Channel Surfing: NBC Exiles "Kings" to Saturday Nights, Thomas Calabro Returns to "Melrose Place," Liza Weil and Debra Mooney on "Grey's," and More

Welcome to your Wednesday morning television briefing.

NBC has exiled struggling freshman drama Kings to the dire Saturday night at 8 pm timeslot, where the network will burn off the remaining installments beginning April 18th. In its former Sunday night slot, the Peacock will air two-hour episodes of Dateline NBC from 7-9 pm ET/PT. In its last outing, Kings captures a lowly 1.1/3 among adults 18-49 and 3.6 million viewers overall. (Variety)

Thomas Calabro will reprise his role as Dr. Michael Mancini in the CW's revival of Melrose Place in a recurring capacity. Casting marks the second former cast member from the original FOX series joining the cast of the updated Melrose Place as he'll join Laura Leighton, who will reprise her role as Sydney Andrews. Could these two have ended up unhappily-ever-after, after all? (Entertainment Weekly)

Liza Weil (Gilmore Girls) and Debra Mooney (Everwood) will guest star in Grey's Anatomy's two-hour season finale, set to air on ABC on May 14th. Weil, best known for her role as Paris Gellar on Gilmore Girls, will play "a cancer patient who crosses paths with Izzie," while Mooney will play the mother to Kevin McKidd's Owen. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Pilot casting alert: Leah Remini (The King of Queens) will star in ABC comedy pilot Don't Try This at Home (formerly known as the untitled Jeff Strauss comedy), where she will play a newspaper editor married to Matthew Lillard's character with three kids. Elsewhere at ABC, Rebecca Creskoff (Mad Men) been cast as one of the leads in comedy pilot This Little Piggy, and Spencer Breslin (Center of the Universe) has joined the cast of the untitled Anita Renfroe comedy pilot. (Hollywood Reporter)

FOX has ordered reality series Someone's Gotta Go, in which real businesses facing layoffs will let the employees decide who will get pink-slipped. Project, from Endemol USA, could be on the network's schedule by late summer or early fall. "It's Survivor meets The Office," said FOX reality chief Mike Darnell. "When someone is arbitrarily let go the first reaction usually is 'How come that person was fired when another idiot is still here?' This finally gives employees a chance to make that decision instead of a boss." (Variety)

Bravo has announced that the ten-episode culinary competition series Top Chef Masters will kick off on Wednesday, June 10th at 10 pm ET/PT. Series will be hosted by food journalist Kelly Choi and regular judges will include New York Magazine food critic Gael Greene, James Oseland, the editor-in-chief of Saveur, and British journalist Jay Rayner. 24 master chefs (including several that have appeared as guest judges on Top Chef) will compete to win $100,000 in money for charity in a format that resembles Top Chef's weekly Quickfire and Elimination Challenges. Guest judges for the season include Lost executive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse, How I Met Your Mother's Neil Patrick Harris, Zooey Deschanel, and Flipping Out's Jeff Lewis. (via press release)

Elsewhere at Bravo, the cabler will launch docusoap NY Prep, described as a real-life Gossip Girl, on Tuesday, June 16th, following the season finale of The Real Housewives of New Jersey. (Futon Critic)

ABC Family announced several new series debuts, including drama Make It or Break It launching June 22nd; half-hour comedy 10 Things I Hate About You launching July 7th; and half-hour multi-camera comedy Ruby and the Rockits on July 21. The Secret Life of the American Teenager will return with its second season on June 22nd; Lincoln Heights kicks off its fourth season on August 14th; and Season Three of Greek will debut on September 14th. (Variety)

ITV director of acquisitions Jay Kandola will step down from her position at the broadcaster in June following a corporate restructuring that saw the loss of hundreds of jobs and a refocusing of the network's acquisitions priorities, which will see US series as less of a priority. (Hollywood Reporter)

Michael Shanks will reprise his role as Daniel Jackson in a cameo appearance in the upcoming series premiere episode of Stargate Universe on Sci Fi, according to consulting producer Joseph Mallozzi. Also returning in some form to reprise their roles: Richard Dean Anderson and Gary Jones. (Digital Spy)

