The 36th annual edition of Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve will kick off Dec. 31 at 10 pm/ET and again feature the (somewhat) ageless wonder alongside [insert your own adjective] wonder Ryan Seacrest. In addition to musical performances from Los Angeles and Times Square, this year's special adds Good Morning America's Marysol Castro reporting on other New Year's Eve happenings in the Big Apple.
TV Guide "spied" Chuck's Zachary Levi in a lip-lock with Aussie actress Rachael Taylor at Tao's anniversary party over the weekend.... New York Ranger Sean Avery, who once was engaged to Elisha Cuthbert, as of late has been linked to Mary-Kate Olsen but is said to be reigniting with old flame Lake Bell on the side, says Page Six.... Jeri Ryan is expecting a girl and Christina Aguilera looks to be carrying a boy, says People.... Sara Rue's marriage was Less Than Perfect, and as such she filed for divorce from her husband of more than four years. — Additional reporting by Stefanie Szlamkowicz
Kanye West's mother, Donda, died unexpectedly Saturday night following a cosmetic procedure. She was 58. The family has not disclosed what procedure she was undergoing or the cause of death, and "respectfully asks for privacy during this time of grief."Donda was the inspiration for the song "Hey Mama" from Kanye's 2005 album Late Registration, and she was known to defend her son against the critics who accused him of writing misogynistic lyrics. This past May, she published the book Raising Kanye: Life Lessons from the Mother of a Hip-Hop Star.
Dylan Walsh (Nip/Tuck), Sela Ward and Penn Badgley (Gossip Girl) are set to star in the remake of 1987's The Stepfather. Friday Night Lights' Adrianne Palicki is in talks to play Badgley's girlfriend.... Winona Ryder will play a young Jane Wyatt — aka Spock's mother — in J.J. Abrams' Star Trek film, suggesting the prequel will include flashbacks to a certain vulcan's youth.... Rapper Xzibit has joined Oliver Stone's Vietnam War drama Pinkville.Related: New Star Trek Film Beams Up House's Jennifer Morrison
Scrubs creator Bill Lawrence was is a unique position as the strike neared in that his show was on its way off the air. Even so, he said Sunday at a New York Comedy Festival event that he refused a request from NBC to slap together a script that would serve as a series ender. Describing the finale the network suggested as full of scenes where "two people kiss," Lawrence (who has one of 12 pre-strike scripts left to shoot) instead hopes to wait out the strike and then craft his own denouement — by any means possible. "I will use all my leverage to end this show properly, even if it means I have to do all the voices myself and call people up to read it over the phone," he said.More strike coverage: • Will Tonight Show Go On... With Guest Hosts?• Strike Could Give Cable Shows Edge at '08 Emmys• Striking Up Romance: Single Scribes Pair Off on the Picket Line
It's of course too early to really say, but a prolonged strike could shake up next year's Primetime Emmy Awards in some ways, in other ways not. To be eligible, a show needs to have telecast six episodes, a benchmark nearly all of the broadcast network offerings will meet. But cable programs that aired earlier this year and cranked out full, 13-episode seasons will have more content to choose from when compiling their reels. Also, Variety notes, network shows typically submit their season finale for the big races, but that would not be an option here. One other wrinkle: Fox's postponement of 24 takes that drama — and series lead Kiefer Sutherland — out of the running.More strike coverage: • Will Tonight Show Go On... With Guest Hosts?• Creator of Scrubs Snubs Season-finale Request• Striking Up Romance: Single Scribes Pair Off on the Picket Line
Bee Movie and American Gangster traded places in their second week of release, as DreamWorks' animated offering topped the weekend box office with $26 million. Gangster drew $24.3 mil.Rounding out the top five were Fred Claus (opening with $19.2 million), Lions for Lambs (debuting with $6.7 mil) and Dan in Real Life ($5.9 mil). The only other major new release, P2, came in eighth with P2.2 million dollars.
Friday's ratings recap:8 pm/ETGhost Whisperer (9.93 million) surged 800K week-to-week to not just best Deal or No Deal (for time-slot bragging rights) but in fact win the entire night in total viewers. Men in Trees (6.16 mil) was up 280 thou (and how about that cliff-hanger?!). Though still in fifth place, The Next Great American Band (2.69 mil) gained 392K.9 pmWomen's Murder Club was No. 1 in viewers (9.7 mil, up 230K), while Moonlight (7.97 mil, up 395K) was tops in demos. Trailing Lyrics (6.3 mil), Friday Night Lights (5.6 mil) inched up 150 thou.10 pmNumbers (9.91 mil) saw a 671,000 increase, while 20/20 (7.044 mil, -376K) and Las Vegas (7.038 mil, -453K) both slipped.
