San Diego Comic-Con 2010 Diary: Day One

Apologies for not writing or tweeting yesterday during the first official day of San Diego Comic-Con. I was stuck in the cavernous expanse of the behemoth Hall H all day yesterday (yes, from waiting in line at 8 am until I left Hall H at 7 pm last night) and had limited internet connectivity and no access to Twitter. (Thank you, AT&T, for making the first day of SDCC so bloody unbearable.)

But while internet issues were a headache, the day was actually quite a lot of fun. I spent the day covering the various film panels that were going on for The Daily Beast's Cheat Sheet, firing off small news items about such films as Megamind, Tron: Legacy, Salt, The Expendables, RED, Scott Pilgrim, and the Entertainment Weekly Visionaries panel for J.J. Abrams and Joss Whedon.

While there wasn't much in the way of news emanating from the latter (other than Joss "officially" confirming that he is directing The Avengers), it was a blast to see these two genius creators in conversation together as they discussed everything from 3D filmmaking, the differences between creating for film and television, their passions and their inspirations.

And the end of the day brought with it the chance to see Edgar Wright's new film Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World with the cast, the press, and some very lucky fans who grabbed 1-UP buttons during the Scott Pilgrim panel. As for the film itself? I absolutely adored it in all of its hyper-surreal fantasy trappings. It opens nationwide on August 13th and if you're fans of Bryan Lee O'Malley, Michael Cera, Wright, or Spaced, I urge you to see it that very day.

Today's schedule is a little looser though still without a break: a bunch of one-on-one interviews this morning including Edgar Wright, Bryan Lee O'Malley, Matt Reeves, and Richard Jenkins, along with the panel for HBO's True Blood, and--hopefully--more Joss Whedon.

Let's just hope my internet connection is better today...

Neil Patrick Harris: "Glee" Club Survivor?

More information is trickling out about Neil Patrick Harris' upcoming guest turn on FOX's musical-comedy Glee this May.

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello is reporting that Harris will play Bryan Adam, a former glee glee club nemesis of Matthew Morrison's Will, who is now as a William McKinley High board member in the episode, to be directed by Buffy creator Joss Whedon.

Citing an unnamed Glee insider, Ausiello goes on to report that the high school feud between Harris' Bryan Adam and Morrison's Will will be depicted via flashbacks which will show the two as rivals for solos and girls as teenagers... and that animosity has carried over into adulthood, where Bryan is now looking to cut the arts program.

"Show choir ruined his life, made him feel he could be a star, but all he could do is book Carnival cruises,” the unnamed Glee insider told Ausiello. "Now he wants vengeance."

I'm happy to add some further details to Ausiello's report as it now seems as though Harris' Bryan Adams is in a glee club survivors support group that will also be populated by Molly Shannon's character.

The word comes from the most recent casting breakdown for Glee, which is looking to cast a new character, "Russell" as one-day guest star with the potential to recur on the 20th Century Fox Television-produced series:

"[RUSSELL] Late 30s-40s. He is a member of a "Glee Club Survivors" support group which includes other members Neil Patrick Harris and Molly Shannon. PLEASE SUBMIT "NAME" as well as "NON-NAME" actors...ONE-DAY GUEST STAR (POSSIBLY RECURRING)"

Which makes me wonder: just who else is part of this support group cabal? And are they all plotting the demise of McKinney's Glee Club?

Glee is set to return April 13th at 9 pm ET/PT on FOX.

Channel Surfing: Julianne Moore in Demand, Whedon Talks "Dr. Horrible," Flockhart to Cut Back on "Brothers," "House" Spinoff Possible, and More

Welcome to your Wednesday morning television briefing.

Could Julianne Moore become the lead of the US adaptation of crime series Prime Suspect? If NBC gets their way, she very well could be. Moore is being pursued by NBC for the remake of the Helen Mirren-starring British series as well as ABC to star in another remake: this time Scoundrels, based on Kiwi series Outrageous Fortune. Moore has some competition for the Prime Suspect gig as Maria Bello has also been approached about starring in the remake as well as starring in Jerry Bruckheimer-produced drama pilot Chase, which has offers out to Bello, Tea Leoni, and Christina Applegate. Other in-demand stars this pilot season: Matt Dillon, Jason Isaacs, Michael Chiklis, and Josh Lucas. (Hollywood Reporter)

E! Online's Megan Masters has an interview with Joss Whedon, in which the Dr. Horrible creator talks about the possibility of a sequel, directing FOX's Glee, Neil Patrick Harris, and more. "We very much want to do it," Whedon told Masters about Dr. Horrible 2. "We meet, we hammer out stuff, we have songs, we have ideas, we're really working it, but it's a slow-moving train. We're very passionate about it, and Neil's been great... He's always checking in before he takes a gig." As for whether Harris will turn up on Whedon's episode of Glee, nothing has been settled yet, according to Whedon. ("That's something that's trying to be worked out, but I haven't heard whether or not that's going to take place," he admitted. "I hope so, that'd be great, [but] I don't know anything about it. I'm just a director on hire for that.") (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello is reporting that Brothers & Sisters star Calista Flockhart will scale back her workload next season on the ABC drama series but will remain a series regular. News comes on the heels of an announcement that co-star Rob Lowe will depart the series at the end of the season. "A Brothers & Sisters insider confirms that Flockhart’s lighter workload was a contributing factor in Lowe’s decision to flee," writes Ausiello. "The West Wing alum already felt his role on the show had become diminished. The prospect of his TV spouse appearing in fewer episodes would’ve only increased his sense of marginalization." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

While the Michael Weston-centered House spinoff is definitely NOT happening, FOX president Kevin Reilly has indicated to Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello that executive producers David Shore and Katie Jacobs have a "standing offer" to develop another House spin-off. "They have really high standards," Reilly told Ausiello. "These are not guys who commercially are going to chase something just to announce they have a spinoff and then figure out the show later on. They’re probably the most thorough producers... I’ve ever worked with." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

CBS has given a pilot order to hybrid comedy Livin' on a Prayer, from executive producers Carter Bays and Craig Thomas (How I Met Your Mother) and writers Kourtney Kang and Joe Kelly. Project, from 20th Century Fox Television, will follow a Pittsburgh couple who are debating whether to take their relationship to the next level. (Variety)

Elsewhere at CBS, the network ordered three additional pilots: Chaos, about "rogue CIA operatives who combat bureaucratic gridlock, rampant incompetence and political infighting," from executive producer Brett Ratner, Tom Spezialy (Desperate Housewives), and 20th Century Fox Television; an untitled police procedural, from executive producers Ed Redlich (Without a Trace) and John Bellucci, CBS Television Studios and Sony Pictures Television, about a female NYPD detective who has total recall; and legal drama Defenders, from writers Niels Mueller and Kevin Kennedy and CBS Television Studios, about "two charismatic and fiery Las Vegas defense attorneys who go to the mat for their clients." (Hollywood Reporter)

ABC ordered a pilot for an untitled crime drama from writer Richard Hatem (Miracles) and director Gary Fleder, who will executive produce with Bert Salke and Chris Brancato. Project, from ABC Studios, revolves around a female detective who joins forces with a tarnished former cop to solve crimes "and untangle the conspiracy that sent him underground." (Hollywood Reporter)

Over at NBC, the Peacock has given a greenlight to an untitled Conan O'Brien-executive produced drama pilot (formerly known as Justice) about a ex-Supreme Court justice who starts his own legal practice. Project, from writer/executive producer John Eisendrath, hails from Universal Media Studios, where O'Brien's shingle Conaco has a year and a half left on its overall deal. (Variety)

Stan Lee will guest star as himself on the March 1st episode of CBS' The Big Bang Theory. According to TV Guide Magazine's Will Keck, Lee will "pop up in [the boys'] favorite comic book shop hangout." (TV Guide Magazine)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello has an interview with NCIS: LA executive producer Shane Brennan about the departure of one of the series' lead actors, which will spark an overarching storyline that will play out through the season. "To my mind, particularly in the first season of a show, there is no main cast," Brennan told Ausiello. "The audience is meeting a whole bunch of characters and you get the opportunity to play around with them. I’m a great believer in playing with the audience’s expectations. It’s about making it as different and fresh as often as you can. And I certainly took that approach with this first season… I want them to know that nothing is sacred. And the cast is aware that this is the game I play. No one’s safe." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Not such good news for FX, sadly, as the Season Three launch of serialized drama Damages lured only 1.4 million viewers, down a staggering 17 percent from its second season premiere. However, once DVR numbers are factored in, the series is expected to receive a boost in the ratings and FX has been quick to point out in the past that many viewers often DVR and save multiple episodes to then watch in a marathon-style viewing pattern. Those viewers who watch more than seven days after the broadcast are not included in any ratings reports. (Variety)

Looks like the cast of MTV's Jersey Shore will be returning for a second season, after all. While MTV refused to comment on the contract negotiations, sources told The Hollywood Reporter that MTV has doubled its episodic offer to the stars of the reality series, offering $10,000 an episode. A deal is thought likely to materialize by the end of the week, a relief for the cabler which wishes to get a new season of Jersey Shore on the air this summer. (Hollywood Reporter)

Martha Stewart is moving her eponymous daytime talk show from first-run syndication to cable, echoing the steps that Oprah Winfrey herself is making over the next year. The Martha Stewart Show will move this fall to Hallmark Channel as part of a programming strategy overhaul that will see telepics shift to Hallmark Movie Channel and Hallmark become a destination for lifestyle shows, series acquisitions, and holiday-themed programming. The Martha Stewart Show will air at 10 am Monday through Friday and then be followed by a 90-minute block of other Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia programming. (Variety)

FOX has promoted Shana Waterman and James Oh to VPs of current programming and promoted David Sleven to director. (via press release)

Stay tuned.

I've Got a Feeling: Joss Whedon to Meet with FX President

Could Joss Whedon's next series project end up at FX?

Signs are pointing towards the remote possibility at least, following comments made by FX President John Landgraf at today's Television Critics Association Winter Press Tour in Pasadena.

While there are no deals in place and no project necessarily on the table, Whedon is set to meet with Landgraf in a few weeks' time.

"Actually his representatives called and scheduled a lunch," said Landgraf when asked about Whedon possibly developing something for FX. "I think I'm supposed to have lunch with Joss in the next two or three weeks... I have enormous respect for him. And by the way, if you look at Shawn Ryan who created The Shield and is running Terriers, Shawn learned at the feet of Joss Whedon, the Joss Whedon school. (And Carlton Cuse, by the way, as well.) I don't really know Joss, but I'm really looking forward to meeting him. I love his stuff."

What do you think? Is cable the right home for Whedon's dramatic sensibilities? How much would a Joss Whedon FX series rock? Discuss.

Channel Surfing: FOX Sends "Dollhouse" to the Attic, ABC Axes "Hank," Syfy Blasts into "Outer Space," and More

Welcome to your Thursday morning television briefing.

