Channel Surfing: "30 Rock" Lands Off-Net Sale, Andrea Bowen Returns to Wisteria Lane, Producers Seek Replacement for Lynch on "Party Down," and More

Welcome to your Wednesday morning television briefing.

Liz Lemon still has a lot of life left in her yet. Universal Media Studios was able to negotiate a payout of roughly $800,000 per episode of 30 Rock from two separate off-network deals to Comedy Central and WGN America. Both channels will be able to begin airing the episodes as a weeknight strip in fall of 2011. "Pound for pound, this is one of the funniest shows on TV. The DNA of the show is fabulous," said Comedy Central's SVP of programming David Bernath. "I really believe its biggest and broadest days are still ahead of it on NBC." TBS and E! were also said to have had interest in picking up the off-net rights to 30 Rock. (Variety)

Andrea Bowen is set to reprise her role as Julie when Desperate Housewives returns for a sixth season this fall but Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello is reporting that Bowen will be back in a major way: as a series regular, citing an unnamed insider with Desperate Housewives as a source. "Bowen vanished from Housewives at the end of season 4, a casualty of the show's four-year flash forward," writes Ausiello. "She briefly returned last season when Julie, on break from college, announced that she was dating her 40-year-old professor Lloyd (Steven Weber). It's not clear if he'll be accompanying her back home, but I'm guessing not." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Meanwhile in other Desperate Housewives news, Maiara Walsh (Cory in the House) has joined the cast of the ABC drama as a series regular, where she will reprise her role as Ana, the "gorgeous and manipulative niece" of Carlos (Ricardo Chavira), who moved in with the Solises last season. She previously appeared in the final two episodes of Desperate Housewives last season. (Hollywood Reporter)

Following news that Jane Lynch won't be returning for Season Two of Starz's comedy Party Down, E! Online's Watch with Kristin is reporting that producers are looking to cast the role of Lydia, a new series regular who can be any ethnicity other than white and at least 38 years old. In a casting call, Lydia is described as "a recently divorced stage mom who has moved out to L.A. from a small town with her daughter and is very upbeat and optimistic about breaking her daughter into the industry. As a newly single woman adrift in the big city, her thoughts are never far from the matter of reeling in a new man, but things never seem to work out. Her constant love troubles never get her down, it just means more to talk about with her Party Down colleagues..." (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

FOX has pushed the launch of Season Two of Dollhouse back a week to Friday, September 25th at 9 pm ET/PT and will instead rebroadcast the season premiere of Glee on September 28th. Meanwhile, The Moment of Truth returns on Wednesday, August 5th at 9 pm ET/PT. (Futon Critic)

Lost's producers are looking for your take on the iconic series' theme song (currently consisting of, um, one note) as part of a competition coinciding with the series' Comic-Con panel later this month in San Diego. "The Lost producers want all you musicians out there to compose and submit a Lost theme song," writes E! Online's Jennifer Godwin. "The winning entry will be premiered to 7,000 screaming fans in Hall H during Lost's Saturday panel at San Diego Comic-Con, on the fifth anniversary together of our time together as show and fandom." (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

BBC One has commissioned and third and final season of drama Mistresses, which will return for a short run of four episodes in order to wrap up the series' storylines. "Mistresses: The Last Act is a final four part special event that will bring the stories of the four mistresses to a dramatic conclusion on BBC1 next year," said BBC drama commissioning controller Ben Stephenson. "Simply and elegantly book ended by a mysterious glimpse into the future, all the four women will be returning - Katie, Trudi, Siobhan and Jessica - with new and sometimes shocking stories." (Broadcastnow)

Bravo has ordered a third season of The Real Housewives of New York City, with production set to begin this fall. (Variety)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello is reporting that CBS will kick off CSI: Miami's eighth season with an origin story that shows how the team came together in 1997. "It's my understanding that the episode will be told from the point of view of a comatose Delko (Adam Rodriguez), who flashes back to his first murder case with the Miami-Dade PD," writes Ausiello. "Delko, of course, was critically wounded in the season finale." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Lionsgate Television has forged a joint venture with Marty Adelstein and Jon Kroll's Lost Marbles that will focus on unscripted programming, specifically new reality formats that they can export to territories around the world. Under the two-year deal, Lionsgate will provide overhead and financing as well as distribution in exchange for a profit stake in any projects Lost Marbles produces. Their first project is an untitled reality series that will pit celebrities against disabled people in a variety of challenges. (Variety)

Stay tuned.

TV on DVD: "Mistresses: Volume One"

Mistresses isn't quite a relationship drama, although it does focus on the romantic--and often illicit--entanglements affecting four female friends. Rather, it's something more akin to a thriller: sleek and seductive with a hint of menace.

The first volume of British drama series Mistresses, which encapsulates the series' two season run earlier this year on BBC America, is available today for sale as a four-disc set. It tells the story of four very different women who find themselves dealing with complicated and complex relationships as they juggle the dual specters of career and personal fulfillment.

But don't let the title put you off from enjoying this complex and provocative series. Yes, the twelve episodes contain more than a heaping dose of sex and scandal but there's also a perilous throughline that runs beneath the surface, giving Mistresses the feel of a noir thriller that asks questions about coincidence, fate, and manipulation.

Brilliant physician Katie (Blackpool's Sarah Parish) falls for a married patient with a terminal illness and mercy kills him... only to come face to face with his twenty-something son Sam (The Tudors' Max Brown) who knows that his father was having an affair and wants to unmask his father's lover. And, against her better judgment, Katie soon finds herself increasingly drawn to Sam sexually, despite their vast age difference and the burning secret Katie strives to conceal from him.