Nickelodeon has ordered two live-action pilots, including an untitled surfing single-camera comedy, from executive producer Tommy Lynch and writers Boyce Bugliari and Jamie McLaughlin (Quintuplets), about two high school surfers looking for the perfect wave and Telepathic, a multi-camera comedy, from executive producer Conan O'Brien and writer Darin Henry (The War at Home), about three teenage misfits who navigate the treacherous waters of high school aided by telepathic powers. (Hollywood Reporter)

The New York Post is reporting that MTV is looking at Washington D.C. as a locale for an upcoming season of its reality franchise The Real World and has placed an ad looking for an accountant for a 20-week shoot in the nation's capital. (New York Post)

A&E has ordered nine episodes of The Fugitive Chronicles," a hybrid docu-drama series that will recount some of the most memorable captures of fugitives over the last twenty years and present these stories in dramatized verite-style re-enactments told from the point of view of both law enforcement and the fugitive. Project, from RDF USA, will premiere later this year. (Hollywood Reporter)

Planet Green has renewed five series for second seasons, including: Emeril Green, Focus Earth with Bob Woodruff, Greensburg, Renovation Nation, and Wa$ted! All are expected to premiere new episodes during the week of April 19th-25th in celebration of Earth Day. (Broadcasting & Cable)

Stay tuned.

Channel Surfing: Alex O'Loughlin Dips Toe into "Three Rivers," Season Three is Last of "Gavin & Stacey," No Ricky Gervais on "The Office," and More

Welcome to your Wednesday morning television briefing on a glorious day that sees the premiere of an all-new episode of ABC's Lost tonight. (I can't wait!)

Former Moonlight star Alex O'Loughlin is said to be in talks to topline CBS medical drama pilot Three Rivers, told from the multiple POVs of transplant doctors, organ donors, and organ recipients. Project, from CBS Paramount Network Television, is written/executive produced by Carol Barbee (Jericho) and executive produced by Curtis Hanson and Carol Fenelon. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Co-creator/star James Corden has said that Gavin & Stacey's upcoming third season, set to air in the UK later this year, will be the series' last. "This is it. This will definitely be the last series," said Corden of the series' third season, set to film this summer. "We have a point to which we are working to and that will be the end. It will be sad but it has been a great time for everyone involved." Corden also indicated that any future specials, like 2008's Christmas Special, are highly unlikely. (Sky News, Digital Spy)

Don't get excited about those rumors that The Office creator Ricky Gervais would be making a cameo in the season finale... because they're not true. "We love Ricky, but have not had any discussions about an appearance on the U.S. show," executive producer Paul Lieberstein told E! Online's Kristin dos Santos. "And we haven't given any thought to the final show because it is probably a zillion episodes away." However, Amy Ryan and Idris Elba are slated to appear in the episode. (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

Jessica Lucas (Cloverfield) has been cast in CW's revival of Melrose Place, where she will play Riley Richmond, a 24-year-old inner-city elementary school teacher from a wealthy family who is engaged to Jonah (Michael Rady) but has cold feet. She joins the already cast Ashlee Simpson-Wentz and Katie Cassidy. (Hollywood Reporter)

Pilot casting alert: Melinda McGraw (Mad Men) has snagged the female lead opposite Kelsey Grammer in his untitled ABC comedy pilot; Alfre Woodard (My Own Worst Enemy) has been cast in FOX drama pilot Maggie Hill; Kyle Bornheimer (Worst Week) will play one of the leads on the untitled Ricky Blitt comedy pilot for ABC opposite Eric Christian Olsen and Alyssa Milano (also cast: Kelly Stables and Brad Small); Reiko Aylesworth (Lost) has joined the cast of ABC's untitled Jerry Bruckheimer drama; Jon Foster (Windfall) will star opposite Jenna Elfman in ABC comedy pilot Accidentally on Purpose; Arielle Kebbel (The Uninvited) will star in ABC comedy pilot No Heroics, a US remake of the UK series; Katherine Moennig (The L Word) and Daniel Henney (X-Men Origins: Wolverine) will star in CBS medical drama pilot Three Rivers; Elisabeth Harnois (One Tree Hill) will star in CBS medical drama pilot, Miami Trauma; DB Woodside (24) has landed a role in CBS drama pilot Back; and Gail O'Grady (Hidden Palms) has been added to the cast of ABC drama pilot Empire State. (Hollywood Reporter)