It's official: FOX has canceled Joss Whedon's metaphysical drama series Dollhouse. The series, which is currently in production on this season's eleventh episode, will finish production and the network is currently expected to air all thirteen installments of the low-rated Friday night drama beginning December 4th. Whedon himself posted on Whedonesque about the cancellation news (which didn't come as a surprise to anyone tracking the ratings) and said, ""I don't have a lot to say. I'm extremely proud of the people I've worked with: my star, my staff, my cast, my crew. I feel the show is getting better pretty much every week, and I think you'll agree in the coming months. I'm grateful that we got to put it on, and then come back and put it on again. I'm off to pursue internet ventures/binge drinking," he wrote. "Possibly that relaxation thing I've read so much about. By the time the last episode airs, you'll know what my next project is. But for now there's a lot of work still to be done, and disappointment to bear. Thank you all for your support, your patience, your excellent adverts. See you again." (Hollywood Reporter, Whedonesque)

ABC has canceled struggling Kelsey Grammer comedy series Hank and has yanked it off of the schedule, effective immediately. The network will instead use the Wednesdays at 8 pm timeslot to air a mix of comedy specials and holiday specials. There are five unaired episodes of the Warner Bros. Television-produced Hank on the shelves and it's not clear whether any of these installments will air. News comes after the network opted not to pick up supernatural drama Eastwick for its back nine, while the rest of ABC's Wednesday lineup--Modern Family, The Middle, and Cougar Town--have all been picked up for full seasons. (Variety)

Syfy has ordered five half-hour episodes of hybrid animated comedy Outer Space Astronauts. Series, from executive producers Russell Barret, David O. Russell, and Scott Puckett, will follow "eight military misfits who journey to the far reaches of the galaxy on board the O.S.S. Oklahoma" in a style that will blend both live-action as well as 2D and 3D animation techniques. It's slated to launch on December 8th. "Syfy fans have never seen animation quite like this before," Syfy EVP of original content Mark Stern told the Hollywood Reporter. "Out of the basement and mind of show creator, Russell Barrett, he's delivered a funny and fresh take on the future of underground and homegrown animation today." (Hollywood Reporter)

Martha Plimpton, Lucas Neff, and Olesya Rulin have been cast in FOX single-camera comedy pilot Keep Hope Alive, from writer/executive producer Greg Garcia. Project, from 20th Century Fox Television, follows Jimmy, a 25-year-old man (Neff) who is forced to raise his infant child with the help of his quirky family after the mother, with whom he had a one-night stand, ends up on death row. Plimpton will play Jimmy's no-nonsense mother. Michael Fresco is attached to direct. (Hollywood Reporter)

Author Ray Bradbury has signed a deal with indie producers White Oak Films to develop The Bradbury Chronicles, a six-hour miniseries based on six of his short stories. No network is currently attached to the project, which will be executive produced by Bradbury, John Dayton, Merrill Capps, Todd Klick, Cory Travalena, and Dale Olson, with Bradbury himself adapting his own work. (Variety)

Scott Cohen (Gilmore Girls) and Stephanie Childers (Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip) have been cast in ABC Family's untitled Michael Jacobs single-camera comedy pilot, where Cohen will play an unemployed architect who "begins to mentor his underdog middle daughter, while his veterinarian wife (Childers) shares a closer bond with their Type-A older daughter." Elsewhere at ABC Family, Troian Bellisario and Ian Harding will star opposite Lucy Hale in drama pilot Pretty Little Liars. (Hollywood Reporter)

FOX has given a series order to Mark Burnett-produced game show Our Little Genius, in which child geniuses, ranging from six to twelve years old, are given the chance to put their knowledge to the test and earn cash prizes. "In television, we often showcase kids who are incredible singers, actors or dancers, so it's high time we give the spotlight to kids with incredible brains," said Mike Darnell, President of Alternative Entertainment, Fox Broadcasting Company, in a statement. "The kids on this show are ridiculously smart, and with its unique appeal to both parents and children alike, I think Our Little Genius is one of Mark Burnett's most compelling creations yet." (via press release)

Warner Bros. Television has signed a new three-year overall deal with Old Christine creator Kari Lizer, under which she will develop projects for the studio as well as remain on board Old Christine as executive producer, should the series be picked up by CBS for a sixth season. (Hollywood Reporter)

NBC has confirmed its plans for its musical competition series The Sing-Off and will strip the series across a single week beginning Monday, December 14th. Series, from Tenth Planet Prods., Outlaw Entertainment, and Sony Pictures Television, will launch with a two-hour installment and air double-length episodes on Tuesday, December 15th and Wednesday, December 16th before wrapping up with a two-hour finale on Monday, December 21st. It will take a breather on Thursday, December 17th, when NBC airs a two-hour primetime Saturday Night Live Christmas special. (Variety)

BBC Two has acquired UK rights to Showtime's dark comedy series Nurse Jackie, which it plans to launch early next year. (Variety)

Elsewhere at the British terrestrial network, Mad Men's Vincent Kartheiser will star opposite Nick Frost (Hot Fuzz), Emma Pierson (Little Dorrit), and Jerry Hall (Calendar Girls) in a BBC Two adaptation of Martin Amis' novel Money, a "comedic tale of excess, greed and flawed ambition set at the beginnings of Eighties capitalism." Production begins this month on the two one-hour installments, written by Tom Butterworth and Chris Hurford and directed by Jeremy Lovering. (BBC)

Broadcast's Robin Parker takes a look at the new production models emerging as American and British comedy writers join forces, with several Atlantic-crossing series such as David Cross' The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret and Matt LeBlanc-led Episodes becoming a reality. (Broadcast)

CurrentTV pinkslipped 80 full-time staffers yesterday in the company's Los Angeles, London, New York, and San Francisco offices as the cabler moves from a shortform content strand to a more traditional television network model, with its schedule likely to be filled mostly by acquisitions. (Hollywood Reporter)

TruTV has ordered reality series NFL Full Contact, which will offers viewers a behind-the-scenes-look into the inner workings of the football league and focus on key personalities within the sport. Series, from executive producers Steve Sabol and Anthony Horn, will launch on February 8th. (Variety)

Stay tuned.

Channel Surfing: One Former "Lost" Star Won't Be Returning, Joss Whedon to Direct "Glee," FOX Gets In Bed with Thieves and Polygamists, and More

Welcome to your Tuesday morning television briefing.

E! Online's Kristin Dos Santos is reporting that one former castmember of ABC's Lost is holding out against a return to the series for its sixth and final season. "Sources close to ABC's Lost tell me that although most of the original cast—holler!—will be seen in some capacity for the show's upcoming season, one former Lost castmember has turned down an offer to return to the series," writes Dos Santos. "So who is it? Well, you know we can't name names in such cases, but suffice it to say that this is a person you'd assume would very much want to return to the series. According to my moles, offers went out to the original castmembers several weeks ago, and this particular Lost star decided to decline. While some of the other returning Losties have already filmed scenes, this Lost holdout has not been on the set or filmed anything for the series, according to insiders." And, oh, it's not Ian Somerhalder... So who could it be? [Editor: my guess? Harold Perrineau.] (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello is reporting that Joss Whedon will direct an upcoming episode of FOX's Glee later this season, but it shouldn't be construed as a sign about Dollhouse getting the axe; Whedon will shoot the Glee episode after Dollhouse has wrapped its thirteen-episode run. "Joss directed one of the great musical episodes in the history of television on Buffy," Glee co-creator Ryan Murphy told Ausiello, "so this is a great, if unexpected, fit. I’m thrilled he’ll be loaning us his fantastic groundbreaking talent." (Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello)

Whedon himself addressed the news via a comment on Whedonesque, where he wrote, "What can we expect from a 'Joss Whedon' epsiode of Glee? An episode of Glee. God willin' and the crik don't rise, a good one. A television director's job is, on some level, to be anonymous; to find the most compelling way to present a story without calling attention to himself. I had a wonderful time doing just that on The Office, and hope to again. A guest director can bring a huge amount to the party (we've had CRAZY talent on Dollhouse), but the party isn't his. I just want to work with good people on a show that I like enough to have watched every episode several times." (Whedonesque)

In other Glee-related news, Spring Awakening's Jonathan Groff has been cast in a multiple-episode story arc on the FOX musical-comedy series. He's set to appear in roughly five or six episodes as the lead male singer of the glee club's rival Vocal Adrenaline and a potential love interest for Lea Michele's Rachel. (Entertainment Weekly's Hollywood Insider)

FOX has given script orders plus penalties to two new drama projects: a US remake of 1999 British crime drama Daylight Robbery, about a group of housewives who turn to a life of crime in order to raise some cash, and Midland, about a polygamist with two wives. The former project, from 20th Century Fox Television, will be adapted by Karyn Usher (Bones), who will executive produce with creator Jane Hewland, Michael Thorn, and Marty Adelstein. The latter, from Fox Television Studios, is created by writer/executive producer Kyle Killen. (Variety)

Fox21 and Platinum Studios are developing a series based on comic book Indestructible Man, about an "elite secret agent who can't be killed and discovers the hard way the difference between 'indestructible' and 'unbreakable.'" (Hollywood Reporter)

Former NCIS star Sasha Alexander has been cast to guest star in an upcoming episode of FOX's House, where she will play "House and Wilson’s genetically-blessed new neighbor," whom both men quickly develop crushes on. She's currently slated to appear in one episode, which will air in either late 2009 or early 2010. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

FOX has ordered three additional scripts for drama series Lie to Me, which is struggling in the ratings during its second season. The series currently has a thirteen-episode commitment from the network. (Hollywood Reporter)

E! Online's Kristin Dos Santos is reporting that there are more crossovers in the works between Grey's Anatomy and Private Practice as well as rumors of a potential third series. I'm told by insiders that there should be at least two more crossovers before the season is through," writes Dos Santos, "though they have yet to hammer out details." (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

NBC has ordered eight episodes of Losing It With Jillian, a companion series to The Biggest Loser which will follow trainer Jillian Michaels as she travels the country helping overweight Americans slim down without having to attend a Biggest Loser-style boot camp. Project, from Reveille and Empowered Media, will also feature celebrity chef Curtis Stone and will be executive produced by Michaels, Giancarlo Cherisch, Mark Koops, Howard Owens, and Ellen Rakieten. No airdate has been set. (Hollywood Reporter's The Live Feed)

IFC has acquired off-network rights to all three seasons of comedy Arrested Development, which it will air on Sunday and Tuesday evenings beginning October 25th. (Variety)

ABC Family is said to be close to handing out a pilot order to drama Pretty Little Liars, based on the series of novels by Sara Shepard about four friends of a social queen bee who vanished without a trace who are thrown for a loop when they start receiving messages from her from beyond the grave. Former Privileged star Lucy Hale is in advanced talks to star in the series, which will be adapted by Marlene King and executive produced by King, Bob Levy, and Leslie Morgenstein. Project hails from Alloy Entertainment and Warner Bros. Television. (Hollywood Reporter)

TVGuide.com's Natalie Abrams talks with 90210's Gillian Zinser about her role as surfer Ivy the CW soap. "She's definitely the quintessential California girl, but she's smart. She's really smart and sassy and quick-witted," Zinser told Abrams. "She's totally one of the guys, as she's part of the surf team and demands her respect in that manner. But a lot of that confident, bro'd out shtick is soon to be broken down when you see her vulnerable for the first time in her intimate moments with Liam. Although she joins the cast as an atypical chick, you see a lot of layers unravel and unfold the more we get to know her." (TVGuide.com)

Disney Channel has renewed The Suite Life on Deck for a third season. (Variety)

Stay tuned.

Sweet Little Dolls: An Advance Review of Season Two of "Dollhouse"

I was largely on the fence about the freshman season of Joss Whedon's Dollhouse.

Conceptually, I felt that there were some fascinating ideas about identity and perception embedded in the series' overarching concept but I felt that these concepts were often let down by some fundamentally flawed execution on a weekly basis. In other words: I wanted to love the series but I found time and time again that I couldn't. Perhaps it was the regular occurrence of plot holes large and numerous, making Dollhouse resemble something akin to Swiss cheese.

The unaired thirteen episode of Dollhouse's first season, entitled "Epitaph One," did manage to change my feelings about the series; it offered a much darker and edgier version of Dollhouse and imbued the series with a strong throughline and narrative purpose. Given that the episode never aired in the US (and is still only available to screen on the Season One DVD boxset or on iTunes), it will be interesting to see as time goes on how "Epitaph One" reshapes the narrative direction of the series.

I was extremely curious then to watch Dollhouse's second season opener ("Vows"), written and directed by Joss Whedon, to see if they learned any lessons from "Epitaph One" or the series' uneven first season.

So what I did I think of "Vows" then? Let's discuss.

For one, I still find Eliza Dushku the least interesting element of the series, which is a bit of a sticky wicket as she is the series' nominal lead. However, she's largely outshone each week by the supporting actors, particularly Dichen Lachman, Enver Gjokaj, Amy Acker, Harry Lennix, and Olivia Williams, and that trend continues in the second season opener.

While Lachman is relegated to the sidelines in this installment (very sadly, though Sierra does get a corker of a tiny scene with Ivy), Acker gets some major attention in this episode, which largely focuses on the fallout from Claire Saunders learning at the end of last season that she's actually an Active named Whiskey. The A-storyline might revolve around Echo's latest engagement (which involves her marriage to a shady arms dealer played by Battlestar Galactica's Jamie Bamber), but it's Claire's story that packs more punch, emotionally anyway, as she's faced to come to terms with the truth about her identity. I won't say how this plays out exactly but I will say that it involves tormenting her "maker" Topher (Fran Kranz) and ties in somewhat with echoes of a Boyd/Claire relationship glimpsed in the "Epitaph One" post-apocalyptic storyline.

It's a shame that Acker isn't a series regular on Dollhouse (she'll instead co-star in ABC's abysmal mystery drama series Happy Town) as Claire brings a stark fragility and depth to the series. Acker has excelled throughout her career at playing brilliantly complex individuals and her Claire/Whiskey is no departure from this formula. Armed with the knowledge about her lack of identity in "Vows," Claire is even more dangerous, fierce, and resourceful. Whether she's out for vengeance or self-awareness, I'll let you discover for yourselves tonight.

Echo and Tahmoh Penikett's Paul Ballard are meant to be the audience's entry point into the world of the Dollhouse, but both of their characters are so distant--and Paul Ballard in particular so chilly and vacant--that it's hard to get a grasp on them or feel much compassion for their situation.