The View cohost Elisabeth Hasselbeck and her husband, NFL quarterback Tim Hasselbeck, on Friday morning welcomed their second child, a son, in an Arizona hospital. The baby weighs 7 pounds 15 ounces. "Both mom and son are happy and healthy," Dad reports, adding that 2-year-old daughter "Grace is so excited to be a big sister." Elisabeth — who embarked on an early maternity leave Oct. 23 when her hubby landed a gig with the Cardinals — will reveal her newborn son's name on Monday's The View via telephone. (The smart money is on Ronald or George.)Elisabeth is due back on The View in early January, when the show returns from its holiday hiatus.
French Stewart (Third Rock from the Sun) and Rebecca McFarland (The Dresden Files) will make like Clark and Ellen Griswold in Happy Campers, an ABC Family pilot about a family on a cross-country road trip. According to the Reporter, the pilot, which starts shooting Monday, features Kay Panabaker (Summerland), Alessandra Toressani, and Ryan Malgarini and the kids, as well as Beth Littleford (The Daily Show) as Stewart's ex-wife. (It must be a really, really big family truckster.)
• Following a fierce bidding war, Starting Under — a comedy from Drew Carey Show creator Bruce Helford and starring Bernie Mac as an opinionated divorcé who lives with (and works for!) his introverted twentysomething son — became the last major pilot to get rubber-stamped, by Fox, before the strike struck, Variety reports. But... what about "Ocean's Eighteen"?!• A&E has shot a pilot for Celebrity called Garage Sale (yes, it's come to this), in which indie actress Illeana Douglas helps her celeb pals unload unwanted junk.• Freaks and Geeks cocreator Paul Feig will direct the pilot for NBC's Kath & Kim, starring Molly Shannon.
CBS has sent out a press release confirming that for all of next week as well, both Late Show with David Letterman and The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson will be airing repeats.During the 1988 WGA writers' strike, Letterman ultimately returned to work — conducting interviews only, thus needing no writer — but not until Johnny Carson made that move first. As I just said to Battaglio in the hallway here, I imagine that is not Letterman's plan this time around.More strike coverage:• Ellen DeGeneres Defends Her Crossing of Picket Line but Still Gets Dissed• Ask Matt answers your burning questions about the strike!
Hoping to prevent a lengthy WGA strike like the one that lasted 22 weeks back in '88, California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger on Thursday said he would be taking measures himself to end the current work stoppage. "I'm talking to the parties that are involved because I think it's very important that we settle that as quickly as possible, because it has a tremendous economic impact on our state," Reuters quotes him as saying. Schwarzenegger says the "sad story" here belongs to the cast and crew members who will lose their jobs as television productions shut down. "The studio executives are not going to suffer, the union leaders are not going to suffer, the writers that are striking, they are not going to suffer," said the Governator. "Those are all people that have money."More strike coverage:• DeGeneres Defends Her Crossing of Picket Line, But Still Gets Dissed• Ask Matt answers your questions about the walkout.• Galactica Boss: Without Strike, Studios Would "Rape an...
High School Musical starlet Vanessa Hudgens' father, Greg, grew outraged and began flinging a water bottle at paparazzi when he and his daughter were swarmed by rapidly clicking shutterbugs as they emerged from a Hollywood gym on Nov. 7. According to Us, Vanessa bellowed "Daaaaad!" and then put her head down to mask her embarrassment. Given Pop's Tony Little-esque workout attire, who can blame the gal?
Thanks to Dancing with the Stars, Jennie Garth is leaner and meaner than ever, but that might not last for long. "I know me. I'll just go get pregnant again!" she tells People. "I actually secretly look forward to [it]".... According to Us, Rashida Jones was mum on her reportedly reignited Office romance with former flame John Krasinski. "I don't want to talk about my personal life," she told the press at a Wednesday event. But she then noted that John is "awesome" and "the best".... Jennifer Lopez at a Wednesday concert announced that husband "Marc [Anthony] and I are expecting" — a full two months after we stopped caring.
