With the field of terrible cooks whittled down to two last night, the contestants have gotten a lot better. But that doesn't mean they're made of stone! And one cook gives herself the most disgusting nickname of all time.
• As if this hasn't already been a crappy week for liberals thanks to the election results in Massachusetts, Air America announced today that it's shutting down effective immediately and filing for bankruptcy protection. [AP, WP]
• More on the conclusion of l'affaire Coco, what's in store for O'Brien (unclear), and what NBC can look forward to in the months ahead (lackluster ratings for Leno, mammoth losses, continued shame, etc). [NYT, TW, WSJ, NYT]
• CNN has been pulling out all the stops to cover the crisis in Haiti (not to mention invested in hundreds of tight t-shirts for Andy Cooper). And yet Fox News, which has sorta ignored the earthquake (and typically avoids covering stories involving poor black people) is still out in front in the ratings. [LAT]
• Kitty Kelley's tell-all about Oprah hits bookstores on Apr. 13. [AP]
• A Pulitzer for the National Enquirer? Stranger things have happened. [WP]
• HGTV and Food Network have returned to Cablevision customers. [NYT]
• Thanks to Lionel Richie and Quincy Jones, you'll be hearing "We Are the World" (Haiti 2010 edition) again in the near future. [Showbiz411]
• Madonna and Beyoncé have joined Team Clooney, FYI. [Reuters]
• So much for free content: Hulu may start charging its users to watch popular TV shows in the future; and YouTube is introducing pay-per-view videos.
• Is the Wall Street Journal really launching a travel agency? Yes. [E&P]
• Say goodbye (arrivederci?) to MTV's Jersey Shore. [NYM, Gawker, MTV]
• Is NBC shutting down Jay Leno's 10pm show and moving him back to late night? Is Conan O'Brien out of a job? NBC isn't denying that a schedule change has been discussed, but it's not saying much more than that for now. [NYT]
• ABC News is reportedly in negotiations with Ted Koppel to bring him back to the network as the anchor of This Week on Sunday mornings. [Politico]
• CNN is handing over the 1-3pm slot to Ali Velshi starting on Jan. 18. [NYT]
• Forbes has sold off its landmark building on lower Fifth Ave. to NYU. [NYO]
• Despite the standoff between Cablevision and Scripps, ratings for the company's two cable outlets, HGTV and Food Network, are up. [AdAge]
• Tucker Carlson's new website, The Daily Caller, launches next week. [WI]
• Avatar's streak continues: It's now the No. 2 biggest movie ever. [THR]
• A Blockbuster video kiosk is coming to a Duane Reade near you. [NYCTB]
• Fox is delaying the start of its sketchy new reality show. [THR]
• Break out a tissue: The Hof is leaving America's Got Talent. [People]
• Lady Gaga was the special guest on Launch My Line last night. [Gawker]
• Did ABC News buy George Stephanopoulos a booster seat when he joined the Good Morning America team? That's the rumor, at least. [Popeater]
• The cover of Vanity Fair's February issue will likely turn plenty of heads: It features a barechested Tiger Woods pumping iron. The photo by Annie Leibovitz was taken before the Woods sex scandal unfolded, however. [VF]
• Is New York Post editor Col Allan retiring? That's the rumor, although Allan says it's just "wishful thinking" on the part of the Daily News. [NYM, Politico]
• Cable spats: Fox and Time Warner reached a deal in their dispute on Friday. But Cablevision customers are still without the Food Network and HGTV.
• Dick Clark has clearly seen better days, but ABC's NYE telecast was No. 1 on Thursday night. NBC's Carson Daly-hosted program came in No. 2. [Variety]
• Disgraced ex-Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich will be one of the "stars" on the next season of Celebrity Apprentice, you'll be thrilled to hear. [UPI]
• Ten years after he presided over the merger of Time Warner and AOL, Jerry Levin now says it was all a big mistake and he's really, really sorry. [THR]
• Good news! The ad market for newspapers, magazines is looking up. [WSJ]
• Arianna Huffington and Glamour's Cindi Leive plan to sleep a lot in '10. [HP]
• Avatar was once again No. 1 at the box office this weekend. The film has now grossed more than $1 billion around the world since it was released. [THR]
Skilled chefs in Hollywood, some of them gay, some of them foreign. High-end, demanding clients, most of them assholes. When the two worlds collide, it sounds like the recipe for success, right? Maybe!