That situation gets even more trippy in the season opener as there's an unexpected twist to Echo's engagement that I didn't see coming, even as I can't quite work out some of its implications. We're meant to feel that there's a connection between them that defies identity and logic but I still don't feel it a season in. Part of that, I think is that Ballard is so unlikable and unsympathetic that it's difficult to wrap your head around their, uh, complicated relationship.

Bamber is fantastic as Martin Klar, a wealthy financier who weds Echo but whose business is just a front for international arms trading. It's a nice change of pace to see Bamber portray a villain for a change (and with his native British accent as well!) and he carries off the role with aplomb. While we only catch a quick scene with Alexis Denisof's Senator Daniel Perrin in the first episode, I'm intrigued to see just where this storyline will go; he seems hell-bent on bringing down the Dollhouse (too bad Ballard didn't know him during the first season) but I can't help but question his motives. Hmmmm...

All in all, "Vows" is an intriguing start to a season that will either broaden Dollhouse's fanbase or keep it limited to its cult audience on Friday evenings. I'm hoping that the dramatic tension of "Epitaph One" can continue to infuse the series with a new purpose and a strengthened mythology and that Whedon and the series' writers continue to focus more on the supporting characters, transforming the series into more of an ensemble drama with Dushku's Echo at its core rather than The Echo Show. Which, in my eyes anyway, isn't the Dollhouse I want to be playing in.

Dollhouse premieres tonight at 9 pm ET/PT on FOX.

Channel Surfing: Whedon Talks "Dollhouse" Season Two, J.J. Abrams' Bad Robot Lands FOX Comedy, Amaury Nolasco Leaves "Southland," and More

Welcome to your Wednesday morning television briefing.

Los Angeles Times' Show Tracker has an interview with Dollhouse creator Joss Whedon about Season Two of the FOX drama series, which returns on Friday. Asked about how malleable the future depicted in the unaired thirteen episode "Epitaph One" is, Whedon said, "We talked about whether it was malleable or not, and right now we pretty much take it as gospel. But then we have a lot of different opinions about how it gets there and who does what. We're fascinated by the implications of this future, and a lot of this season has been guided by it without being so beholden to it that people who didn't see it won't understand. We were incited by the idea that the abuse of power is more widespread than just this one house." (Los Angeles Times' Show Tracker)

J.J. Abrams' production shingle Bad Robot has landed a pilot presentation order from FOX for a half-hour comedy series that's being described as a "medical comedy." Details on the project are being kept firmly under wraps, though it's known that Mike Markowitz (Becker) is writing the script and will executive produce the pilot along with Abrams and Bryan Burk. (Variety)

Major casting change for NBC's police drama Southland. Prison Break's Amaury Nolasco has departed the project after filming just three episodes; he played an aggressive new partner for Regina King's Detective Lydia Adams. No reason was given for his departure. Stepping in: Extract's Clifton Collins, who will play a new character named Ray Suarez who "is still being fleshed out." (Hollywood Reporter)

Showtime and DreamWorks Television are said to be developing a scripted series that will revolve around the mounting of a Broadway musical, which would then actually play on the Great White Way after the series airs. The network is said to be in talks with executive producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron as well as songwriters Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman. Meetings are underway to find a writer for the series, whose format--half-hour or hour--is under discussion. (Variety)

Campbell Scott, Lily Tomlin, Keith Carradine, and Martin Short have joined the cast of FX's Damages for the series' third season. (Televisionary)

Bill Condon (Kinsey) will direct Showtime dark comedy pilot The C Word, which stars Laura Linney as a suburbanite who is diagnosed with cancer. Project, from Sony Pictures Television and Original Film, is written and executive produced by Darlene Hunt and executive produced by Neal H. Moritz and Vivian Cannon. Production on the pilot starts this fall. (via press release)

E! Online's Jennifer Godwin has the scoop on the upcoming season of ABC's Private Practice (including news that Chris Lowell won't be appearing in all 22 episodes) and talks to Kate Walsh about Addison's backstory and what's coming up for the flame-haired doc this season. "There will be more Addison family members coming to the show this year," Walsh told E! Online. "I'm not sure who's going to come over from the East Coast, but I'm sure they're going to be good and WASP-y and awesome. When Grant Show came on last year as my brother, it was fun for me to see Addison in that lower-status position, as someone's daughter or little sister. It's really fun to play because she's such a fierce and agro personality at work, and then to see her smacked down at home is fun." (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

NBC is getting back into the international co-production game with the acquisition of Canadian two-hour backdoor pilot The Mountain from Muse Entertainment. Project, written and directed by Doug Barr, will revolve around a woman who moves her family to the mountains, where they move into a cabin she inherited from her uncle, who may or may not be dead. (Variety)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello has details about Heather Locklear's return to Melrose Place, where she will play Ella's boss at the PR firm where she works. He talks to Melrose Place star Katie Cassidy about Amanda Woodward and gets some additional hints at a workplace showdown between the two. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

MTV has announced that its new comedies Disaster Date and Popzilla will launch on Monday back-to-back in the 6 pm ET/PT timeslot. (Variety)

The Wrap's Joe Adalian is reporting that the CW has ordered eight episodes of half-hour docusoap Fly Girls, which will follow five flight attendants from Virgin America as they jet off to such locales as New York, Las Vegas, and South Beach looking for "good times, great parties, adventure and love." Project, from Collins Avenue, will be executive produced by Jeff Collins and Colin Nash and is expected to launch in early 2010. (The Wrap's TVMoJoe)

Shine International has acquired international distribution rights to FX's six-episode animated comedy Archer, which launches in January. (Variety)

Cookie Jar Entertainment has hired former UPN and Regency TV executive Maggie Murphy as SVP of development, where she will focus on developing content aimed at tweens and will report to Tom Mazza. Murphy was most recently president of Kiefer Sutherland's shingle Eastside Entertainment. (Variety)

Stay tuned.

Comic-Con Update: 20th Century Fox Announces Panels, Talent For SDCC Next Month

After weeks of anticipation (and speculation), 20th Century Fox has finally announced which series they will be bringing down to San Diego Comic-Con next month.

The unusual suspects--24, Bones, Dollhouse, The Simpsons--are all going to be on hand to present cast and producer panels throughout the weekend but the studio has also announced panels for Glee, Cleveland Show, American Dad, and Futurama to boot.

Meanwhile, such boldface names as Kiefer Sutherland, Mary Lynn Rajskub, Anil Kapoor, Freddie Prinze, Jr. Katee Sackhoff, Joss Whedon, Eliza Dushku, David Boreanaz, Emily Deschanel, Matt Groening, Seth MacFarlane, Seth Green, Mila Kunis, and the cast of Glee will be on hand as well.

The full press release from 20th Century Fox Television can be be found below, along with dates and times (and descriptions) of each of their panels.

TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX TELEVISION BRINGS NINE SHOWS TO COMIC-CON

Kiefer Sutherland, Mary Lynn Rajskub, Anil Kapoor, Freddie Prinze, Jr. Katee Sackhoff, Joss Whedon, Eliza Dushku, David Boreanaz, Emily Deschanel, Matt Groening, Seth MacFarlane, Seth Green, Mila Kunis, Stars of “Glee, ” “Futurama,” “Cleveland Show,” “American Dad” Among Those Scheduled To Appear

June 24, 2009, Hollywood, CA – Twentieth Century Fox Television will once again dominate the San Diego Comic-Con convention, with stars and creators of nine of its signature shows heading down to the world famous fan gathering next month for panels, autograph signings at the Fox booth and press appearances.

Descriptions, times and locations of the Fox panels follow:

FRIDAY, JULY 24:

2:15-3:00 P.M. Coming off its most critically acclaimed season in years, 24 stars Kiefer Sutherland, Mary Lynn Rajskub and new cast members Anil Kapoor, Freddie Prinze, Jr. and Katee Sackhoff join showrunnner Howard Gordon and the producers of the Emmy-winning series for a special sneak peek at the heart-stopping premiere episode of Season 8. Ballroom 20.

3-3:45 P.M. Bones showrunner Hart Hanson and stars David Boreanaz and Emily Deschanel are on hand for a discussion of what’s on deck for Booth and Brennan, hot on the heels of this year's much talked-about season finale in which the pair finally wound up between the sheets. Ballroom 20.

4 P.M-6 P.M. Join Dollhouse creator Joss Whedon and star/producer Eliza Dushku for a no-holds-barred Q & A about what they have planned for season 2, after they unveil a special screening of the NEVER BEFORE SEEN “Epitaph One” episode of the Fox hit which releases on DVD just four days later. Ballroom 20.

SATURDAY, JULY 25:

11:15 A.M.-12 P.M Join Seth MacFarlane, Mila Kunis, Seth Green and the brilliant creative minds behind Family Guy for a raucous discussion of what goes on behind the scenes of tv's most subversive animated hit. They’ll also be offering a not-to-be-missed sneak peek at "Something, Something Dark Side," the Empire Strikes Back parody follow-up to Star Wars: Blue Harvest. Giggity! Ballroom 20.
12-12:45 P.M. Con fans will get the FIRST LOOK at The Cleveland Show, the wickedly funny new spin-off of Family Guy starring America's favorite beleaguered animated African American, Cleveland Brown. Co-creators Seth MacFarlane, Mike Henry and Rich Appel and voice cast Sana’a Lathan and Kevin Michael Richardson will all be on hand to discuss this new series premiering on Fox in the fall. Ballroom 20.

1-1:45 P.M. Futurama: Life or Death?! BE A PART OF SCI-FI HISTORY! Join Executive Producers Matt Groening and David X. Cohen, and stars Billy West, Katey Sagal, John DiMaggio and Maurice LaMarche for high-stakes thrills as a top-ranking Fox executive decides live, on stage, whether Futurama will make yet another triumphant return, or whether it is gone forever! The very fate of Futurama hangs in the balance! Paramedics will be standing by in case the intense excitement causes any panelists to collapse. Raucous celebration or abject despair to follow the news. Ballroom 20.

1:45-2:30 P.M. Now entering its record-breaking 21st season on the air, The Simpsons is the longest-running series in the history of American television, and a household name around the world. Get a behind-the-scenes look at what's coming up in the Simpsonverse, including never-before-seen highlights from the upcoming "Treehouse of Horror XX", with a panel including Simpsons Creator Matt Groening, Showrunner Al Jean, Executive Producer Matt Selman and Supervising Director Mike Anderson. Ballroom 20.

1:30-3 P.M. When Fox aired a special preview of its subversive new comedy musical series Glee after the American Idol finale, the response was through the roof and fans have hungered for another episode ever since. The wait is over! Join stars Matthew Morrison, Lea Michele and Cory Monteith and the producers of the Fox hit for a sneak preview screening of a never-before-broadcast episode with panel discussion to follow. Don’t Stop Believin’, Con fans! Glee is here! Indigo Room.

SUNDAY, JULY 26:

11:15 A.M.-12:15 P.M. American Dad showrunners Mike Barker and Matt Weitzman and stars Seth MacFarlane, Wendy Schall and Dee Bradley Baker are back to regale the fans with an insider’s look at how an episode of the hilarious Fox animated comedy is made, from table read to animatic to color. Don’t miss this one-of-a-kind Comic-con event. Ballroom 20.

Pendragon Aflight: Anthony Head Talks "Ripper," "Buffy," "Merlin"

Wonder just what ever happened to Joss Whedon's Buffy prequel Ripper?

Speaking on a press call last week to promote his new series Merlin (which launches later this month on NBC), former Buffy star Anthony Head addressed some questions about that long-stalled Ripper project, plans which Head says were "sideswiped by Dollhouse."

Head, who plays Uther Pendragon on the NBC/BBC series, was candid about the likelihood of donning Rupert Giles' specs for another go-around as the much-beloved Watcher, created by Joss Whedon.

"Ripper is a kind of a - it's a funny old thing," said Head. "Whether it ever gets made or not... if it does ever get made, I'll probably be an octogenarian by the time it does. But it is something I actually introduced Joss to [Doctor Who producer] Julie Gardner, who was a producer with the BBC. She has long wanted to do something with the project. There are obviously complications with Ripper because there are lots of tie ins. There's FOX, there's the Kazuis. There's all sorts of stuff that, basically it isn't just a simple question of Joss making a series that he wants to make as far as anything concerned with Buffy. There are a lot of people down the line that would have a say. And that's part of the equation."

"We've had conversations about working together again," said Head about future collaboration with Whedon. "It's, I don't know, something that may happen again in the future. I hope so. [...] He came up with an idea, pitched it at lunch with Eliza and from that moment on it was a done deal. I don't think, I may be wrong, but I don't think any of the Buffy crew could really, well not crew because there's a lot of Buffy crew working on Dollhouse, but actors would really fit comfortably in Dollhouse because you'd automatically be, you know, you'd be taken to Faith."