Nikki Finke is reporting that Ben Silverman's predecessor at NBC, Kevin Reilly (now the president of entertainment at FOX) passed on new drama series Kings, which allegedly cost a whopping $10 million to produce the pilot and a staggering $4 million price tag per additional episode. It's particularly shocking given the low ratings that Kings managed in its first outing, luring only 6 million viewers overall and a 1.6/4 in adults 18-49. "I hear that Ben Silverman was hands-on," writes Finke. "Remember, please, that Ben's predecessor at NBC Entertainment, Kevin Reilly, passed on it. But Ben picked up the script and ran with it. Some thought it should have been a mini-series, but Ben said no. Others thought the modernized Bible retelling should have had more backstory, and at one point Silverman ordered the writers to make it 'more real world.' So he told them to work up a cockamamie scenario whereby the Allies never won World War II, and America went bankrupt afterwards, which meant no oil out of the Middle East, so Mexico got rich, and then..." (Deadline Hollywood Daily)

Gloria LeRoy (All in the Family) is set to join the cast of ABC's Desperate Housewives, around the time that Nicholette Sheridan departs the series. The 77-year-old LeRoy will play Rose. Michael Ausiello has learned from an unknown source that Rose " will figure into Edie's exit in a surprising way" and Ausiello says it's "one that involves an increasingly cuckoo Orson, a violent act, and a touch of dementia. And not necessarily in that order." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

NBC is said to be close to a deal with Hat Trick Productions to develop a US format of UK news panel series Have I Got News For You. According to TV Week's Josef Adalian, the Peacock is said to be in advance talks for a pilot, in which "two teams of celebrities and newsmakers humorously [try] to answer questions about current events and politics." (TV Week)

The Chicago Tribune's Maureen Ryan cornered Paula Malcolmson about her new series, Caprica, the Battlestar Galactica prequel series that is slated to air on Sci Fi (or, rather Syfy) in 2010. "Battlestar has “come to an end, and it’s a beautiful end and [fans] should mourn that show," Malcolmson told Ryan. "You can’t just come along with another show that’s going to replicate it. That’s not what we want to do, we want to give them something else." Co-star Esai Morales said that Caprica is "about what it is to be human." In other news, the BSG telepic The Plan is likely airing on Sci Fi this fall, around November. (Chicago Tribune's The Watcher)

SCI FI Wire also spoke to Paula Malcomson. "It's a complicated show," Malcolmson told SCI FI Wire. "It's hard to describe in a couple of sentences. It's about a couple of families that are in the wake of a tragedy and are sort of dealing with their lives. A lot of the technology, the sci-fi stuff comes in, and it's [about] how that can be a good or a bad thing." (SCI FI Wire)

FOX has pulled reality competition series Hole in the Wall yet again and will fill the series' Sunday 7 pm ET/PT timeslot with repeats of American Dad and King of the Hill effective immediately. Meanwhile, the network has shaved down variety series Osbournes: Reloaded from a one-hour debut to a 40-minute installment on March 31st now that it has expanded American Idol to an 80 minute edition. (Futon Critic)

Reality production company 495 Prods., which produces A Shot at Love, has renewed its deal with MTV, under which the cabler has committed to three new series from the company. (Variety)

Elsewhere at MTV, Audrina Patridge will leave The Hills after its upcoming fifth season and has signed a deal with Mark Burnett Prods. for an untitled docusoap series that will track Patridge's professional and personal life. The series will be pitched to networks beginning next week.
"We are truly pleased to have the chance to work with Audrina," said Mark Burnett. "She has already proved her star quality, and we can't wait to show her fans worldwide the next stage of her life and career." (Hollywood Reporter)

UK residents will be able to catch CBS procedural drama Eleventh Hour, from Warner Bros. Television, later this year. Living has acquired rights to the series and plans to launch it sometime in 2009. "Strong, compelling with hard hitting story lines and a great cast, including an amazing performance from Rufus Sewell, Eleventh Hour is a great addition to Living's drama line up," said Amy Barham, Virgin's head of acquisitions. (The Guardian)

While there are no dates set for SAG to begin official negotiating sessions with AMPTP, national interim exec director David White is trying to reassure guild members that progress is being made. "Our negotiators are active behind the scenes," wrote White in a message to members. "While the rigorous confidentiality required in negotiation settings prevents me from providing a full update here, I want to assure you that we are working deliberately, and with as much haste as possible, to conclude our talks and bring to you, the members, a deal for your ratification." (Variety)

Some bad news on the commercial contract negotation front, however: SAG and AFTRA leaders are said to be mulling whether to mail out strike-authorization ballots if negotiations with advertisers don't improve quickly. Issues on the table right now stem from ad industry asking for rollbacks, including ending the traditional pay structure on national ads and a proposal to increase the standard work day from eight to ten hours in order to reduce overtime. (Hollywood Reporter)

Stay tuned.

