Colbert turns another personal injury into a mock crusade
With a bruised forehead, Stephen Colbert has found a new cause celebre: fighting the glamorization of ‘‘face violence.’’
As he did after breaking his wrist last year, Colbert has transformed a real-life injury into a mock crusade. Colbert was injured Saturday, and while he’s been cagey about the cause, he’s made no attempt to hide the scarring between his eyebrows this week on ‘‘The Colbert Report.’’
Does every J.J. Abrams TV series about scary science have to begin with a plane crash?
In this new trailer for "Fringe," Abrams' new series scheduled this fall on Fox, the action begins when — as a plane is careening out of the sky — one of the passengers injects himself with something that ... well, let's say death by the actual crash probably would have been preferred by most passengers. And if you like that syringe scene, you're in luck because the trailer contains about a dozen more needle pricks. Eeuuuw!
'Battlestar Galactica': Let's get back to base-ics
Is anyone else as bored and disillusioned as I am by this leaden final season of Sci Fi's "Battlestar Galactica"?
It pains me to write such things, given how the show's first two seasons were so exciting and refreshing. But after Season Three's confusing ending (Tyrol's a Cylon? So why no fuss about his baby?), this fourth and final season has been one long, bleak dud, lacking the common-cause heroism and universal Odyssean storyline that made this retooled drama so compelling.
If you need us on Memorial Day, we'll be entranced by this Lohan nightmare
Enjoy this sneak peek at the upcoming reality trash of the summer: the show chronicling the maternal crusades of Lindsay Lohan's bleached, tanned mother.
Do we love 'The Paper' because it's great — or because we're journalists?
A clip reel from the current debut season of MTV's "The Paper."
Docu-reality series are everywhere these days, but good ones — not just fun to gawk at, but dramatic on their own — are depressingly hard to come by. Most often, the characters are either unreal from the start, or far too real. They mug for the camera like so many ‘‘real housewives.’’ They angle to make the most of mild celebrity, like those too-many Kardashians. Or they’re so dull as to be hardly worth the screen time: Even ‘‘Jon & Kate Plus 8,’’ the should-be-fascinating Discovery Health/TLC series about a family with twins and sextuplets, gets bogged down in the details of shelf-hanging and carpet replacement.
Capturing life in high school, you’d think, would be the hardest task of all: How can reality in the homogenized suburbs live up to the angst and pathos of snarky screenplays or overwrought teen TV dramas? Perhaps by happy accident, MTV has figured it out.
Britney's second sitcom appearance tonight — and a third...?
A sneak peek at tonight's return of Britney Spears to the sitcom "How I Met Your Mother," from CBS.
Three times might be the charm for Britney Spears and ‘‘How I Met Your Mother.’’
With Spears making her second guest appearance on the popular CBS comedy, the show’s co-creator Craig Thomas says tonight's episode was written to leave the door open for the pop singer to make a return appearance next season.
Candidates Hillary Clinton, John McCain and our own Barack Obama are serious about courting the blue-collar vote in tomorrow's Pennsylvania primary election. Because they're each appearing on tonight's "Monday Night RAW" world-wrestling show.
WWE wrestlers settle their differences. Is the Democratic primary about to be decided this way?
Stephen Colbert’s bid for the presidency may have fallen short, but he’s still determined to influence the race.
Today, ‘‘The Colbert Report’’ begins a week of broadcasts in Philadelphia, where the all-important Democratic Pennsylvania primary is looming. Colbert hopes the relocation will return him to center stage in the election.
‘‘I don’t need to be president. I don’t need to be president,’’ repeated the comedian in a recent interview, as if trying to convince himself. ‘‘If somebody else needs that, if Hillary Clinton or John McCain or Barack Obama need that title to make themselves feel good, that’s fine. I just want the power to decide who will be president and I’m going to Philly to help exercise that.’’