"And Eliza is not Faith in Dollhouse," he continued. "She's a fascinating character that, you know, lives a totally different life from Faith and it came out through the life of Faith that, you know, she'd like to - she'd like to play something different than what Eliza is usually asked to play. And he came up with the idea that she could play something different every week. And from there Dollhouse was born. But I would love to work with him again. I think he's a fascinating writer, fascinating director. He's a lovely, lovely guy. I'm very, very fond of him and I would - I'd, you know, I don't use the word genius lightly but I think he is one."

"I think [Joss] really is a great writer," said Head. "I would like to see him make more movies. I think, you know, I thought Serenity was a funny film and actually it was hugely well received by critics and at the same time was not possibly marketed as well as it might have been. It was a great film. He makes writing really count. It's not just writing for writing sake. He gives everything a life and a reason. With Dollhouse, I think he had problems initially with Fox because they wanted one show and he was sticking readily with his guns. And I think they've gone with it now because they realized that ultimately it's wonderfully complex and i all the characters have got all sorts of neuroses and problems. I mean it's a fascinating world that he's created with Dollhouse."

"And it's what they've done with Merlin; by creating a world in which magic is forbidden on pain of death, they've created a very, very interesting world for a young Merlin to exist or not to, you know, basically fight for his life," said Head. "A good drama is about conflict. And if like Joss Whedon you can allow comedy to come through to support your drama, it makes the thrills and spills that much more pertinent and that much more poignant when you do get it. When you get the shop horror it gives you a bed to feed it in. You know, and then ultimately that's what makes its appeal so wide."

So, given how much time has passed since Whedon first approached Head about Ripper, have their plans changed significantly?

"Originally when he pitched [Ripper] to me, he didn't have to pitch it very fast, I was like yes," remembered Head. "It was a series. And it was Giles as this sad lonely man in England without a real reason to be. And it was pretty much ghost stories. Week-by-week, some ghost story would somehow affect him."

"And then he said that he didn't [feel]--I mean he by that time I think he had been affected by Angel--the need to write a weekly story," he went on. "I think he found at that point the drive was different. And so he suggested this one film he was going to make. And he told me the story that he'd written and it's absolutely beautiful. And I hope that one day it gets made whether it's the guise of Ripper or whether we just sell it as a story, a one-off TV movie. It's a lovely, lovely story. It's kind of a ghost story. It's also about a man investigating his own soul and it's fascinating and lovely and sad and it's classic ghost reading. I hope we get to make it one day. And from there on in he was going to, you know, if it was successful maybe he could have been convinced to do a series. And as I say he's back in the seat of doing a weekly series with Dollhouse. Maybe he can be convinced otherwise. But never say never but at the same time, I think it's on the shelf for a while."

"I don't think we'll every really know [what Ripper means]," said Head. "I think Ripper just means it's the darker side of someone that suddenly see that you never every knew existed. And it's a very dark side. And we got to see some of it in Buffy. You know, he's the only guy who killed an innocent man in Buffy. Well Faith did. But Faith is bad. But he smothered somebody who ultimately was a innocent bystander. And so [had] some darkness. That's Ripper."

So is Head still surprised by all the attention he gets from Buffy fans years after its cancellation?

"It wasn't cancelled. It was never cancelled," said Head, chidingly. "Just we took a bow and decided to basically that he had said enough. Although having said that and I haven't seen it all, but Season Eight is alive and kicking in comic book form."

"No, I'm not surprised [by the continued support of Buffy fans] inasmuch as ultimately Buffy was an extraordinary piece of writing," he continued. "And because of that, the fact that it was used by universities as an example of modern writing. I'm amazed when I got to LA and I go and meet producers who came up as writers and Buffy was almost their bible and they almost genuflect. So it's always very flattering but it's nothing to do with me. It's because I worked with Joss Whedon. What does amaze me, and the fact that I love, is that I'm constantly met by young people and I think that they've seen something else I'm in, Little Britain or Merlin and Buffy goes - I don't know what it does in the States but it goes round and round. It's cyclical here and it keeps garnering young audiences. And long may that be so because it is great TV."

"But one of the things that appeals about Buffy was the fact that it was so multi generational," Head reflected. "It was - even though FOX didn't market it this way, FOX marketed it for 15-year-olds to 25-year-olds. [...] It is truly universal appeal and that is the secret of Merlin as well. It has this extraordinary general, multi-generational appeal that people come up to me in the street and say thank you. I go it's nothing to do with me. I didn't write it. But they say this is truly a show that we can sit down with our kids and everybody loves it. Everybody - it's a truly family show. And there's not that many shows that parents and grandparents and brothers and sisters, teens, 25-year-olds down to the age of six can actually enjoy a show together. There's something in it for everybody. And it's once every few years a show like it comes along... It's kind of very simple, very basic premise but it's a very clever premise. And as I say, it somehow appeals to everyone."

Has Head been typecast then since he first played Rupert Giles on Buffy?

"Actors generally, you get a recurring role in this and a recurring role in that," said Head. "I mean I've been very, very fortunate to play leads in a number of series; and very different types of things. And to a certain extent I've worked quite hard not to be typecast. You know, when initially when I came back from Buffy there were quite of offers of professors and the occasional librarian but they were largely professors. There was an episode of Doctor Who that I did. And initially I balked at it because it was headmaster and then I read that it was a headmaster who ate children and ultimately was actually a demon who flew. I kind of - I went one round and it was a great episode and it was great fun to do."

"But it's more than that," he continued. "You know, trying to find something, which will develop your career, will take you on to something new and will open people's minds up. I mean Giles for me was a huge, huge turning point because it was the first character role that I had played. And up to that point in England I was playing romantic leads. You know, that to a certain extent was not limiting but it basically it was just going in one direction. And the thing that Buffy gave me was an opportunity to show people that I did other stuff and it was the first time I'd really been - even though Giles wasn't necessarily a comic role, there was a lot of comedy in it."

"And so it gave the producers of Little Britain the idea that I could play a straight man in a comedy and he plays it absolutely straight down the line. But there has to be some comedy. Do you know what I mean? So Matt and David, I think, basically saw something in me that they thought would work in a comedy. So since then I've done quite a lot of comedy, per se. And it's great fun to be allowed to go from one genre to another. And go, you know, to do musicals the same as well. I'm very, very fortunate."

Merlin premieres Sunday, June 21st at 8 pm ET/PT on NBC.

Channel Surfing: Westfeldt and Boyd Clock in for "24," Grillo-Marxuach Bound for "Day One," "Doctor Who" Feature in Development, "Buffy," and More

Welcome to your Wednesday morning television briefing.

Jennifer Westfeldt (Grey's Anatomy) and John Boyd (The Notorious Bettie Page) have been cast in Day Eight of FOX drama series 24. Westfeldt will recur as journalist Meredith Reed, an ambitious writer who has ties to Middle East leader Arman Hashemi (Anil Kapoor), who arrives in the U.S. on a peacemaking mission. Boyd, meanwhile, will be a series regular and will play CTU analyst Jonah Schwartz. (Hollywood Reporter)

The Middleman creator Javier Grillo-Marxuach has joined the writing staff of NBC's upcoming sci-fi series Day One, where he will serve as writer/co-executive producer. Also joining the writing staff, according to series creator Jesse Alexander (who broke the news via Twitter): Kings' Erik Oleson, and Angela Kang. (io9)

BBC Films has confirmed that a big screen version of Doctor Who is being developed and that development of a script is currently underway. It's unclear whether inbound showrunner Steven Moffat or executive producer Russell T. Davies will write the feature film or if David Tennant or his replacement, Matt Smith, would play the Doctor. (Digital Spy)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello has contacted Joss Whedon for a reaction to the news that director/producer Fran Rubel Kuzui is planning a feature film reboot of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Joss' noncommittal reply? "I hope it's cool," wrote Whedon via email. Ahem. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

HBO will launch comedy series Hung, starring Thomas Jane, Jane Adams, and Anne Heche, on June 28th at 10 pm ET/PT, following an episode of True Blood. The first episode of Hung runs a lengthy 45 minutes while the subsequent installments will each run 30 minutes. (Variety)

The Hollywood Reporter's The Live Feed has a hysterical cartoon jokingly depicting FOX executives deciding the fate of on-the-bubble sci-fi series Dollhouse and Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles at gunpoint. (The Hollywood Reporter's The Live Feed)

BBC America will launch supernatural drama Being Human, about a werewolf, vampire, and ghost who live together, on Saturday, July 25th at 9 pm ET/PT. (Televisionary)

Bravo is developing reality spinoff The Real Housewives of Washington, D.C. and is said to be looking for "personalities who are among Washington, D.C.'s influential players, cultural connoisseurs, fashion sophisticates and philanthropic leaders -- the people who rub elbows with the most prominent people in the country," according to Bravo EVP/general manager Frances Berwick. Series, to be developed by Half Yard Productions, is expected to launch sometime in 2010. (via press release)

Al Pacino will star in an untitled HBO telepic about Dr. Jack Kevorkian. Set in the early 1990s, the film will follow Kevorkian (Pacino) as he creates the first assisted suicide machine and the resulting media frenzy. Project, written by Adam Mazer and based on Harry Wilie and Neal Nicol's biography "Between the Dying and the Dead," will be directed by Barry Levinson. (Variety)

ABC is following through on its plans to merge ABC Entertainment and ABC Studios into a single unit under president Steve McPherson. While the network is said to still be finalizing its "development chain of command," it's widely thought that Suzanne Patmore-Gibbs--who currently serves as EVP of drama development--would be promoted to become McPherson's second-in-command, leaving Channing Dungey to take over as the network's head of drama and Josh Barry to replace Dungey on the studio side. (Hollywood Reporter)

Carol Kane will reprise her Homicide: Life on the Street role as Gwen Munch, the ex-wife of Detective John Munch (Richard Belzer) in the June 2nd season finale of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. The episode will also feature Nick Stahl (Carnivale), who will play Peter Harrison, an artist turned killer who has set his sights on one of the SVU team after he succumbs to mental illness and Kane's Gwen will have to help her ex-husband track him down. (via press release)

RelativityReal, the reality/alternative arm of Relativity Media, has signed a three-year overall deal with Wilmer Valderrama, under which he will create, develop, and executive produce series for both broadcast and cable networks. Valderrama is currently developing a half-hour telenovela Brooklyn Sound at MTV. (Variety)

Stay tuned.

Channel Surfing: "Buffy" Feature Sans Whedon, Tennant to Appear on "Sarah Jane Adventures," Sarah Chalke Uncertain about "Scrubs" Return, and More

Welcome to your Tuesday morning television briefing.

Could Buffy be heading back to the big screen... sans Joss Whedon, Sarah Michelle Gellar, or any of the supporting talents that made the franchise a success? Sadly, yes, in what appears to be shaping up as one of the worst ideas of the year. Executive producers Fran and Kaz Kuzui, along with Vertigo Entertainment's Roy Lee and Doug Davison are said to be developing a reboot of the Buffy franchise. (Fran Rubel Kuzui directed the original Buffy feature.) However, said project would not involve characters like Willow, Xander, Angel, or Spike (or, indeed any of the above elements) and would instead focus on a new slayer and would kick off a new franchise. The producers are currently meeting with writers and have not reached out to Joss Whedon about any involvement with the project. (Hollywood Reporter)

David Tennant will star opposite Elisabeth Sladen in two upcoming episodes of Doctor Who spin-off The Sarah Jane Adventures's third season. Reprising his role as the Doctor, Tennant will not just cameo but will play a leading role in a two-part episode when the series returns for its third season in September. "Viewers thought they may have to wait until November for the next full episode of Doctor Who, but this is an extra special treat," said executive producer Russell T. Davies. "And it's not just a cameo from David – this is a full-on appearance for The Doctor as he and Sarah Jane face their biggest threat ever." (BBC)

Sarah Chalke still hasn't made up her mind about whether she will reprise her role as Elliot on Season Nine of Scrubs, recently ordered by ABC. "I actually don't know yet what I'm going to do, but I will very soon. You guys will be the first to know. Regardless, I'm excited that the show got picked up again and it's going to go another year," Chalke, who stars in Lifetime's upcoming mini-series Maneater, told E! Online. ""I think the setup on Maneater kinds of lends itself to [an ongoing series] because you've got the close group of girlfriends, sort of a Sex and the City." (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

Reveille and Brillstein Entertainment have partnered to develop an unscripted series based on Twitter. Details are scarce but the project--to be executive produced by Amy Ephron, Kevin Foxe, Steve Latham, Mark Koops, Howard Owens, Jon Liebman, and Lee Kernis--is described as "putting ordinary people on the trail of celebrities in a revolutionary competitive format." (Variety)

