Lots of casting news, yet again. James Franco keeps rolling along, as does Liam Neeson. Little Bryce Dallas Howard might be teaming up with her papa, while a bunch of grizzled old thespians are teaming up to teach architecture.
So 40 million people watched Joe Biden be his usual affable self and Sarah Palin look terrified and panicky as she struggled to finish every 90 second answer. Wow! That's more than any debate since 1992, when Ross Perot was more entertaining than anything else on television! Also this is a hilarious paragraph:
· Helen Mirren will trade in her two-piece for a gun in The Debt, a remake of an Israeli hit about a Mossad agent who comes out of retirement to track down a war criminal. [Variety] · TNT fell for the old "Buy a Bruckheimer, Get a Wahlberg For Free" trick, not realizing it negotiated for Donnie's new Boston cop procedural Bunker Hill. Gotta read those contracts, gang. [THR] After the jump: Salma Hayek storms Fox, Jeff Zucker reassures nobody, Earl's preem crashes.· Completely over the success of Ugly Betty, executive producer Salma Hayek's budding media empire will next overtake Fox with the multiethnic family comedy The New McToms. [THR] · At an exec powwow in London on Thursday, noted NBCU economist Jeff Zucker insisted that his network's value to GE "only increases if there is less coming from the financial divisions." And the Olympics? "We measure success in ways that are far greater than the bottom line." Indeed, this man has all the answers. [THR] · And not to pile on, but last night's My Name is Earl and ER premieres were down 29% and 20%, respectively, from last year's bows. But that's OK — maybe NBC doesn't measure success that way, either. [The Live Feed] · Director Gary Fleder has reupped with ABC to helm every episode of every ABC series produced through the end of time. Or television, whichever comes first. [Variety]
Click to viewBoomp3.com It ain’t easy being a smoker at LAX these days. My Name Is Earl star Jason Lee felt as if he had to hike all the way to Northridge in order to find a spot where he could have a very vital stress releasing cigarette before his flight. Lee understands the desire to have smokers separated from the general public, but the cubby hole he was placed into was a bit much. Lee said, “I get it, but couldn’t they give us smokers more room to work with other than this little box. The line to smoke goes all way down to Manhattan Beach. We’re people who have a bad habit, but it’s not a crime. Maybe two or three people could smoke at a time.” [Photo Credit: Bauer-Griffin] *A Call To The Bullpen is a work of fiction. Although the pictures we use are most certainly real, Defamer does not purport that any of the incidents or quotations you see in this piece actually happened. Lighten up, people ... it's a joke.
The latest salvo in the ongoing battle between 30 Rock star Alec Baldwin and My Name is Earl creator Greg Garcia is being waged right here on Gawker. Garcia sent us his response to Baldwin's early morning swipe, in which he goofed on Garcia for being a Scientologist. "Alec, I can't tell you how happy I am to once again point out that you are an idiot. I'm unable to answer your question about Scientologists because, although I respect anyone's right to their own beliefs, I am not currently nor have I ever been a Scientologist. Maybe you should have done some research that extended past the comments section of Defamer before you crafted your insult."
Lovable madman Alec Baldwin has so many feuds going on with so many people that he can no longer attend to them one at a time. The 30 Rock star published a fine, blustering anti-McCain/Palin piece on today's Huffington Post ("We know nothing about Sarah Palin. Nothing. Which is not anywhere near enough information to elevate her to the position whereby she would succeed McCain if he died in office or suffered a catastrophic illness. At 72 years of age and in questionable health, McCain's fitness to coach a high school football team would be in doubt, let alone the grueling reality of the presidency of this country.") and then he took a post-script detour to get in a last minute shot at one of his enemies at NBC by making fun of the guy's celebrity religion.
While we found yesterday's 8,000 word New Yorker profile of Alec Baldwin to be an engrossing (if entirely too long) read, we were able to find one person who was less than impressed by Baldwin's long-winded rants about the perils of being impossibly rich and famous: My Name Is Earl creator/executive producer Greg Garcia. In the piece, not only did Baldwin blast the suits who run NBC's programming and promo departments for "wring(ing) the last drops" out of Thursday night comedy staples like Earl and Scrubs while 30 Rock is treated like a "red-headed stepchild", he also indirectly criticized the quality of said shows by labeling both as "done" and "cooked." Naturally, this irked Garcia, who spoke exclusively with Defamer this morning about his thoughts on his show's performance, 30 Rock's ratings and, of course, Baldwin himself:
The months-long anticipation we've experienced awaiting new episodes of NBC comedies has almost totally destabilized Defamer HQ, particularly in our speculations as to how the network would gently reintroduce us to programming like My Name is Earl. Would we see a brief sketch with Jason Lee agreeing to return to work on the condition of no more Paris Hilton cameos? Would the show go meta, with its cast treating its staff writers to a Earl-esque karma intervention? Or would NBC boss Jeff Zucker hijack the moment and squander yet another two minutes of viewer goodwill? Wait — did we just give it away?
From a tipster: "Young female TV writer for My Name is Earl who is a Republican and just bought her second house (in Palm Springs maybe?) had dumped another writer, [her] longtime boyfriend, who then got a book deal to write a book about how jerky she was basically, and how the breakup sucked. He wrote it and she was nailed, even without names, so then the book company just gave HER a deal to write a book about how it was HIM that sucked so bad. Who says the publishing industry is bankrupt?" Huh. Which book was this?
While some writers mused about taking minimum-wage gigs to help them make ends meet or alleviate their boredom during the strike, My Name is Earl creator Greg Garcia actually followed through on the idea, hoping to reconnect with the people a sitcom showrunner tends not to encounter while locked in a writers room with a dozen former Harvard Lampoon writers for 14 hours a day. According to THR, Garcia quietly took a month-long job at an undisclosed fast food joint, careful not to reveal to his new coworkers that he was actually a millionaire TV producer patiently waiting around for some kind of deep-fryer mishap he could possibly work into a future Earl. Not unexpectedly, Garcia experienced some amusing plot complications during his high-concept adventure, which ended with the kind of feel-good, hugging-and-learning resolution we all expect from our Hollywood-produced comedies:
With the Fall television season kicking off, networks are trying new and exciting ways to distinguish their shows from the others in a crowded marketplace. Blogging.la's Will Campbell came across an ad in Entertainment Weekly (fun fact: if you ignore those renewal notices, they eventually stop sending you new issues, thus freeing up your bathroom time for the consumption of actual literature!) for NBC's My Name is Earl that was so effective in its attention-grabbing mission that it demanded immediate destruction:
