Channel Surfing: Darlton Talk Donkey Wheel, Priestley Directs "90210," Lifetime Snags Four for "Maneater," and More

Welcome to your Wednesday morning television briefing. I don't know about you but I'm still on a high after yesterday's amazing presidential inauguration. While the nation joined together yesterday to bear witness to the 44th president taking the oath, there are still a few television-related headlines to get through this morning.

Entertainment Weekly's Doc Jensen (a.k.a. Jeff Jensen) continues his video interview series with Lost executive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse. Up today: a segment focusing on Season Four, including discussions about the coffin, the donkey wheel, and the freighter. (Entertainment Weekly)

Jason Priestley will direct the eighteenth episode of 90210 this season, which will feature a crisis involving several characters. "I have a lot of challenges ahead of me on how to shoot this, it's big," said Priestley, who wouldn't confirm whether said crisis is an earthquake or a car accident. "Yeah, we're in a hospital... a female ends up in the hospital." But don't look for Jessica Lowndes' Adrianna to be giving birth. "I can tell you that no one is giving birth," said Priestley. "Boy, that would be a preemie wouldn't it?" (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

Don't expect The Office's Jim and Pam to get married this season, according to executive producer Greg Daniels. "If people assume it'll happen this season, then I don't want to do it," Daniels told Michael Ausiello. "There are so many stories about a couple getting married that I want to explore." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Lifetime has cast Judy Greer (Miss Guided), Philip Winchester (Crusoe), Gregory Harrison (Joey), and Maria Conchita Alonso (Saints & Sinners) opposite Sarah Chalke (Scrubs) in mini-series Maneater, based on Gigi Levangie Grazer's novel about a shallow 30-something socialite who panics because she's still unmarried and sets her sights on a Hollywood producer. Project, from Sony Pictures Television, will be directed by Timothy Busfield. (Hollywood Reporter)

Sadly, Monday night's episode of Gossip Girl, easily the strongest segment of the season so far story-wise, also managed to be the lowest-rated installment of the sophomore season, garnering only 2.2 million viewers, reflecting a decline of 700,000 from its previous episode. How depressing is that? (Entertainment Weekly's Hollywood Insider)

Warner Bros. will eliminate nearly 800 jobs worldwide, roughly ten percent of its workforce, across all areas in light of the economic downturn. Among the measures being taken: the elimination of 200 currently open positions, the layoff of 300 employees, and the outsourcing of 300 additional position, mostly in information systems and accounts payable to a third party company. (Variety)

Finally, Michelle Obama's hairstylist Johnny Wright has signed a development deal with 44 Blue (Split Ends) to star in a new reality series, with the project--to be either a docusoap or makeover series--going out to cable networks soon. (Hollywood Reporter)

Stay tuned.

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.

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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 ...

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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...

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