Talk Back: NBC's "Kings"

"Heavy is the head that wears the crown."

By now, you've read my advance review for the first few episodes of NBC's newest drama offering, Kings, which launched last night with a two-hour pilot episode.

But, now that Kings has aired, I am curious to know what you thought of the first episode.

Did you like the alternate universe/vaguely futuristic setting of Shiloh City? Were you turned on or off by the pseudo-religious imagery, Biblical retelling of David's story, and the war-torn setting? Did you love Ian McShane as the morally corrupt King Silas Benjamin? Were you captivated by the story of David Shepherd? Or amused by the vaguely Shakespearean royal retainers? And most importantly: will you be watching Kings again next week?

Talk back here.

Signs and Wonders: An Advance Review of NBC's "Kings"

I'm feeling very torn about NBC's new midseason offering Kings, a modern-day retelling of the Biblical story of David, here set in an alternate universe that's a dark mirror of our own.

On the one hand, Kings, created by former Heroes writer Michael Green, is an ambitious series that fuses the Biblical with the Shakespearean and offers up a soapy look at the politics of war and the throne. Its cast, in particular the incomparable Ian McShane (Deadwood), is pretty damn top-notch and its production values are among the very best in television: the production design drips the pomp and circumstance of a self-proclaimed king.

Yet for all of that, there's something cold and off-putting about the series. Perhaps that's due to its often glacial pace (the network didn't do any favors by allowing director Francis Lawrence to cut a two-hour pilot) or the fact that, rather than use the story of David as a metaphor for our own current war on terror and the current economic climate, Green chose to set Kings in an alternate universe. This world, enmeshed in a never-ending battle between the kingdoms of Gilboa and Gath, is on the surface seemingly very similar to our own, filled as it is with Blackberries, celebrities, and scheming politicos. But it's the little differences--the preponderance of omen-signifying butterflies, monarchical crests, and strangely named sovereign territories--that actually take the viewer out of the experience.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Kings is nominally the story of young solider David Shepherd (Chris Egan), the seventh son of a slain soldier and a brusque rural mother, who finds himself unwittingly a symbol of hope and peace when he defeats the impregnable Goliath tank in a showdown with Gath that puts him on the cover of every newspaper. In the process, he happens to rescue Jack, the ne'er-do-well son (Sebastian Stan) of their ruler, King Silas Benjamin (McShane).

Overnight, David finds himself taken from the front and set up in an apartment in the ultramodern Shiloh City, the capital of Gilboa and a shining example of both Silas' overwhelming success as a ruler and of super-clean urban planning, should Manhattan have been swept clean of all refuse. There, he becomes a celebrated member of the royal household, attracting the eye of the high-minded princess Michelle (Allison Miller) while causing friction behind the scenes, particularly when it comes to the icy Queen Rose (Susanna Thompson). Silas, it seems, will give the boy whatever he wants--half his kingdom, even--for rescuing Jack. That is when he's not trying to gave David murdered for stealing his spotlight and possible for being the next God-chosen ruler of Gilboa.

And that's where things get muddled. Over the course of the three episodes of Kings supplied to press for review, it's hard to keep track of whether Silas wants David as an ally or whether he's designing a coffin for him, so often does the king's motivation vacillate. And rather than keep things focused on the improbable advancement of David and his deepening relationship with Silas, there's a host of other subplots to juggle: a vow made by Michelle that puts her relationship with David at risk; a secret lover and child that Silas visits in the countryside; a power grab by the queen's ambitious brother William (Dylan Baker) involving the treasury; a secret harbored by Jack about his personal life; a secret prisoner held for decades in the palace dungeons; palace retainers are wise fools. The list goes on and on.

Which is fine if this was meant to be a guilty pleasure soap but Kings has pretensions of being more than that, of retelling an old story in an effort to offer a commentary on our own issues with power, war, money, and fame, no matter whether we live in America or Gilboa. It seems undecided about whether it's a parable about the strength of the individual against a giant adversary, a taut drama about the struggles of a weary ruler, a soapy look into the lives of Manhattan's--sorry, Shiloh City's--elite, or a political thriller set in a war-torn nation.