Now that the dust has cleared after the network upfronts, it's clear who the real winner is this development season: studio Warner Bros. Television, who managed to sell a new series or have one renewed on every single broadcast network. Besides for NBC's Chuck, which got an eleventh hour renewal, the studio is behind such series as ABC’s Eastwick, Hank, The Forgotten, The Middle and V, Miami Trauma, Cold Case, and There Goes the Neighborhood at CBS, FOX’s Human Target and Past Life, and The CW’s Vampire Diaries, The Beautiful Life and Parental Discretion Advised, which will be co-produced with CBS Television Studios. "This season, it’s been very challenging," said WBTV President Peter Roth about the struggles the studio faced this year. "One network has five fewer hours of shelf space. The changing economic environment challenged every company. We are facing, most especially, the imperative to put on undeniable, can’t-miss, have-to-watch TV. It’s been a challenging year, perhaps more so than other years. I feel satisfied at least in terms of having been given our opportunities, a chance to get on the air with product I really believe in. The real test will be how many of these can be true long-term hits." (Broadcasting & Cable)

Hollywood Reporter's The Live Feed takes a look at some of the timeslot competition this fall, rating such competitors as ABC's Desperate Housewives and CBS' Three Rivers, Fringe against Grey's Anatomy and CSI, Southland against Medium, Dollhouse, and Ugly Betty, and Flash Forward vs. Survivor, Bones, and NBC's comedies. (Hollywood Reporter's The Live Feed)

Season Two of Merlin, which is set to air on BBC One this fall, will feature guest stars such as Mackenzie Crook (The Office), Sarah Parish (Mistresses), Adrian Lester (Hustle), Charles Dance (Bleak House), and Santiago Cabrera (Heroes). The series, which will air its first season Stateside on NBC this summer, stars Colin Morgan, Bradley James, Anthony Head, Katie McGrath, Angel Coulby, Richard Wilson, and John Hurt. (BBC)

Former USA executive Lindsay Sloane has been named FOX's co-head of drama programming, where she will oversee the department with Terence Carter and report to Matt Cherniss. Sloane replaces Rachel Bendavid, who is leaving the network. "We've established the ideal team to lead the next generation of drama development at FOX," said Matt Cherniss, who called Sloane a "gifted scripted series development executive." (Variety)

Stay tuned.

Valley of the Dolls, Part Two: Joss Whedon Talks "Man on the Street" and "Needs" Episodes of "Dollhouse"

A few weeks back, I had the opportunity to participate in a press call with Dollhouse creator Joss Whedon, who was answering questions about the series beyond the first initial episodes.

As Whedon had promised, Dollhouse would kick into gear with the "game-changing" episode "Man on the Street," which featured Patton Oswalt as a Dollhouse client with a specific need for Echo's skills as an Active.

While you were able to read the first part of the Dollhouse interview with Whedon here, I had to bank certain elements of his answers until the last three episodes had aired. Below you'll find what wasn't included the first time around as Whedon talks specifically about "Man on the Street" and Friday night's episode of Dollhouse, entitled "Needs."

As for why I couldn't include this information the first time around, it's because it's really spoilery. (Or maybe I did include it and just had Topher wipe your memory.)

Without further ado, here's what Whedon had to say about some of the twists revealed in the last three episodes.

Are we supposed to be wondering, after seeing "Man on the Street," if Echo really was compromised or if her efforts to reach Paul actually were just part of Adelle’s plan?

"You can go ahead and wonder that," teased Whedon, "but for now, I’d take it at face value."

In "Needs," when Sierra goes to the see Nolan (Vincent Ventresca), whom she says is who put her in the Dollhouse, should the audience walk away believing that he actually sold her into slavery?

"More or less," said Whedon. "I wouldn’t even say sold, so much as kidnapped. Her situation is by far the worst of anyone’s. How complicit the Dollhouse was in that, how much they actually knew about her past, we don’t go to in the episode, but what actually happened to her is just as appalling as anybody’s story."

Adelle tries to argue in "Needs" that most of the dolls are there voluntarily and the Dollhouse is performing a beneficial service for them by wiping out these other memories. But, even though this might be true in the case of November, does that continue to make the show uncomfortable or decrease the "ick factor"?

"I don’t know, maybe. It makes me uncomfortable," admitted Whedon. "I’m not going to lie. But for me, it’s part of what we’re dealing with. We’re dealing with people who have power and are abusing it and people who don’t and are trying to regain it. [...] In the instance of November, I think [Adelle] is providing a service or in the instance of, as we’ll find out, Victor might be providing a service that somebody is looking for. And then in other instances, that is going to be abused and the 'ick factor' gets very high. It seems to get high with Sierra quite a bit, I’m sorry to say, poor girl. She really gets put through it. But it’s not something we feel that we can shy away from without being a little hypocritical."

"The Patton Oswalt thing [in "Man on the Street"] was an attempt to address the humanity of it," continued Whedon, "the beauty of somebody who wants something with context as opposed to something that is purely sexual and then have Paul Ballard just completely not be convinced by any of it, just again and again, just hit him with it to say no, but that doesn’t matter to show the two completely opposing viewpoints and articulate both of them."

Now that we know there is actually 20 Dollhouses out there, will the series be cutting away to any of these other Dollhouses?

"We do get to see one of the higher ups and we talk about the other Dollhouses," said Whedon. "We didn’t want to do a Italian Wolfram and Hart gag, where we just use the same set and fill it with Italians. No, it’s one of my favorite things he ever did, but that’s because Angel was a lot sillier. So as the economy started to take a toll on our budget, that and the fact that we’ve thrown out our pilot, we hunkered down. So, no, you will not see Dollhouse: Tokyo in this season, but, boy, I’d like to.

"Dollhouse: Miami," joked Whedon about where the series would go. "It looks like we, glasses off, have got a doll."

Dollhouse airs Friday evenings at 9 pm ET/PT on FOX.

Valley of the Dolls: Joss Whedon Discusses "Man on the Street" Episode of "Dollhouse"

Tonight's episode of Dollhouse on FOX? It's the Joss Whedon-scripted "Man on the Street," the series' sixth installment and the one episode which many are holding up as the first time the dark drama series really hits its stride.

To promote this all-important episode, Dollhouse creator Joss Whedon participated in a conference call with press and answered some questions that were lingering in the minds of both audience members and journalists alike: will we ever see any of the Dollhouse's employees' personal lives, do some of the engagements (ahem, midwife) that Echo is assigned to make sense, and where's the trademark Whedon sense of humor? Will Whedon really leave television behind for new media?

And, yes, Joss addressed all of those questions and more. (You can read Whedon's earlier comments, made prior to Dollhouse's premiere, here.)

Given that tonight's episode, "Man on the Street" better represents Whedon's vision for Dollhouse, what was it like writing the script for this installment?

"I wrote it faster than anything I’d ever written," said Whedon. "It just poured out of me. It was like all of that brewing that we've been doing became the soup of that episode and so it really was a game changer for us on set and in production. The staff and the cast read it and a lot of tumblers fell into place. That’s how we felt about the episode."

Was there any sense, however, that the "Man on the Street" episode was perhaps being over-hyped?

"There may be a negativity associated with hyping it, but for all of us, episodes like Episode Eight ["Needs"] and a lot of the following episodes really work on the model of 'Man on the Street' more than anything else," Whedon said. "So it was a big moment for us. It was a moment that we felt like we found a level and we were really proud of it. So I figure that other people may feel differently, but we walked away from shooting that episode going, okay, we just added a layer and we feel pretty excited about it."

As for what changed with "Man on the Street," Whedon was frank about what finally clicked within him while breaking this episode.

"I think it was doing an episode that somebody who had never seen the show could walk in on because it explains very clearly the premise," he said. "In fact, it’s kind of about explaining the premise and at the same time really getting under the skin of the Dollhouse and of Paul’s character and of what’s going on with everybody and the workings of the place and coming at it sideways, rather than just showing an engagement and flipping in some information around that engagement. This was one where we really got to look at the cogs of the clock and that’s what gave it such momentum for us."

So if this episode approaches the mythology of the series from a "sideways" place, much like Dollhouse's original pilot, was it a case of Whedon finding the series or the network finally relenting and letting him do Dollhouse the way he wanted to?

"I think it was both," mused Whedon. "['Man on the Street'] definitely contains elements that were pitched or developed by people at the network in terms of the motivations of the Dollhouse and the feel of the politics of the thing and what’s going on: the thriller aspect... It’s very much full of the stuff that they were pitching. But it also is storytelling wise, much more how I had envisioned coming at it to be only in a sense that is clearer, than my original pilot. My original pilot was deliberately obtuse and you had to come along and stay with it and figure it out."

"This, we go right up front," he continued. "Here’s the situation. It’s a myth. This guy is looking for it and all that stuff. We lay it out as simply as we did in the first five, but because we get to get inside the Dollhouse more and have the events there take on much more resonance, it has got what I had hoped to bring to the other episodes that I didn't really have the opportunity as much. So I felt like it was really finding the code to a show that I can do my best work in that the network still really can get behind. So it was a meeting of the minds."

And while this episode features the first face-to-face (and yes, "fist-to-fist") encounter between Echo and FBI Agent Paul Ballard (Tahmoh Penikett), don't look for any exploration of the reasons why Paul is so determined to track down the Dollhouse.

"We don’t really go back into his story in the first season, the first of so many seasons that there will inevitably be," said Whedon, rather tongue-in-cheek. "We feel like there’s a thorn in his side and we feel that we can push it further and twist it and possibly hit a vital organ."

Likewise, this season won't really deal with the motivations behind why Boyd Langton (Harry Lennix) is working for the Dollhouse.

"I will tell you without reservation that in this season, we don’t answer it," he admitted.

But Whedon does say that we will see the handler/Active dynamic between Boyd and Echo change over the course of the season... into something that might just approach the rapport between Buffy and Giles.

"[Their relationship] is going to shift," said Whedon. "It’s definitely very much that same kind of de facto father figure. He definitely cares about her more than his job requires, but at the same time, he doesn't have the same opportunities in these first 13 [episodes] to really do anything to help her in that same sense. Their relationship is also going to have to shift a little in the ways that I’m not going to describe. But for us on the staff, that was sort of the bedrock place of no matter what happens with these guys, we know that he wants to protect her and it’s the only truly safe place in the Dollhouse is his paternal feeling toward Echo."

To return to a question that been asked several times before, is it possible that some of the employees of the Dollhouse are in fact imprinted Actives themselves?

"Yes, we talked about that and the different possibilities that we could tweak and the pasts that people have," said Whedon. "How many layers of unreality can you have in somebody’s identity and to an extent, we get very excited. We have to pull ourselves back and say if we make this a lie within a lie within a lie within a lie, people are just going to start slapping us. We’re like now we’re not invested in anybody. So we've talked about [it], but we've been very restrained with the concept because you have to have some touchstone of reality, even in this world."

Another question that keeps popping up among the series' viewers: why did Dollhouse get, well, imprinted with a lack of humor?

"There is humor in the show," said Whedon. "There’s a lot in the episode after 'Man on the Street.' But the fact of the matter is this is not a comedy... If there is a typical Whedon show, this is not it. It’s not the lighthearted romp that the other shows were... There’s definitely funny stuff coming up. There’s always moments of funny, but it doesn't build like a comedy. It wasn't designed to be a comedy. It’s not going to play that instrument. You have to do different things at different times. If people are feeling like it’s too serious, then either their expectation has to be changed, or we need to lighten up a little. But, yes, I don’t think they’re ever going to see the same sort of long, six page runs of just pure humor. This is not that show."

And the fact that some of the engagements--like when Echo is imprinted with the personality of safecracker Taffy--make sense while others--like Echo being a midwife up in the mountains--don't? It's something that Whedon and the other writers are still trying to work on.

"You know, we do work on it," admitted Whedon. "Again, it’s one of those things where because it makes sense to us on some levels, we look back and go, 'Are they with us?' But we finished shooting it before any of it aired, so it’s a little dicey there. There were times we talked about why some of the engagements it seemed a little bit like, you could find somebody who might be that person... It’s just become the way we do it. But we never spent too much time with that because we were never sure how much of an issue that was going to be. It’s the one thing that’s difficult about making a show when it’s not airing is you don’t have that feedback yet... So it gets addressed, but probably not as much as people would like."

But, given the Dollhouse's mission statement, you'd expect that most of these engagements would be of the weird sexual kind. Yet in the first five episodes, this is only touched on pretty tangentially. Was this intentional or a network note?