Spitzer scandal leads '20/20' to move up prostitution story
Former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s call girl scandal has prompted ABC News to give the go-ahead to a two-hour prime-time special on prostitution that includes Diane Sawyer’s visit to a legal brothel in Nevada.
The ‘‘20/20’’ special, which airs 8 p.m. Friday, has been in the works for two years. It was expected to be on sometime in May or June, but ABC moved it up because Spitzer’s resignation last week put the topic in the headlines, said David Sloan, executive producer of ABC’s newsmagazines.
‘‘It has taken a lot of time and I think it’s going to be very provocative,’’ Sloan said.
Sex and shopping: Sneak peak at Britney's sitcom gig
In this image released by CBS, Josh Radnor (left), speaks to Britney Spears, who portrays receptionist Abby, in a scene from "How I Met Your Mother." Also guest-starring in this episode, which airs Monday on CBS, is Sarah Chalke, at right.(Monty Brinton/AP/CBS)
The first words we hear pop starlet Britney Spears say in her upcoming episode of the sitcom "How I Met Your Mother" are: "Can we have sex and then go shopping?"
CBS has let slip a few seconds of footage as a teaser, after the jump...
The first thing that hits you while walking across the set of "Wheel of Fortune": the wheel is so small!
The old adage that the camera adds 10 pounds is true for inanimate objects, as well. I thought it would be 25 feet wide. But I could probably lie across it, feet and head on the pegs. I restrained myself from testing that theory, however.
But I got to see many such "Wheel" wonders during tapings of the hugely popular game show Friday evening at Navy Pier.
Why aren't the gay guys kissing on 'As the World Turns'?
A while back we wrote about the campaign by "Jericho" fans to save the series from cancellation — they sent thousands of nuts to CBS execs (related to a line in the season finale). Now fans of the soap opera "As the World Turns" are gearing up to send kisses to CBS execs. Hershey's kisses, that is. Fill in your own Reeses joke here ...
Misha Davenport digs the immortality (well, it premieres this week, so we'll see what life it's got in it...) of Fox's new drama "New Amsterdam" in his review today.
'Lost' resumes production, five more episodes returning April 24
The Honolulu Advertiser newspaper is reporting that production on "Lost" is heating up again in the Hawaiian islands.
The cast is reportedly due back on March 10, which is just 10 days before the last completed episode will air.
"Lost" was a casualty of the writers strike, returning this spring to ABC with only eight of its planned 16 episodes to complete the current season. An ABC spokesperson has said the network plans to complete only five more episodes to air this spring, beginning April 24.
Two days after its premiere on NBC, the Internet-to-broadcast series ‘‘quarterlife’’ is moving to Bravo, sources say.
The series will complete its run on NBC Universal’s cable network, adding another stop on the show’s remarkable tour of media distribution outlets: from MySpace, to an MTV preview, to NBC’s broadcast network, to Bravo.
Five one-hour episodes remain in the original network order. The episodes are based on 38 eight-minute shorts that first ran online.
On Tuesday, the NBC premiere of ‘‘quarterlife’’ marked the network’s worst time-period performance in the 10 p.m. hour in at least 17 years, averaging a 1.3 rating/4 share among adults 18 to 49 and 3.1 million viewers.
You don’t have to stay up past midnight to enjoy your late-night shows.
Material from David Letterman, Jay Leno, Jimmy Kimmel and Conan O’Brien is increasingly turning into viral video on the Web. Long secluded in the wee hours of the night, these funnymen are now, with the help of a click or two, finding laughs in the waking hours.
They’re often a hit, too, and none more so than Kimmel has been recently.
NBC also said its prime-time schedule will begin returning to life with new episodes of “My Name Is Earl” starting April 3. “The Office,” “Scrubs” and “ER” will be back April 10. And then come the “Law & Orders”: “SVU” on April 15 and the original on April 23.
The network also said freshman dramas “Chuck” and “Life” have been renewed for next season.
The first thing that hits you while walking across the set of "Wheel of Fortune": the wheel is so small!