) later. Poston himself passed away in April 2007, not long after his wife Pleshette underwent chemotherapy for lung cancer.Pleshette's film career included Jerry Lewis' The Geisha Boy, The Birds and The Ugly Daschund, while her TV appearances included Have Gun, Will Travel, Alfred Hitchcock Presents and, most recently, 8 Simple Rules and Will & Grace. Pleshette famously reprised her role of Newhart's on-screen wife for the finale of Newhart, in which the entire country inn-set series was revealed to have been a crazy dream.
Concurrent with the HFPA's decision to open up the Golden Globes news conference to all media outlets (and not just NBC), the TV Guide Network announced its plan to air live, commercial-free coverage of the winners on Sunday at 9 pm/ET. The Network's coverage will be anchored by Chris Harrison (host of the soon-to-premiere Hollywood 411) and Maria Sansone (Yahoo!'s The 9). The pair will also oversee TV Guide Network's two-hour pre-show, Countdown to the Globes, starting at 7, as well as Globes Post-Show, from 10 to 11.Until then, check out TVGuide.com's Golden Globes mini-site, where you can cue up videos, browse pics of last year's best fashion and winners and this year's first-time nominees, see who Roush, Ausiello and Maitland have picked to win, and cast your own vote on this year's races.
Calling into Ryan Seacrest's On the Air radio show, O.C. alumna Mischa Barton spoke openly about her Dec. 27 DUI arrest, saying, "I'm 100 percent responsible for my actions," and then adding, "I really am disappointed in myself."Barton could not get into the particulars about what happened or her alleged state at the time she was pulled over, but seemed genuinely ashamed. "I don’t know what to say about it except that I'm not perfect, and I don’t intend to do something this stupid again." I think she just ruled out an O.C. reunion movie. Oh, wait....
Fearing that its beautifully trendy kids will get crushed by the American Idol juggernaut — and also looking to get the best play from an upcoming rash of strike-induced repeats — the CW is moving Gossip Girl to Mondays at 8 starting Jan. 28. The thinking is that while in reruns, the show might get exposed to a different crowd on a new night, thus broadening its reach. "There's great buzz and a great reaction to Gossip Girl," a CW scheduling exec explains to Variety. "Now we just want to grow the audience a bit."Serena, Blair and the bratty bunch won't be alone on Mondays for long. Starting Feb. 18, GG's lead-out will be Pussycat Dolls Present: Girlicious, which will seek to form a brand-new (and presumably girlicious) girl band. One other major CW programming note: any remaining new Reaper episodes (there are two, by Ausiello's count) will piggyback Smallville starting Feb. 28. But don't fret, Supernatural fans — a CW rep assures me the series will be back Jan. 31, a...
Having escorted Britney Spears out of Cedars-Sinai on Saturday morning via an underground tunnel, Dr. Phil has weighed in on the broken-down pop star. "My meeting with Britney and some of her family members this morning in her room at Cedars leaves me convinced more than ever that she is in dire need of both medical and psychological intervention," Dr. Phil tells ET Online. "She was released moments before my arrival and was packing when I entered the room. We visited for about an hour before I walked with her to her car. I am very concerned for her." According to TMZ, an episode of Dr. Phil exploring Britney's situation is being taped Monday for Wednesday broadcast, perhaps featuring a visit from Spears herself.As for how Britney got released from the "72-hour lockdown" she entered late Thursday, Cedars-Sinai says they made the decision on their own — without consulting either legal team in the custody clash — which they are at liberty to do if at any point during a lockd...
A day late and perhaps a dollar short on top of that. But nonetheless, I would be remiss if I did not share my resolutions for 2008. Such as:• The consensus is deafening and I cannot ignore it any longer. Though I have never seen a single episode, nor do I have the opportunity to "catch up" with previous-season DVD sets, I resolve to watch The Wire when it returns this week.• Provided that the strike ends... someday... and we start getting new How I Met Your Mothers, I resolve (again!) to finally track down Alyson Hannigan for a Q&A.• The sometimes groanworthy Private Practice? I resolve to stick it out through the end of the season.• I resolve to do whatever is within my meager yet undeniably increasing powers to get 30 Rock's audience into the seven mil range.• As managing editor of this fine site, I resolve to shout from the mountaintops, in the loudest manner possible using HTML, the resolution of the WGA strike once it arrives.• I resolve to de...
Danielle Fishel, who in the mid-1990s set many a pubescent lad's hormones aflutter with her role as Topanga on Boy Meets World — and earlier this year was a recurring guest on The Tyra Banks Show — was arrested early Thursday morning on a drunken-driving warrant, the Associated Press reports. Fishel was released from jail shortly after her arrest. I'm sorry, did we learn nothing from Shawn in Episode 5.18?
Having accrued critical success with the delicious Mad Men, AMC is eyeing a bevy of new (and different) projects. Among them, Variety reports: Fort Smith, a Western from 24 exec producer Robert Cochran and revolving around a posse patrolling the post-Civil War West; another Western centered on Comanche leader Quanah Parker; Uninvited Guest, a quirky drama from Less Than Zero screenwriter Harley Peyton and following a fella with multiple personality disorder; and Greenfields, in which a psychiatrist breaks his patient out of jail.
Now that nearly all of the facts about 16-year-old Jamie Lynn Spears' pregnancy have come forth — she's due around Mother's Day, and Nickelodeon seems committed to airing Zoey 101 — it was inevitable that rumors started surfacing. Some of the buzz:• Spears was paid $1 million by OK! for her story. (The tab got a bargain, if you ask me.) • Though Spears has ID'd Casey Aldridge as the child's father, the New York Daily News hears she had been seeing rapper Lil' Romeo.• Casey's Uncle Odus tells TMZ (see video here) the family is "shocked" and yet "we aren't" by the news. A pastor, Odus has seen "this type of thing" more often than he'd like.• Britney has sent her sis blue and pink baby blankets with a note: "Just a little something to keep the little gal or guy warm. I luv you, Brit."• And perhaps the silliest story I have seen this morn: Fashion designer Liz Lange tells People mom-to-be Jamie Lynn should dress in "little cute dresses and jeans with t...
After a five-day trial and 90 minutes of deliberation, a jury decided that Sopranos creator David Chase owes no money to Robert Baer, a former prosecutor and judge who gave Chase the idea for a show about north Jersey mobsters. Outside the courtroom, the New York Daily News reports, Chase likened the legal action to "a fly buzzing in your bathroom for several years, and now it's been swatted." He then made an awesome allusion to the Sopranos controversial conclusion, saying of the trial, "I hope [fans] like the ending."
See what happens when you watch these shows, people?! On the heels of A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila drawing 6.2 million viewers with its finale, MTV has greenlit a spin-off. Per the Reporter, That's Amore will find Shot at Love's annoying cloying goofy colorful and Milan-raised Domenico choosing an "American sweetheart" from among 15 bachelorettes. The moon hits your eye like a big apple pie March 2, airing Sundays at 10.
CMT has granted an eight-episode order to My Big Redneck Wedding, an unscripted series hosted by Tom Arnold. According to the Reporter, each episode will feature a different wedding of the "most down-home country couples," highlighting the "rustic eccentricities" of each nuptials. (How do the newlyweds drive away in a car that's on blocks?) Look for a Jan. 11 premiere.