"There were two things," said Whedon. "One is, yes, some people at the network definitely said, 'Well, wait a minute. This idea that we've bought is illegal and very racy and frightens us.' There was definitely an element of [wondering] should we tone this down that for me was frustrating because what I was telling them was dangerous ground and was meant to be. That is not to say that the only thing I pitched them was Echo has sex. The idea was always that she would be doing a lot of different things. I had a structure that the first few episodes was supposed to take us into whereby the type of engagement would always be shifting. That she would be solving crimes, that she would be helping people. That she would be committing crimes, [...] that sexuality was a big part of it and the most sort of edgy and possibly titillating part of it, but not in any way the only part of it."

"When I pitched [Dollhouse I said], 'It’s Alias meets Quantum Leap,'" said Whedon. "I thought of [Echo] more than anything as kind of life coach, as a kind of the person you absolutely need in your life at a certain moment who will either change you or comfort you or take your life to the level that you want it to be. And that could be something nice, evil, sexual. It could be any number of things. It was never just meant to be the one. The one sort of took over because it’s the one that frightens people the most and also obviously interests them the most."

"Having said that," said Whedon, "I still have no problem with the idea that somebody very rich and very far off in the mountains would hire the perfect midwife."

Should we be expecting some emotional twists then potentially in the relationships between Victor and Sierra or even between Paul Ballard and Echo?

"If we have to figure out a caper, that’s work," said Whedon. "But to figure out something that causes one of them to be in pain, that’s fun! So, yes, as the show progresses, we are able to get further with the emotionality because the dolls are actualizing more and everything is going to get much more tense for everybody. For certain people, there could be some romance, but it’s never simple... Victor’s feelings about Sierra are probably the closest thing to simple that there is in the show right now. We’re not not going to mess everybody up."

As for showing what some of the Dollhouse's employees are up to after-hours, is Whedon figuratively handcuffed as far as showing that element on the series?

"We’re not handcuffed," he said. "It’s just that at this point, we’re still interested in how they relate to our actives and particularly [Echo]. So we don’t spend a lot of time with people in their outside lives, although we do spend some. We will learn a little something about the private lives of some of our employees, but something we’re threading in lightly. That’s really something you would come to later in a season."

"Our first 13 are basically, just take the baseball bat and keep on hitting and then later on if you have people hooked, those threads are easier to weave in because [viewers] are more invested," continued Whedon. "We’re just swinging for the bleachers emotionally in the second half and so some things we will get to show because it will give us insights into the characters, but not everybody has an apartment set."

And viewers will definitely learn more about Amy Acker's scarred Dr. Claire Saunders.

"I love that character, not just because it’s Amy Acker, but because she wears misery and torture on her face literally," he admitted. "We will definitely learn how she came to this fabulous career. In the last few episodes, we get to turn the Acker up pretty hot and it’s very exciting."

However, don't expect any other Whedonverse alums to turn up on Dollhouse, other than Dr. Horrible's Felicia Day, who's slated to appear in an upcoming installment.

"Well, I did mention that Felicia Day was going to appear in an episode and that’s pretty much it for Buffy," said Whedon. "Most of them are, I’m happy to say, working, but I do like to see the gang. [However] we have to establish to reality of this world before we can bring in somebody without it being too jarring. Although we have one episode with a guy who looks a lot like Nick Brendan and his character’s name is Nicholas and that was a terrible idea. We should have never named him Nicholas because every time I see his footage, I go, 'Hey, wait a minute.' Oh, I’m confused."

And now for the $64,000 question: Is Whedon leaving television for the internet altogether, as some recent reports have indicated?

"I never actually said that," said Whedon. "It’s definitely [that] the new media is very attractive to me. It’s an open field. There’s a lot of freedom and I’m very afraid that that freedom will be taken away before the artistic community has a foothold in it. So for reasons both artistic and political, I wish very much to pursue new media. But that doesn't mean that I’m never going to do television. Everybody knows I had a rough time getting Dollhouse up-to-speed, but that doesn't mean I’m never going to do television. I love television and I love it in a different way than I love the Internet in a different way that I love movies. It’s a kind of storytelling that is just, the scope and the breadth and the depth that you can get from a TV show is unlike anything else and I love it."

Dollhouse's "Man on the Street" episode, the series' sixth, airs tonight at 9 pm ET/PT on FOX.

Talk Back: Series Premiere of FOX's "Dollhouse" ("Ghost")

"Did I fall asleep?"

By now, you've read my advance review of three of the first four episodes of Joss Whedon's new drama Dollhouse on FOX, as well as my interviews with series creator Joss Whedon and Dollhouse's Eliza Dushku (Buffy the Vampire Slayer), who plays the Dollhouse's operative Echo, who seems to be growing slowly more self-aware.

But, now that the series premiere of Dollhouse ("Ghost") has aired, I'm curious to see what you thought of the episode and the series' potential.

Were you entranced by Dollhouse's overarching concepts of identity and self-awareness? What did you think of the series' cast of characters? Did you think that this episode was a good introduction to the world of Dollhouse... or did its story of Echo negotiating the return of a kidnapped girl leave you feeling empty? (Did you accept why the millionaire would hire a mind-wiped doll rather than actual hostage negotiator?) And most importantly: will you tune in again next week to continue watching? Talk back here.

Next week on Dollhouse ("The Target"), Echo is imprinted with the personality of a female thrill-seeker as the companion to a millionaire outdoorsman but quickly finds herself being hunted; Paul Ballard discovers a clue to Echo's real identity; Boyd remembers his introduction to the Dollhouse. (To read my advance review of the first few episodes of Dollhouse, click here.)

Paley Festival Announces "Dollhouse," "Dr. Horrible" Panels

While the full schedule won't be released until Wednesday, February 18th, the Paley Center for Media has offered yet another tease at two panels that will be presented as part of the 2009 William S. Paley Television Festival (a.k.a. PaleyFest 09).

Joss Whedon will present not one but two panels this year as Dollhouse and Dr. Horrible are expected to be a part of the lineup for the 26th annual television festival, along with the previously announced panels for Fringe and True Blood.

Joss Whedon, Nathan Fillion, Zach Whedon, Felicia Day, and Jed Whedon are already confirmed and will participate in the Dr. Horrible panel, along with other members of the creative teams for both Dollhouse and Dr. Horrible. (What's a Dr. Horrible panel without the titular villain himself?)

The all-inclusive PaleyFest09 Premium Festival Pass is available now at ticketweb.com and include one guaranteed ticket for premium seating each night, access to Festival events, free parking, concession stand vouchers, one Paley Center general Membership for one year, and other benefits. Starting February 18th, 2009, three PaleyFest09 Ticket Packages will be announced and available, also at ticketweb.com. Individual tickets will go on sale to Paley Center Members on Thursday, February 26st, 2009, and to the general public beginning the following Sunday, March 1st, 2009.

PaleyFest09 will be held from April 10th to April 23rd.

Stay tuned.

Channel Surfing: "Chuck" Plans Game Changer Finale, "Melrose Place" Character Breakdowns, Whedon Has His Fill of Vampires, Pilot Updates, and More

Welcome to your Monday morning television briefing.

Chuck creators Josh Schwartz and Chris Fedak said that this season's finale will be "game changing" for Chuck and his band of spies. "We're going to launch the show in a really exciting direction next year. We designed our season heading toward it," said Schwartz, appearing this weekend at New York Comic-Con. While Schwartz and Fedak are being tight-lipped, they did mention that Jordana Brewster will reprise her role as Chuck's deadly ex Jill in an upcoming episode. (TV Guide)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello has the character breakdowns for the CW's planned update of Melrose Place, including a character who is the son of the original's Jake (Grant Show), an omni-sexual PR maven, a wannabe filmmaker, a recovering alcoholic, a med student turning tricks to pay her tuition, and a teenage sex kitten. The pilot, produced by CBS Paramount Network Television, will be overseen by Smallville's Todd Slavkin and Darren Swimmer. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Joss Whedon has had his fill of vampires, as he tells TV Week's Josef Adalian in a new interview, in which he talks about Buffy, Dollhouse, and Dr. Horrible. (TV Week)

Elsewhere, Joss talks about Eliza Dushku, the possibility of a Buffy feature film, and what to expect to see in Season One of Dollhouse. (Televisionary)

NBC has given out a pilot order to single-camera comedy State of Romance, described as a modern take on Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice" set in Chicago, from Universal Media Studios, and writer/executive producers Barbara Wallace and Tom Wolfe. (Hollywood Reporter)

CBS, meanwhile, picked up four pilots: dramas Three Rivers, from CBS Paramount, writer Carol Barbee (Jericho), and executive producers Curtis Hanson and Carol Fenelton, about organ transplants, and cast-contingent The Good Wife, about a politician's wife who goes back to work as a defense attorney from writer/executive producers Robert King and Michelle King (In Justice), CBS Paramount and Scott Free, and comedies Accidentally on Purpose (also cast-contingent), about a San Francisco movie critic who finds herself pregnant after a fling with a younger man from writer/executive producer Claudia Lonow, CBS Paramount and BermanBraun, and Waiting to Die, about two single guys happy with their lives, from writers Will Sasso and Chad Kultgen and Sony Pictures Television. The pickups join Jerry Bruckheimer-produced medical drama pilot Miami Trauma, about a team of trauma surgeons from writer Jeffrey Lieber (Family Practice) and Warner Bros. Television, which was also picked up on Friday. (Hollywood Reporter)

Variety discusses just what happened to primetime comedies (CW doesn't even bother to develop them anymore) and points to a possible re-emergence of the genre this midseason, with a slew of comedies being launched at the networks. (Variety)

Ed O'Neill (Married with Children) has been cast in ABC comedy pilot An American Family, where he will play a man who becomes a step-father after he marries a woman 30 years younger than him (Sofia Vergara). Also cast: Eric Stonestreet (This Might Hurt), who will play part of a gay couple (along with Jesse Tyler Ferguson) who adopt a Vietnamese baby. (Hollywood Reporter)

David Nutter (The Mentalist) will direct ABC drama pilot Eastwick, from Warner Bros. Television. Nutter has now gone 14-for-14 in directing pilots that have gone on to be picked up to series. "She has come up with an amazing starting-off point -- I can really see where the series is going to go," Nutter said of writer Maggie Friedman's script. "She's got a great bedrock of characters and a great mystery." (Variety)

Former Universal Media Studios president Katherine Pope has been hired as a consulting producer on FOX drama Lie to Me for the final four episodes of the series' 13-episode first season run. It is said that Pope will support showrunner Sam Baum "in a role similar to Katie Jacobs' duties on Fox's House alongside creator/exec producer/showrunner David Shore." (Hollywood Reporter)

FOX is developing a US remake of Argentinian teen telenovela The Rebels (Rebelde Way), about private school kids who form a pop band, with Jennifer Lopez and Simon Fields' Nuyorican Prods. on tap to produce. Script will be adapted by Duane Adler (Step Up). (Variety)

Maureen Ryan has a first look at a notable guest star appearing in Galactica's medical bay this week: The Daily Show's John Hodgman, who currently lends his voice to the feature film Coraline. He'll drop by to lend Doc Cottle a hand in Battlestar Galactica's February 13th episode, entitled "No Exit." (Chicago Tribune's The Watcher)

CBS Paramount Network Television has asked the stars of the majority of its produced dramas such as CSI, NCIS, and NUMB3RS, to waive their annual raises and keep their salaries at a plateau next season, as part of an overall cost-cutting measure. However, some argue that this could produce the opposite effect: stars who won't fall in line and accept a salary freeze. "If our lead doesn't accept the freeze, we will have no choice but to let one of our supporting actors go," says on CBS Paramount drama executive producer. "There's no question that it's the second-tier actors who are most vulnerable." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Julia Ormond (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button) and Mahershalalhashbaz Ali (The 4400, Benjamin Button) have been cast in Lifetime Movie Network telepic The Wronged Man, based on a true story. Project, from Sony Pictures Television, is directed by Tom McLoughlin and written by Teena Booth. (Hollywood Reporter)

SAG has once again voted to remove Doug Allen as the guild's chief negotiator and has replaced the negotiating committee with a new task force. Move comes on the heels of president Allen Rosenberg's legal claims that the previous vote violated guild procedure. Talks between SAG and AMPTP are expected to begin on February 17th, following a more than two month silence between the two parties. (Los Angeles Times)

Jerry Springer will not return as the host of Season Four of NBC's America's Got Talent. The Peacock is currently on the hunt for a host to replace Springer, who dropped out due to time commitments with his syndicated talkshow and a stage production this summer. (Variety)

Syndicated talkshow The Steve Wilkos Show has been renewed for a third season, to run during the 2009-10 season. (TV Week)

However, syndicated court show Cristina's Court, produced by Twentieth Television, will not be renewed for a fouth season, though episodes will be produced through September. (Variety)

Stay tuned.