Kindly Trudi (The Inspector Lynley Mysteries' Sharon Small), widowed after 9/11, keeps receiving strange phone calls that she believes could be her missing husband, whose body was never recovered. When she receives a £1 million check from the 9/11 fund, she also happens to get asked out by divorced dad Richard (The Office's Patrick Baladi). Is this the start of a new era for Trudi? Could be. Or are the two incidences related? Trudi questions whether her relationship with Richard is built on truth or something far more nefarious.

Ambitious attorney Siobhan (Shark's Orla Brady) discovers that her sex life with her husband Hari (Spooks' Raza Jaffrey) has been transformed into a never-ending effort to produce a child. Despite being in love with Hari, she quickly finds herself drawn into a series of sexual escapades with her co-worker Dominic (Sensitive Skin's Adam Rayner). She learns that Hari is infertile but then she becomes pregnant... with Dominic's child. Can she tell her husband the truth? Or will she keep this fact to herself?

Sexually irrepressible Jessica (Party Animals' Shelley Conn) works as a party planner. She's involved in a mindless affair with her married boss Simon (Adam Astill) and is satisfied with her life as the other woman... until she's assigned to plan a wedding for a lesbian couple, Alex (Fringe's Anna Torv) and Lisa. Thrown together with Alex, Jessica feels an instant connection with her, though Jessica is thrown by her attraction to another woman. But she's tempted to give into the spark between them and throw caution to the wind.

Ultimately, Mistresses: Volume 1 is compelling, dark viewing and the perfect addition to the DVD library of any fan of British television, relationship series, or indeed haunting thrilers.



Mistresses: Volume One is available today on DVD with a suggested retail price of $59.98. Or pick it up in the Televisionary store for just $44.99.

Modern Love: An Advance Review of BBC America's "Mistresses"

I'm not exactly the ideal audience for BBC America's newest British drama import, Mistresses (launching tonight at 9 pm ET/PT, with a "sneak peek" at 8 pm), but I also found myself sucked into this sleek and seductive new series.

Originally airing in the UK on BBC One, Mistresses (which will air its first two seasons back-to-back in the US), is the story of four female friends, each with very, er, complicated relationships. But don't think that this is yet another Desperate Housewives clone: these women live lives that are far closer to our own that the hyper-real soap that is Wisteria Lane.

For one, the cast of characters seems populated by women we all know in our own real lives. There's brilliant physician Katie (Blackpool's Sarah Parish), a hopeless romantic who falls for John, a married patient with a terminal illness, and secretly euthanizes him... only to come face to face with his twenty-something son Sam (The Tudors' Max Brown) who knows that his father was cheating on his mother and wants to find out just who this woman is. For her part, Katie promised John that she would look after Sam... but finds herself increasingly drawn to him sexually.

Then there's compassionate and maternal Trudi (The Inspector Lynley Mysteries' Sharon Small), widowed after 9/11, who keeps receiving strange phone calls that she believes could be her missing husband, whose body was never recovered. When she receives a £1 million check from the 9/11 fund and meets divorced dad Richard (The Office's Patrick Baladi), it could be the start of a new era for Trudi, but she finds herself increasingly being pulled back into the past.

Brilliant attorney Siobhan (Shark's Orla Brady) has discovered that her love life with her husband Hari (Spooks' Raza Jaffrey) has been transformed into a never-ending effort to produce a child and finds herself drawn into a relationship with her sexy co-worker Dominic (Sensitive Skin's Adam Rayner).

Finally, there's the sexually irrepressible Jessica (Party Animals' Shelley Conn), the youngest member of this group. She works as a party planner and is involved in an affair with her married boss Simon (Adam Astill); she's satisfied with her life until she's assigned to plan a wedding for a lesbian couple, Alex (Fringe's Anna Torv) and Lisa. Thrown together with Alex, Jessica feels an instant connection with her, though Jessica is thrown by her attraction to another woman.

Created by SJ Clarkson, Lowri Glain, and Rachel Anthony, Mistresses presents a very different look at modern relationships, seen through the eyes of four very different women, each one deeply flawed but also wholly sympathetic. Through the series' trysts, romances, and friendships, the talented writing team--made up of mostly women, it must be said--is able to explore just what makes men and women tick in the 21st century.

The cast is top-notch. I'm especially enamoured of Sharon Small's Trudi, who manages to provide one of the more tragic figures in the piece as well as one of the most optimistic and comedic. (It's no small feat to pull that off and Small does so with skill and grace.) All of the women are absolutely fantastic and it's easy to feel yourself drawn into their orbits: Orla Brady quietly exudes the steely nerves of a woman who knows what she wants but feels the pressure of morality; Sarah Parish paints a nuanced portrait of a woman teetering on the edge of a breakdown, both personal and professional; and Shelley Conn gives Jessica an exuberant edge in a compelling storyline about sexual awakening that could have in lesser hands, seemed cliché or exploitative. (That's to say nothing of Anna Torv's charged performance as philandering lesbian bride-to-be.)

All in all, Mistresses proves to be the rare female-centric television series that women (and their men) can watch together with equal relish. And with four talented actresses at its core, gripping storylines, and a whole lot of passion, there are worst ways to spend a Friday night. So pour yourself a big glass of red wine, turn off the telephone, and settle in with these mistresses.

Mistresses premieres tonight with two back-to-back airings of the premiere episode at 8 pm and 9 pm ET/PT on BBC America.