• Comcast is "leaning toward" keeping Jeff Zucker as NBC Universal's CEO if it goes ahead with a deal to buy take control of the company. [Bloomberg]
• The Fine Living Network will be rebranded as the Cooking Channel—and positioned as a Food Network competitor—in the second half of 2010. [AdAge]
• Some laid-off staffers at Condé Nast are furious about the severance they've received; chances are ex-Gourmet editor Ruth Reichl isn't one of them. [NYP]
• Does NBC's decision to cancel Southland "signal an abandonment of a decades-long commitment to drama"? Some seem to think so. Meanwhile, the show's producers are looking for a new home for the cop drama. [NPR, LAT]
• Let the hair battle begin: Disgraced former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich may be a contestant on Donald Trump's Celebrity Apprentice next season. [CT]
• Cooking shows are all the rage right now with the Food Network and Travel Channel both witnessing record ratings. Real estate shows, however, have been bombing. Why? "Food can take away the pain." [Bloomberg]
• A Q&A with Danny Meyer, who says he hopes to regain the star that his Union Square Cafe lost recently just as soon as Sam Sifton takes over as Times dining critic, and that his big pet peeve are dishes with hazelnuts in them. [RG]
• Steve Hanson reports the eatery he's opening in the former Hog Pit space on Ninth Avenue will be casual American spot called Bill's Bar & Burger. [NYT]
• The chance the fish you're eating does not have some mercury in it? Virtually nil, according to a new report by government scientists. [NYT]
• Time Warner sucked wind in the second quarter as profits fell 34%. Newly-independent Time Warner Cable, however, posted a profit. [AP, Reuters]
• McKinsey has set up shop at Condé Nast. What it is the consulting firm's actually doing (or recommending), however, remains a mystery. [NYO]
• Barry Diller's IAC posted a modest profit for the second quarter, but reported that revenues at the media conglomerate were down modestly, too. [AP]
• Michael Milken is backing some sort of new business website. Exciting! [NYT]
• Even more exciting: Sarah Palin is thinking about hosting a radio show. [HP]
• Why did Janice Min leave Us? It was about money, reports WWD, which explains that given the economy, Jann Wenner wasn't prepared to offer her the $2 million a year she's been collecting. Min is denying it. [WWD, NYDN]
• Dan Rather’s $70 million lawsuit against CBS is back on track. [NYT, WSJ]
• McKinsey has been retained by Condé Nast to do the sort of "rethinking" and "realigning" that the consulting firm gets paid enormous sums to do. And while it isn't the first time McKinsey has been in the building—they were hired by Condé in 2001—this time employees are totally freaking out. [NYO]
• One title that is doing well: Food Network Magazine, apparently. [CNY]
• ESPN's Erin Andrews was secretly videotaped in the nude while staying at a hotel. Now an ESPN employee is said to have been behind it. [NYDN, AP]
• The top restaurant in New York City, according to San Pellegrino's list of the World's 50 Best Restaurants: for 2009: Per Se, naturally. [Serious Eats]
• A look at the Gates, the new venue in the former Biltmore Room space. [GS]
• Be advised: Morton's is now charging $2.50 to add ice to your drink. [IC]
• It's been two years since the banh mi trend surfaced, apparently. [GS, Eater]
• Yet another victim of the recession: hot-dog cart vendors. [NYDN]
• Andre Balazs isn't saying much about the restaurant opening in the Standard Hotel, although he's willing to admit he's naming it after his daughters. [GS]
• Sorry, sex fiends: The Casbar, a sex club in the Brooklyn that was featured in the New York Times in February, has been shut down. [DBTH]
He's called her a "bobble-head" and a "freakazoid," and has accused her of "peddling crack to kids" with her Dunkin' Donuts commercials, but if Anthony Bourdain's comments about Rachael Ray in the past have caused her any psychic pain, she isn't saying so. In an interview with Nightline airing tonight, Ray tells interviewer Cynthia McFadden that she "absolutely loves" Bourdain and has "an enormous amount of respect" for him. We're not convinced the feeling is mutual, but we have a feeling we'll find out for sure soon enough. [ABC News]
♦ Ten places to feed your midnight cravings, including the usual suspects like Blue Ribbon and the Spotted Pig . [NYO]
♦ Jean-Georges isn't the only restaurateur who landed in hot water for skimming tips: A roundup of the dozen or so big-name venues that have faced similar legal trouble over the past year. [Reuters]
♦ The Food Network is looking for a "young, irreverent chef" with a "Yoga-like ability" to host a new show. [Eater]
♦ Frank Bruni offers up his take on Williamsburg's Marlow & Sons. [NYT]
♦ Sweet & Vicious is back in business. [Eater]
♦ Lucky Cheng's might be leaving the East Village for a new spot in Times Square. [GNML via DBTH]
♦ A peek at the new menu at Grayz. [GS]
♦ Does the financial meltdown mean the end of bottle service in New York? [DBTH, Gawker, GNML]
♦ A new study shows that Food Network hosts are pretty lousy at following food safety guidelines; Paula Deen, FYI, is the worst. [Super Chef via Eater]
♦ Death & Co.'s David Kaplan has gone to court to stop his building's landlord from evicting the bar over noise violations. [NYO]
♦ Anthony Bourdain enjoys eating "bootleg foods" like "illegal cheese." [Gothamist]
♦ Bizarre Foods host Andrew Zimmern eats rancid cheese and fermented animal parts for a living and yet says he's never gotten sick on the job. [amNY]
♦ A new food magazine called Swallow is launching next month. [GS]
♦ Trader Joe's is opening its first Brooklyn outpost next Friday. [BP]