Playing with Dolls: Talking to "Dollhouse" Creator Joss Whedon

One of the most eagerly anticipated series of the year involves mind-wiped dolls who are imprinted with various personalities, skills, and flaws.

And, no, I'm not talking about the latest iteration of Bravo's Real Housewives franchise but rather the sci-fi action series Dollhouse, from Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator Joss Whedon, which launches Friday, February 13th.

Just don't expect any song-and-dance routines along with the high-flying stunts and motorcycle chases. "No, I’m not planning a Dollhouse musical just yet," said writer/executive producer Joss Whedon.

But before we tackle what Joss had to say about FOX's Dollhouse, I am sure many of you are curious to know if there is any update about the rumored big-screen version of Buffy. "Yes," said Whedon. "There is not going to be one... I think that’s pretty much it. Nobody has ever broached the subject from the studio side. I think everybody is busy working, so I think that it probably won’t happen. That’s my guess. The landscape changes constantly, but until somebody who has millions and billions of dollars asks me that question, the answer is pretty much the same."

(Note to Buffy fans hoping for a miraculous feature film return of the Slayer: don't hold your collective breath.)

Meanwhile, Whedon had quite a lot to say about his latest small-screen venture, Dollhouse, so let's dive in and see what he had to say about its rather, uh, unconventional development process, its Friday night timeslot, and what viewers should expect to find when they enter this Dollhouse.

Given the frequent rumblings in the press about the difficult development process for Dollhouse, which found the network scrapping the original pilot in favor of a new series opener, how does Joss compare Dollhouse's birth to that of his other series?

"I think this show definitely went through a tougher process, tough in a different way than the other shows," said Whedon. "Probably most similar to Angel in the sense of what we had in our minds about what Angel was ultimately was different than what the network did. Our version was a little darker, and in this instance, it wasn’t so much a question of reworking what the show was as it was a question of reworking how we get into it. There were definitely some differences of opinion about what was going on and what we were going to stress in the show, but mostly it was about how do we bring the audience in and the mandate was very much once they had seen the pilot."

"The original pilot explained everything that happened, but came at it very sideways," continued Whedon, "and they said let the audience see an engagement so that they understand that every week she’s going to go to a different place and be a different person and that they have that sense of structure. That part was simple enough."

So whose idea was it to do another pilot? "It was my idea to do a new pilot," admitted Whedon, "because once I was clear on what it was they didn’t have that I had planned to provide in the show anyway, it seemed like a no-brainer to give them something they could get behind more. But there was some real questioning about what exactly we wanted to get at in terms of the humanity and what they do and why people hire them and there’s a sexual aspect to it that makes some people nervous. Part of the mandate of the show is to make people nervous. It’s to make them identify with people they don’t like and get into situations that they don’t approve of, and also look at some of the heroic side of things and wonder if maybe they were wrong about what motivated those as well. So we’re out to make people uncomfortable, but not maybe so much our bosses."

Given the challenges he encountered in the development process, does he now feel that he found the show?

"I would say emphatically yes," said Whedon. "We had all of the elements, the characters, none of which were changed really, and none of the regular characters, and the premise, the concept, the way we were able to explore what makes us human, all of that is in there. As the season progresses, it ends up going exactly where I had hoped it would go before all of this happened, so I do feel like we got back to our vision in a way that really works for the network. And the last few episodes that we just completed shooting got all of us extraordinarily excited."

So then is Whedon satisfied with the way the show turned out versus his original vision?

"There are things I miss from my original vision, and there are things that I think are better the way it is," admitted Whedon. "Ultimately, the show ends up going exactly where I hoped it would go. There are elements of intrigue and high stake suspense that have been added, but I don’t think they hurt the show at all, and it really goes where we planned to have it go. The idea was always to have a mythology that was counterbalanced by a standalone aspect that every episode would be self-contained, and that the mythology would play out, but you would feel a sense of resolve, be that an engagement, or some other aspect every week."

"The mandate to go ahead and just really make the first several episodes pure standalone engagements is tough," he continued. "It’s more work for a staff to drum up that enthusiasm and that identification for the guest of the week. That’s just difficult, but we knew that was part of the show going in, that every week, we were not only going to have to create a new world and care about it, but that she was actually going to have to join the guest cast, because she would be a new person. So it’s a challenge, but it’s one that we knew going in we were going to have to tackle, and I think we’re getting better at it. It is definitely a different skill."

As for that Friday night timeslot, Whedon thinks it's actually a Very Good Thing at the end of the day.

"Honestly, I really do see the opportunity there because the deal with the Friday night time slot was you don’t come out, bang, opening weekend, and it’s all decided," said Whedon. "It’s about growing a fan base, both for Dollhouse and Terminator. I think Terminator is a remarkably good show, and the kind of show that makes sense to be paired with Dollhouse, so I feel great about that, plus I get to see all these posters with Summer and Eliza together and that’s just too cool."

"Ultimately, this is a show where people will hopefully become intrigued and then hang in, that really builds, so it needs the 13 weeks, and it needs the 13 weeks of people paying attention, but not so much attention that it gets burned out in the glare of the spotlight," he continued. "I’ve always worked best under the radar. Most of my shows people have come to after they stopped airing, but I would like to buck that trend, and at the same time, it is part of how I work that you stay with it and it grows on you and it becomes family, and the Friday night is a much better place for that to actually happen."

So does he have any words of calm to offer fans who might be, shall we say, concerned about the perceived doom and gloom surrounding the series?

"Usually, words of calm in these situations lead to panic," Whedon joked. "If you say there’s nothing to panic about, somebody says, he said the word panic. Basically, we found the show. My concern isn’t whether the show gets saved. It’s whether these fans who are panicking about it love it. They may get over their panic. They may see it and go, you know, actually, we’re okay. The network should do what they think is right. Ultimately, the support is very sweet, and the fact that people care and they want to see the show get a chance. That’s important to me too, because it really is a show that finds itself as it goes along, but, at the end of the day, my biggest concern is that I give them something worth panicking over."

And if the first episode seems a little tame, fans should wait for the second episode, written by Steven DeKnight (Angel), which is an outrageous take on the classic short-story "The Most Dangerous Game."

"Outrageous is always good," mused Whedon. "That episode was meant originally to be around episode five, or possibly even eight, and it was the network who said, excuse me, did you say bow hunting? That will come second please, because we already had the pilot working, so it kind of got bumped up further than, but you’re not the first person to say why didn’t you just open with that, and my answer would be I don’t know. I had the other idea first. Basically, I think its one aspect of it is the bigger than life adventure, but we have episodes that I think are equally insane and, in some ways even more beautiful. So if people watch episodes and wonder they should’ve opened with this, that means the episodes are getting better, and I’ll take an upward curve any day."

So is Dollhouse all darkness and doom or is there a lighthearted side to the series as well?

"There is a lot of fun and a lot of humor in it," he admitted. "What it doesn’t have is an inherent silliness that both Buffy and Firefly had, and even Angel, that was we could just take one step back that part of the fun was of deconstructing the genre we were in. This has to be a little bit more grounded in order for it to play, or it would become campy, and with vampires and spaceships and horses, we had more leeway to be a little less realistic in how we plotted things. But humor is a part of the show all over the place, because we have really funny actors, and these situations do become absurd, and besides, we would get really bored if we didn’t."

What concepts sparked the idea in Whedon's head for Dollhouse?

"I’m very interested in concepts of identity, what espouse is our own, what’s socialized, can people actually change, what do we expect from each other, how much do we use each other and manipulate each other, and what would we do if we had this kind of power over each other?" mused Whedon. "And in this, our increasingly virtual world, self-definition has become a very amorphous concept, so it just felt what was on my mind. I don’t mean it felt timely like I was trolling the papers looking for something timely. It’s just been something I think about a lot."

Given the self-contained storytelling element of Dollhouse, is it easy for viewers to jump in at any point?

"We absolutely made sure of that," said Whedon. "We always refer to the first seven episodes as the seven pilots. You can’t just shut down after episode one and it can’t be a train that’s left the station. So the first several episodes, the first five are all individual engagements where the premise is made clear and the cast of characters is made clear and relationships are made clear. Obviously there is some progression in those relationships, but there is nowhere where you have giant pieces of information missing, or where you have to sit through a three minute previously on in order to get to the show. We really care about that, and that was one place where we were completely on the same page as the network."

So what can viewers expect then from Season One of Dollhouse?

"We definitely start entwining things this season," said Whedon. "There’s a lot of payoff in this season. There are some things that we draw out and then some things that we payoff fairly heavily, so that people don’t get the feeling that they’re just going to tease me every week. Paul Ballard is going to be hunting the Dollhouse, and obviously, he’s going to be one step behind them for awhile, but then every now and then, he’s going to come up against them in a rather abrupt fashion, and he’s not going to be the reporter in The Hulk, always five feet behind, and this creepy naked guy [in the premiere episode] will be explained."

"Echo’s progression is a constant in the show, her search for herself, so that’s something that is being spun out episode by episode," he continued. "It’s just different little aspects. It’s like she takes a little memento away from every engagement, so that will be a constant. But we’re definitely laying in some threads, and there are definitely things that we are not explaining, but we kind of took some of the things we were going to hold for a few years and said hey, let’s just hit them in the head with a frying pan, because that will keep them excited, and it’s not like we lack for places to go."

Should viewers be looking for any familiar faces from the Whedonverse among the cast of Dollhouse?

"You know, the basic mandate for me was to find new people, because I had Eliza and I didn’t want to feel like it was going to be “Faith” or just a reunion for my pals or anything like that, and I found some not only amazing new actors, but amazing new friends," said Whedon. "But then, eventually, a person has to wake up and smell the 'Acker' and realize you just have to cast anything that you can with [Amy Acker], so that happened. Apart from that, we’ve put on some old faces in some guest roles, but not too often, and sometimes, we’ve been very much behind the eight ball in terms of production and when you know somebody can do something right and you don’t have time to go and find somebody else who can, you hire them. But apart from Amy and Eliza, it’s a new crowd."

Speaking of the cast of characters, should viewers be wondering if any of the other characters are in fact covert actives, as they can be imprinted without their knowlege?

"Not in the first season, although we’ve discussed a lot of permutations," said Whedon. "We’re pretty much laying out the situation a little bit simply at first. We’re going to twist the knife in some people, but more than any of the anchors, it’s the people running the place who have their own secrets that are going to be fun to pull away at."

And it should be instantaneously clear to viewers familiar with Whedon just with which character he most associates with.

"It’s not a shock to see a lot of Topher in myself, because he’s building people, and he’s amoral and fairly goofy," he said, "but I see a lot of myself in Adelle DeWitt too, and ultimately, in all of the characters. If you don’t, you’re usually doing it wrong. If just one person is your mouthpiece, then you’re going to have trouble writing a real conversation between two people, and the fact of the matter is the person who is my mouthpiece is definitely sketchy, which is good, because it makes me question everything I have to say, no matter how funny it is."

Whedon also talked about his decision to give the day-to-day showrunning duties on Dollhouse to the writing team of Elizabeth Craft and Sarah Fain, who most recently oversaw ABC's Women's Murder Club.

"You know, why anybody gets my sense of humor I never know, but I do know that when they do, I keep them as close as I possibly can," he said. "Liz and Sarah are the kind of people who are so solid and so sensible and so good at the day-to-day show running that you forget how good they are with the script until they turn it in and you go that’s right, you guys are really funny and very twisted. They’re the kind of writers who take all of their weirdness out on the script and it’s not out on me or the people they work with, and that’s what you look for in a showrunner. It was important for me also that the showrunners be female, because the subject matter is intense and delicate, and they are aware of that without being a slave to it."

So, given the birthing pains associated with Dollhouse, does Whedon feel that the craft of television-making has changed significantly since the days in which he developed Buffy back a the WB?

"You know, in many ways, it hasn’t changed at all," he mused. "We were held to mid-season on Buffy. There was a certain amount of birth pangs. We were re-shooting things for the first episode during the last episode. So I think part of this is either the same, or I just really haven’t learned anything about how to do it better. But I think the changes have really been that the media is constantly making new demands. There are six act breaks instead of four. [FOX] did remote free TV, which means fewer commercials, which is an exciting prospect, but it also means we’re shooting 15% to 20% more show per show on the same schedule as every other show, and that just really is beating the hell out of us. Also something that ultimately, because of the remote free TV, and because of our production issues, fell by the wayside, but these are the extras that people expect. There’s just more to it than going in there and telling your story. The marketing of the thing and the story itself are intertwined in ways that create opportunities, and in some ways that just really exhaust me."

What else did the loquacious Joss have to say?