Adding to the audience fatigue are the Shakespearean monologues that McShane gets to deliver each episode. While they are meant to be gems of pure oratory charm (even if McShane leans slightly too heavy on scenery-chewing), they are undermined by the feeling that we're supposed to be rooting for the shining golden boy David, who, in comparison to the grandeur and power of McShane's Silas, feels more than a little dull. Egan is far too easily upstaged by McShane, who definitely has the meatier part, channeling as he does the Biblical King Saul here, crossed with the monomaniacal charms of a full-maned Lex Luthor, while the closed door conspiracies and corrupt politics seemed better dramatized in HBO's Rome than they do here.

In the end, that we would all likely rather follow the corrupt if charismatic king than the naive Shepherd (and, yes, his name really is Shepherd) is a bit of a problem for Kings, which seems to have a kitchen sink mentality when it comes to signs and wonders, offering up butterflies, birds, and deer in the first three episodes alone. But the main portent I took away from watching the first three episodes, despite admiring NBC for taking a risk for putting an ambitiously serialized drama such as this on the air, is that I don't really care who controls Gilboa in the end. For a series about the spiritual and physical battle for the throne, this is quite a bad omen indeed. And you don't need a flock of butterflies to tell you that.

Kings premieres Sunday evening at 8 pm ET/PT on NBC.

Channel Surfing: "Gossip Girl" Spinoff Back to the 1980s, Chevy Chase to Torment "Chuck," Idris Elba Heads to "The Office," and More

Welcome to your Thursday morning television briefing.

Looks like Ashes to Ashes isn't the only series heading back to the 1980s (well, except for Mitch Hurwitz's Lost in the '80s, that is): Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage have announced that the untitled spinoff of CW's Gossip Girl will focus on a teenage Lily Rhodes van der Woodsen Bass (played in the original by Kelly Rutherford) as a wild child in 1980s Los Angeles who moves in with her sister in San Fernando Valley after a falling out with her parents and must adjust to life at a Valley public school and a nightlife on the Sunset Strip in Hollywood. Spinoff will be produced as a backdoor pilot that will air May 11th as part of Gossip Girl's current season. (Variety)

Chevy Chase has been cast in a three-episode story arc on NBC's Chuck, where he will play Ted Roark, the billionaire technology mogul and owner of Roark Instruments, a company that Chuck Bartowski has always dreamed of working for. But Roark is accused of stealing Chuck's father's ideas and the company may not be as squeaky clean as it originally seems. (press release, Hollywood Reporter)

Holy Stringer Bell! British actor Idris Elba (The Wire) has been cast in six episodes of NBC's The Office, where he will play an uptight executive at Dunder Mifflin's corporate office who creates, shall we say, some major problems for Michael Scott. (press release, Variety)

Aubrey Plaza of the Upright Citizens Brigade has joined the cast of the untitled Amy Poehler/Greg Daniels/Mike Schur comedy pilot, which is to be set in the office of Amy (Poehler,) the deputy chairman of the parks and recreations department in Pawnee, Indiana. Plaza will co-star as April, an intern who shadows Amy. (Hollywood Reporter)

Kings is moving to Sundays at 8 pm, as a lead-in to Celebrity Apprentice. Could it be that NBC machinery didn't think the allegorical series had enough staying power to warrant a 10 pm weeknight time slot? Meanwhile, look for John Wells' new cop drama Southland (formerly known as Police and even more formerly known as LAPD) to take over the Thursdays at 10 pm timeslot once ER wraps up its run. (The Peacock recently ordered three additional episodes of ER.) (Hollywood Reporter)

Mark Cherry and the cast discuss the 100th episode of ABC's Desperate Housewives, slated to air on Sunday, which will feature flashbacks--revealing just why each woman turned out the the way they did--that are linked by appearances by handyman Eli Scruggs (Beau Bridges). (USA Today)

