CSI Honcho Plots TV Invasion

Looks like the man behind all three CSIs, Without a Trace, Cold Case and The Amazing Race wants an even bigger piece of the prime-time pie. Movie producer turned TV-hitmaker Jerry Bruckheimer has five pilots vying for space on the fall schedule.

A military drama called The E-Ring shines as the Bruckheimer series most likely to get picked up. Starring Law & Order alum Benjamin Bratt and Dennis Hopper, the NBC pilot goes inside the Pentagon the way The West Wing went behind the scenes of the White House.

"It's a formula that can be updated for these tenser times of insecurity over homeland security," says John Rash of ad agency Campbell Mithun, who's had a sneak peek at The E-Ring.

CBS is considering American Crime, a drama about a prosecutor who's also a new mom (Jennifer Finnigan could star if NBC cancels her sitcom, Committed).

Meanwhile, WB might pick up Just Legal, which casts Don Johnson as an ambulance-chasing lawyer who hires an 18-year-old law school grad (Undeclared's Jay Baruchel).

Networks are so desperate for a new hit sitcom that they've even turned to Bruckheimer for comedy, although he has no track record in that department. The drama king has two comedies in the works: the tentatively titled Evolution of Man, a WB show starring Just Shoot Me's Wendie Malick as a life coach for three underachieving guys and a CBS project about adult siblings who have to deal with their newly divorced dad. Says Rash about Bruckheimer's risky forays into comedy, "With his ability to find talent, I wouldn't underestimate him."