• Echo vs. Faith match-up: "Faith would win, unless of course Echo had been imprinted with Faith’s personality, [in which case] I’m going to call it a tie."
• Will Joss explore the limitations of the Dollhouse's technology? "The Dollhouse is fairly strict about what they will use this technology for so no ninja armies just yet, but keep watching the skies."
• Buffy Season Nine comic: "We definitely have a Season Nine in mind. We’re slogging our way through season eight. We’ve talked about doing more Serenity comics, and we’ve even talked to Dark Horse about a potential for some Cabin tie-ins."
• No Dollhouse comic, however: "Dollhouse is very simply the least visually oriented of all of these in a genre way, and therefore, lends itself the least to being a comic, but comics are in my blood as much as any other medium."
• More Dr. Horrible in the works? "We are definitely committed to the idea of Dr. Horrible reappearing somehow."

Lastly, just what does Whedon think of his leading lady, Eliza Dushku, given their long history together?

"She’s overcome her homely shyness over these years," Whedon joked. "Eliza is, apart from being, in my opinion, as great a star as I have ever known, she has a genuinely powerful electric and luminous quality that I’ve rarely seen. She’s also a really solid person. She’s a good friend. She’s a feminist. She’s an activist. She’s interested in the people around her. She has a lot of different things going on, and I’ve watched her over the years, as a friend, try to take control of her career, and try to get the roles that weren’t available to her, and protect the ethos and the message of what it was that she was doing, and I respect that enormously. Being part of that progression is, for me, one of the greatest benefits of this show."

And, should Dollhouse be lucky enough to return for a second season, what topics would Whedon like to tackle after the initial batch of episodes?

"Well, the constant topic of identity is one," he said. "There are a couple of things that were originally on the slate that didn’t quite fit the venue and had to stand back. We had an episode about Rwandan boy soldiers that was really about how we imprint people now, how we literally brainwash people, and we’re contrasting that with the Dollhouse. There was an episode that was about perversion. It was about sexual shame and people’s inability to deal with real people that was, I thought, ultimately very heartfelt and very strange and very beautiful, but again, not to make the cut for the first 13. Those are some that would be coming up."

Dollhouse launches Friday, February 13th at 9 pm ET/PT on FOX.

Channel Surfing: FOX Committed to Building "Dollhouse," "Sunny" Questions, "Fringe" Soars, and More

Welcome to your Thursday morning television briefing. I'm in fashion overload after back-to-back episodes last night of Top Model and Project Runway (more on the latter in a bit) but can't say that I am as enthused with either series as I was in the past.

Lest you worry about the fate of Joss Whedon's action drama Dollhouse--beset by multiple problems months before the series' launch--you can dismantle the shrine. FOX is said to be still deeply committed to the project. “With months before our broadcast premiere, we have the rare luxury of extra time,” a 20th Century Fox Television spokesman said. “We believe in this show and want to give it every opportunity to succeed.” Let's hope that's true, given the recent reports that the network was decidedly less than pleased with the series' creative direction. (Entertainment Weekly's Hollywood Insider)

Meanwhile, FOX must be pleased as punch that its other cult drama Fringe performed so well in its second outing. Airing behind a new episode of House, Fringe improved 59 percent in the demo (5.1/13 vs. 3.2/9) and 45 percent in overall viewers (13.27 million vs. 9.13 million) from its series premiere a week earlier. FOX was quick to mention that no new drama on any network has improved so much from its first to second week since at least 1991.

HBO renewed Alan Ball's vampire drama True Blood after just airing two episodes. (Televisionary)

HBO and Playone's Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman have hired Kirk Ellis (John Adams) to write a series that will adapt James Ellroy's novels "American Tabloid" and "The Cold Six Thousand," following three men and their "shifting alliances with the CIA, the Mafia, and the Kennedys" in the turbulent 1960s. (Variety)

Jada Pinkett Smith will star in and executive producer TNT drama pilot Time Heals, about "a strong but caring director of nursing at Charlotte Mercy Hospital in North Carolina, a single mother who always puts the pain of others first." Project, from Sony Pictures Television, will be executive produced by Pinkett Smith and Jamie Tarses and written/executive produced by John Masius (Dead Like Me, Providence). (Hollywood Reporter)

Excited about tonight's season premiere of FX's It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia? (I am literally counting down the hours until 10 pm tonight.) Rob McElhenney answers EW reader questions and talks about Sunny, the gang's FOX comedy pilot Boldly Going Nowhere, and fields some script pitches. (Entertainment Weekly's Popwatch)

Fans of CBS' cancelled Moonlight will have to wait a little while longer for a DVD release of the series. Warner Home Video has announced that a US release of Moonlight is in the works, but likely not until around New Year's. (TV Guide)

USA has given a 90-minute cast-contingent pilot order to medical drama Operating Instructions from writers/executive producers Judd Pillot and John Peaslee (According to Jim) and executive producers Conan O'Brien and David Kissinger. Project, from Universal Cable Prods, will follow a female trauma surgeon who returns to the States after two tours of duty in Iraq and takes a job as the head of surgery at a military hospital. According to Jeff Wachtel, EVP of original programming at USA, "There is a truly dramatic underpinning [to the series], but the show also will be informed with comedic sensibilities." (Hollywood Reporter)

Sarah Carter (Shark) will guest star in two episodes of the upcoming season of ABC's Dirty Sexy Money as a "mystery woman who crosses paths with Darling matriarch Tish (Jill Clayburgh)." For the love of all things holy, Craig Wright, please do not resurrect that awful storyline from the original Dirty Sexy Money pilot with the journalist. You know which one I'm talking about. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Brian Burns has set up three projects at CBS and HBO. The two CBS projects will be developed with his brother Ed Burns; one will be an ensemble drama about arson investigators at the New York Fire Department and the other is a psychological thriller whose details are being kept under wraps. At HBO, Burns will team up with Dan Kennedy for a comedy inspired by Kennedy's memoir "Rock On: An Office Power Ballad," about a slacker who takes on a job at a record label. (Hollywood Reporter)

Jason Jones (The Daily Show) will guest star this season on CBS' How I Met Your Mother as the ex of Stella (Sarah Chalke) and the father of her son. (Hollywood Reporter)

Stay tuned.

What's On Tonight

8 pm: CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (CBS); America's Got Talent/My Name is Earl (NBC); Smallville (CW); Ugly Betty (ABC); Hole in the Wall (FOX)

9 pm: CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (CBS); The Office (NBC); Supernatural (CW); Grey's Anatomy (ABC; 9-11 pm); Kitchen Nightmares (FOX)

10 pm: Flashpoint (CBS); ER (NBC)

What I'll Be Watching:

9 pm: Kitchen Nightmares.

Missing the softer side of Gordon Ramsay? Tune in to the US version of his reality series in which he pull back struggling restaurants from the brink of closure. On tonight's episode ("Guiseppi's"), Ramsay visits Guiseppi's Italian restaurant in Michigan and finds a family prone to squabbling and in-fighting rather than running a successful business together.

10 pm: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia on FX.

Televisionary favorite It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia finally returns with brand-new episodes. On tonight's fourth season premiere ("Mac & Dennis: Manhunters"), Dee and Charlie develop a cannibalistic hunger after accidentally eating some of Frank's human meat, while Mac and Dennis take hunting to the next level. Afterwards, it's another brand-new episode ("The Gang Solves the Gas Crisis"), in which Mac, Dennis, and Charlie take advantage of high gas prices by investing in barrels of gasoline and selling them door-to-door, while Dee and Frank discover that Bruce plans to give money to a Muslim center.

Channel Surfing: "Dollhouse" Shut Down, "90210" Casting, "Doctor Who," "Fringe" Ratings, and More

Good morning and welcome to your Thursday morning television briefing. I ended up making it a fashion-fueled night last night with new episodes of Top Model and Project Runway and threw on the ABC pilot Single with Parents (starring Alyssa Milano) just for good measure.

What's up first today? Dollhouse, natch. Everyone is talking about the production shutdown on the set of the new Joss Whedon action drama, slated to kick off in January 2009. 20th Century Fox Television has shut down shooting on Dollhouse beginning tomorrow through September 25th so that Whedon can oversee a rewrite of the fourth script and get ahead on the next few scripts. News comes after FOX rejiggered the running order in July: Dollhouse's originally filmed pilot will now bow second, after a newly constructed pilot episode (which I hope to see soon). Does this bode ill for the series? No one can say but it does at least point to the reassuring fact that Whedon does seem to be involved with the decisions and agreed with the studio that the script "needed work." (Variety)

Catherine Zeta-Jones, Doctor's companion? Doctor Who executive producer/head writer Russell T. Davies, who is overseeing the four feature-length specials that will air in 2009 before handing over the reins to inbound head writer Steven Moffat, has indicated that he wants Zeta-Jones to play one of the Doctor's companions in a spin-off feature film version of the franchise. "Being from Wales myself," said Davies, "I would love to have Catherine Zeta-Jones as a companion for The Doctor." And it appears that the rumors of David Tennant signing on for such a feature may have merit. "To have anyone else [playing the Doctor] would be inconceivable," said Davies. (Digital Spy)

90210 fans, get your Brenda fix while you still can. While producers have signed Jennie Garth for another five episodes (in addition to the six episodes she was initially contracted to do), Shannen Doherty's run on 90210 will--at least for the time being, anyway--be reserved to the four episodes she had originally shot. "They asked me to do a lot more," said Doherty. "I'm in the middle of pitching a show, [so] I couldn't commit to more than [I did]." The CW drama, meanwhile, lost roughly 1.4 million viewers between the premiere and this week's episode. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

In other ratings news, FOX's launch for J.J. Abrams drama series Fringe garnered the top spot in the key adults 18-49 demo but underwhelmed with 9 million total viewers, finishing behind America's Got Talent (11.6 million). (New York Times)

Speaking of Fringe, The Los Angeles Times' Patrick Kevin Day offers up five tips to the makers of Fringe, including: (1) Give us a great villain; (2) Avoid the kissing stuff; (3) Develop the side characters; (4) Get gross; and (5) Have a plan. Do you agree with his assessment? (Los Angeles Times)

VH1 has ordered an untitled unscripted series from Ish Entertainment that will follow Antonio Sabato Jr. as he looks for the perfect woman. Series will be shot "like a soap opera" and will follow Sabato as he puts the female contestants through their paces with challenges "such as recreating a steamy love scene or skydiving in a gown." (Variety)

Lost's Tania Raymonde--you know her best as Ben's murdered adopted daughter Alex on the hit ABC series--has signed on to join the cast of Cold Case as Frankie Rafferty, a funky lab tech and potential love interest for the significantly older Danny Pino's Valens. Raymonde's first episode will air in November. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Production is gearing up in Mexico City on Fox TV Studio's Persons Unknown--from creator/executive producer Christopher McQuarrie (The Usual Suspects)--about seven strangers who are taken from their everyday lives and wake up in a deserted town, where they are watched by security cameras and quickly realize that there is no escape. The cast so far includes Alan Ruck, Chadwick Boseman, Gerald Kyd, and Kate Lang Johnson and the series will be executive produced by McQuarrie, Heather McQuarrie, and Remi Aubuchon (Caprica).

TBS has ordered a third season of comedy The Bill Engvall Show, with ten episodes to bow next summer. (Variety)

Bravo is developing an untitled docusoap based around "hip and stylish" 18-25 year-olds in Orange County. The cabler hopes to start shooting this fall. (Hollywood Reporter)

Stay tuned.

What's On Tonight

8 pm: Big Brother 10 (CBS); My Name is Earl/America's Got Talent (NBC); Smallville (CW); Ugly Betty (ABC); Hole in the Wall (FOX)

9 pm: CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (CBS); The Office/The Office (NBC); Grey's Anatomy (ABC); Kitchen Nightmares (FOX)

10 pm: Flashpoint (CBS); 30 Rock/The Office (NBC); Private Practice (ABC)

What I'll Be Watching:

9 pm: Kitchen Nightmares.

Missing the softer side of Gordon Ramsay? Tune in to the US version of his reality series in which he pull back struggling restaurants from the brink of closure. On tonight's episode ("Handlebar"), Ramsay visits the Handlebar Restaurant & Lounge in Mount Sinai, New York, where the owners don't seem to have realized that the 1980s came and went a long time ago.

10 pm: Tabatha's Salon Takeover on Bravo.

Yes, it's a complete and utter retread of Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares with salons subbing in for restaurants, but there's absolutely nothing else on tonight to watch, so here goes. On this week's episode ("Images Salon: Oyster Bay, NY"), Tabatha Coffey tries to save another struggling hair salon, this time a Long Island strip mall hair salon, where styling skills and customer service aren't the watchwords of this business.