CBS has officially swung the axe: Swingtown is no more. CBS president Nina Tassler confirmed the cancellation speaking at yesterday's CBS panel at the Television Critics Association Winter Press Tour. "We're not going back to Swingtown," said Tassler. "At the end of the day the show was well executed, it was well received, the performances were great, the writing was great. It was a risk, we took it, and we're proud of it." Meanwhile, look for CBS to order an additional episode of The Mentalist and for the untitled NCIS spin-off cast to appear in an upcoming episode of NCIS. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Diablo Cody will play herself in an upcoming episode of the CW's 90210, the series' nineteenth episode, which will also feature the first appearance of Tori Spelling's Donna Martin. "Donna Martin is still in the fashion business, and it may be that she may be called upon by Diablo Cody to create something for some event," said executive producer Rebecca Rand Kirschner. "That may be the beginning of their friendship.” (iF Magazine)

CBS is developing an untitled variety/sketch comedy pilot with musician John Mayer, which it plans to air later this year. If successfully, the pilot could spawn a series of specials. (Los Angeles Times' Show Tracker)

Universal Media Studios has signed a two-year, first-look deal with Don Cheadle's Crescendo Prods., under which Crescendo will develop series projects for the studio. Company is run by Cheadle along with producing partners Kay Liberman and Lenore Zerman. (Hollywood Reporter)

Stay tuned.

Channel Surfing: Macaulay Culkin Heads to "Kings," Bravo Gets Stylish with "Fashion House," "Persons Unknown," and More

Welcome to your Friday morning television briefing. Just a few quick headlines this morning as I've been called to perform my civic duty today and have to drive downtown for jury duty.

Macaulay Culkin will appear in a multiple-episode arc on NBC's midseason drama Kings, where he will play the nephew of King Silas Benjamin (Ian McShane) who has been exiled from the kingdom of Shiloh for mysterious reasons. Also slated to appear in the series: Miguel Ferrer (Crossing Jordan), Leslie Bibb (Popular), Michael Stahl-David (The Black Donnellys), and the previously reported Brian Cox. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

(Aside: I saw the pilot for Kings about two months back and while it was gorgeously directed, I thought that the pacing (it's currently scheduled to air as a two-hour) was glacially slow and could use significant tightening; I think it would be a hell of a lot more compelling at 60 or even 90 minutes.)

Could Bravo be readying a Project Runway clone? Sources say that the project Fashion House is remarkably similar to Project Runway, currently the subject of a lawsuit between NBC Universal and the Weinstein Company. One source went so far as to call Fashion House "a shameless copycat show" and is said to be using Runway's original production team, Magical Elves, on the new series. (New York Post)

CBS will give freshman comedy Gary Unmarried a shot in its Monday night lineup, reairing the pilot episode on Monday at 9:30 pm, replacing Worst Week. The move is said to be an attempt to get viewers to sample Gary Unmarried and it's thought that CBS will keep the series on Wednesdays for now. (Hollywood Reporter)

FOX has put reality competition series Hole in the Wall on hiatus and will fill the series' Thursdays at 8 pm timeslot with repeats of Kitchen Nightmares for the "foreseeable future." Yeah, it was only a matter of time before the death knell sounded for that one. (Futon Critic)

Gary Cole (Desperate Housewives) is set to join the cast of HBO's Entourage as a series regular next season; he'll play Hollywood agent Andrew Klein, one of Ari Gold's oldest friends in the business, and will be introduced during the current season in a three-episode arc to begin in November. (Hollywood Reporter)

Dan Byrd (Aliens in America) has joined the cast of Heroes, where he'll play David, a twisted compulsive liar who could potentially be an apprentice of Sylar (Zachary Quinto). Byrd will appear in at least three episodes of Heroes' Volume 4: Fugitives.(Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Fox TV Studios has hired Michael Rymer (Battlestar Galactica) to direct the first episode of its of Persons Unknown, a co-production with Mexico's Televisa and Italy's RAI, that is set to start shooting on Monday. (Series, which has an initial 13-episode order, does not yet have a home in the US.) Cast in the project, from creator Christopher McQuarrie (The Usual Suspects): Daisy Betts (Out of the Blue), Jason Wiles (Third Watch), Tina Holmes (Six Feet Under), Sean O'Bryan (Vantage Point), Lola Glaudini (Criminal Minds), Alan Ruck (Drive), Chadwick Boseman (Lincoln Heights), Gerald Kyd (Casualty), and Kate Lang Johnson (Days of Our Lives). (Variety)

In other casting news, Nathan Lane will play the gay brother to Brad Garrett's Eddie Stark in a November sweeps episode of FOX's 'Til Death. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

E! has renewed latenight talk show Chelsea Lately through 2009; series has seen a 21 perecent increase year to year. (Variety)

Stay tuned.