Mark Wahlberg is in talks to star as DEA agent Max Payne in a big-screen adaptation of the hit video game. OK, but where's my Duke Nukem?!.... Mickey Rourke was arrested Thursday on suspicion of driving under the influence when he was pulled over after swerving on his... scooter. "I didn't even drink that much," the AP quotes a reportedly slurring and watery-eyed Rourke as saying.... Arriving on DVD Nov. 20: Love, American Style: Season 1, Volume 1 (Nov. 20) and Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse.
Though Kevin Federline's attorney lobbied for Britney Spears to be stripped of all visitation rights after she ignored eight out of 14 recent phone calls summoning her for mandatory drug testing, the judge in the former couple's custody case is giving the pop tart one last chance to make good on her court-ordered obligation. Going forward, the judge on Thursday said, "There needs to be one number that the testing facility calls that she responds to."According to TMZ, Spears' lawyer had argued that his client was merely sleeping at the time of the missed calls, saying to the judge, "You are not a pop star with a No. 1 album, so you don't know [how hard it is]."Yeah, taunt the guy in the robe. Excellent strategy.
This Wednesday, as ABC's broadcast of the CMA Awards matched last year's audience of 15.9 million total viewers and dominated in the key demos:8 pm/ETKid Nation (7.15 million, up 250 thou) was a distant second, followed by Fox's sitcombo of Back to You (6.38 mil, -520K) and 'Til Death (6.48 mil, -500K). Behind Phenomenon (6.1 mil), Top Model (5.07 mil) gained 350K.9 pmCriminal Minds was down a hair, to 14.54 mil. Bionic Woman dropped another 1.34 mil, and at 6.44 mil viewers placed just barely ahead of Kitchen Nightmares (6.36 mil). Gossip Girl held steady at 2.5 mil.10 pmCSI: NY drew 12.87 mil, losing the same 630,000 viewers that Life (rising to 6.41 mil) seemed to gain.
Joely Fisher knows what she's grateful for this Thanksgiving. After a car crash this past Monday, in which Fisher and her daughter True were hit head-on by a 91-year-old man who fell asleep at the wheel, she thanks her lucky stars that they got away unharmed. At the launch party for the book Altar Your Space at the Tara Home store in Los Angeles, the 'Til Death star showed TV Guide a minor burn on her chin from the bursting airbag. "I'm thankful that it wasn't worse than that," says Fisher. "We were belted in and [True] was in a car seat. It's pretty amazing." The accident only added to an already difficult week. Fisher and her costars have shut down production on 'Til Death due to the writers' strike, and they don't expect to start up again anytime soon. "I'm in support of the writers, they're absolutely right. I think the unfortunate thing is that the studios and networks were so prepared for this that they're going to have a huge fight on their hands. We could be in a lot of trou...
Even though Wednesday night's CMAs sent Kenny Chesney off with a second straight Entertainer of the Year win and gave Carrie Underwood a repeat Female Vocalist of the Year award, the night really belonged to Underwood's fellow Idol Kellie Pickler, whose emotional rendition of "I Wonder" — a song about her estranged mother — earned her an enthusiastic standing O.Other big winners included Brad Paisley (male vocalist), Sugarland (vocal duo), Rascal Flatts (vocal group) and Taylor Swift (newbie). Album of the Year went to George Strait's It Just Comes Natural, and his "Give It Away" was named best song. — Ben Katner
The stars of Grey's Anatomy on Wednesday took their lunch breaks outside with picketers and told them they were just about finished shooting until the strike is resolved. "We're supposed to be going until the end of May," T.R. Knight noted, "and right now our last shooting day will be Tuesday or Wednesday." Added Sandra Oh: "This matter is way too important not only for our writers, but ultimately everyone who makes movies, everyone who makes entertainment here in this town and again for the rest of the world." Um, I don't know if I'd go that far. — Ben KatnerMore in TVGuide.com's Strike Watch blog:• Fox "Strike" Schedule Subtracts 24, Adds Prison Break• Office Closing: Carell, Others Won't Cross Picket Line
The ink isn't even dry yet on the order that says Britney Spears can only have three days a week with her kids, and what does she do? She leaves the boys in a parked car with her court-appointed monitor while she buys — I kid you not — chandeliers. Perhaps not surprisingly, Brit's due back in court Thursday, as Fed-Ex's attorneys are slamming her for not responding in a timely fashion when she gets the call to come in for random drug testing. — Ben Katner
