Channel Surfing: Starbuck is "Lost and Found," Paul McGann NOT headed to "Doctor Who," Hugh Laurie, and More

Good morning and welcome to your Friday morning television briefing.

In her first television role since the end of Battlestar Galactica (hitting small screens in 2009), Katee Sackhoff has signed on to star in drama pilot Lost and Found for Dick Wolf at NBC. Project, from writer/executive producer Chris Levinson, revolves around NYPD detective Tessa Cooper (Sackhoff) who is forced to solve John and Jane Doe cases after she finds herself rubbing her bosses the wrong way. Sackhoff's attachment lifts the cast contingency on the project, which was ordered to pilot last month. (Hollywood Reporter)

FOX has signed a new deal with Gordon Ramsay that will keep the chef at the network for several more years and includes an agreement to produce two more editions of Hell's Kitchen, another season of Kitchen Nightmares, and a third series (likely based on Ramsay's Channel 4 series Man Camp, about a boot camp for men worried by how feminine they're becoming) and a special in which at-home viewers will be able to cook alongside Ramsay. (Futon Critic)

Hugh Laurie has become one of the highest paid actors on television, signing a new deal with Universal Media Studios to continue starring on FOX's House through the 2011-12 season, in a deal said to be worth more than $9 million a year (or $400,000/episode). (Hollywood Reporter)

HBO has ordered a pilot script for an untitled drama series about a Florida golf pro who is forced to enter the witness protection program from writers/sports columnists Carl Hiaasen and Mike Lupica. (Variety)

BBC has denied tabloid reports that Paul McGann, who played the Doctor in a 1996 made-for-TV movie and a series of audio adventures, had been cast in one of the four upcoming Doctor Who specials expected for 2009. The Beeb has categorically denied the story, which ran in The Sun: "There is no truth to the story at all," said a spokeswoman. (Digital Spy)

Wondering how Jason O'Mara felt, being the only cast member to stick around after ABC axed the original pilot for Life on Mars? Find out in this interview. (Los Angeles Times)

BermanBraun has hired Gene Stein as its head of nonscripted programming while Matt Hanna, who had been overseeing the development slate, will focus on overseeing the series that the production company produces through its deal with Thom Beers' Original Prods. (Variety)

In other executive shuffle news, Maria Grasso has left Lifetime and to join cabler OWN:The Oprah Winfrey Network in a top development role, reporting to Robin Schwartz. (Hollywood Reporter)

Stay tuned.

What's On Tonight

8 pm: Ghost Whisperer (CBS); America's Toughest Jobs (NBC); Friday Night SmackDown! (CW; 8-10 pm); 2008 ALMA Awards (ABC; 8-10 pm); Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? (FOX)

9 pm: Ghost Whisperer (CBS); Dateline (NBC; 9-11 pm); Don't Forget the Lyrics (FOX)

10 pm: NUMB3RS (CBS); 20/20 (ABC)

What I'll Be Watching

Um, I think I'll just go out instead...

Have a Burning Question for Team Darlton, Matthew Fox, Evangeline Lilly, or Michael Emerson?

Lost fans: you don't have to make your way to the island via Ajira Airways in order to ask a question of the creative team or the series' stars. Televisionary is taking questions from fans to put to Lost 's executive producers/showrunners Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse and stars Matthew Fox ("Jack Shephard"), Evangeline Lilly ("Kate Austen"), and Michael Emerson ("Benjamin Linus") for a series of on-camera interviews taking place this weekend. If you have a specific question for any of the above producers or actors from Lost , please leave it in the comments section below . I'll be accepting questions until midnight PT tonight and, while I can't promise I'll be able to ask any specific inquiry due to the brevity of these on-camera interviews, I am looking for some insightful and thought-provoking questions to add to the mix. So who knows: your burning question might get asked after all.

Continue reading full story...

What's Done is Done: The Eternal Struggle Between Good and Evil on the Season Finale of "Lost"

Every story begins with thread. It's up to the storyteller to determine just how much they need to parcel out, what pattern they're making, and when to cut it short and tie it off. With last night's penultimate season finale of Lost ("The Incident, Parts One and Two"), written by Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse, we began to see the pattern that Lindelof and Cuse have been designing towards the last five seasons of this serpentine series. And it was only fitting that the two-hour finale, which pushes us on the road to the final season of Lost , should begin with thread, a loom, and a tapestry. Would Jack follow through on his plan to detonate the island and therefore reset their lives aboard Oceanic Flight 815 ? Why did Locke want to kill Jacob? What caused The Incident? What was in the box and just what lies in the shadow of the statue? We got the answers to these in a two-hour season finale that didn't quite pack the same emotional wallop of previous season ...

Continue reading full story...

In Defense of Downton Abbey (Or, Don't Believe Everything You Read)

The proof of the pudding, as they say, is in the eating. Which means, if I can get on my soapbox for a minute, that in order to judge something, one ought to experience it first hand. One can't know how the pudding has turned out until one actually tastes it. I was asked last week--while I was on vacation with my wife--for an interview by a journalist from The Daily Mail, who got in touch to talk to me about PBS' upcoming launch of ITV's period drama Downton Abbey , which stars Hugh Bonneville, Dame Maggie Smith, Dan Stevens, Elizabeth McGovern, and a host of others. (It launches on Sunday evening as part of PBS' Masterpiece Classic ; my advance review of the first season can be read here , while my interview with Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes and stars Dan Stevens and Hugh Bonneville can be read here .) Normally, I would have refused, just based on the fact that I was traveling and wasn't working, but I love Downton Abbey and am so enchanted with the proj...

Continue reading full story...

[Televisionary]

Search This Blog