NBC has already booked Snooki -- along with her merry band of Jersey Shore fist-pumpers (minus Vinny) -- for the third episode of the Tonight Show with Jay Leno 2.0. Instead of an interview, NBC is flying the cast out to L.A. this week to pre-tape a segment which will air on March 3. Snooki already has a history with Leno, having appeared on his primetime show once solo for a 10@10 segment and another time with The Situation and DJ Pauly D. [Radar]
That staggering $45 million payout that NBC awarded Conan O'Brien and his Tonight Show staff may have stipulated who gets custody of the Masturbating Bear, but it did not allocate any severance for Conan's 50 person crew. TMZ reports that Coco will dip into his own pocket to pay each of the stagehands at least six weeks severance and one personalized Conando telegram each. The union members told TMZ that they are "very happy" with the outcome. [TMZ]
For every hundred karaoke and cell phone shoot-out segments that Jimmy Fallon airs on Late Night, there comes one bit so inspired that viewers are tempted to start watching NBC regularly after 12:35 PM. One of those rare moments arrived last night in the form of a Glee parody complete with blue slushy, Jayma Mays look-a-like Abby Elliott and Bon Jovi. Click through for that clip, as well as the other highlights you missed last night while imagining the best Avatar ethnic dance routine for your Oscar show this year.
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Megan Mullally may face the daunting task of replacing Jane Lynch on Starz's caterer comedy Party Down this April, but the job is already a cathartic venture for the 51-year-old actress. Now, for instance, she gets to use swear words -- frequently. The Emmy-winning Will and Grace star talked to Movieline about how cable television is good for comedy, why she loves to swear on-screen, and the reason that network comedy is becoming "archaic."
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Zach Galifianakis' Twitter feed just announced the Hangover star will be hosting the March 6 episode of Saturday Night Live, promising at least one sketch in which Andy Samberg will hang suspended from Zach's belly in an AdultBjörn. Hooray! (Hopefully he'll write his own sketches.) [@galifianakisz]
One of the better moments in Oprah's Leno-spectacular last week occurred when Lady O. drew attention to a recent poll in which a staggering 96 percent of her viewers America aligned themselves with Conan O'Brien after NBC's Tonight Show scuffle. Leno shrugged, agreed that he had a long, hard road ahead of him before he could reclaim his Letterman-trouncing ratings at 11:35 PM, and then delivered a blistering forty minutes worth of blue collar verbiage designed to seduce middle America back into his grease-stained arms. Oprah announced that she would post a new poll immediately after the interview, in which viewers could recast their Leno/Conan ballots based on Leno's testimony. Twenty-four hours passed, Movieline discovered that Leno had only swayed one additional percent of Oprah's voters...and we figured that sounded about right. (After all, he confessed that he did not try to contact Conan throughout the mishandling). But then Oprah.com quietly took down its poll on Friday without announcing results on air as promised, and Movieline received a tip from a source close to Leno's camp alleging that the vote had been rigged.
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Since Lost's third season, Nestor Carbonell has popped up several times on the show as the mysterious, ageless Richard Alpert, but when the sixth and final season premieres tonight, Carbonell will finally join the cast as a regular. It's a sign that Richard (who seems inextricably linked to the island's mythology) is going to prove pivotal in revealing many of Lost's big secrets, but it's also a tribute to the ingratiating slow burn Carbonell's managed while revealing hardly a thing about Richard's true nature.
Movieline spoke with the actor yesterday about what's in store for Richard in season six, what we can expect from a Richard-centric episode, the tragic origin story of his much-discussed heavy eyelashes, and his willingness to play Khan in a potential Star Trek sequel.
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· The television medium this morning welcomes Matthew Broderick, who has signed on to star in an NBC sitcom from Lorne Michaels and Paul Simms (NewsRadio) called Beach Lane. Broderick will star as a celebrity author recruited by an irresponsible millionaire to manage his struggling small-town Hamptons newspaper. Michaels and Simms will executive produce alongside 30 Rock's Marci Klein. After being courted by TV networks for years, the project marks Broderick's first full-time foray into series television. The actor was initially approached months ago about the project but only committed after reading the final script, written by Simms. [Variety]
Lost fans shock ABC execs, Andy Samberg preserves the Parks and more TV Bites after the jump.
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These days, every channel has its reality competition workhorse that pays the bills. Fox has American Idol, Lifetime has Project Runway and after last year's breakout season, Logo now has RuPaul's Drag Race. Tonight, RuPaul kicks off the show's second iteration by honoring one of her favorite films, Gone With the Wind, in a challenge that requires the dozen accomplished drag queens to craft fierce looks out of curtains, and as usual, the bottom two will lip-sync for their lives in front of an esteemed guest judge (in tonight's episode, Kathy Griffin). But this is only one of the latest ventures for the cultural force, whose new book Workin' It!: RuPaul's Guide to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Style hits bookshelves tomorrow. In June, Ru will give straight women the confidence to use "all of the colors in their crayon box" with a new show called Drag University.
Movieline caught up with RuPaul to discuss expanding her reality empire, owning your power, and how everyone could benefit from a little drag.
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If you survived all 200+ minutes of the last night's Grammy telecast, you numbered among the lucky ones. Or is it the unlucky ones? The night's biggest awards went to lackluster choices (including a particularly disappointing Record of the Year win for Kings of Leon's "Use Somebody"), and one speech reminded us of cinema's greatest faux-gracious award recipient. Unfasten your seatbelts for a review of music's stodgiest, bumpiest night.
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· Pop the Nikolai. MTV has inked deals for all members of the Jersey Shore (including evictee Angelina) to return for a second season. The cast's shrewd Friends-style negotiations paid off -- with each member reportedly getting $10,000 per episode (MTV has ordered a 12-episode season). To facilitate a mid-to-late summer premiere, the cast will begin shooting this winter in a new location. Tony DiSanto, president of MTV programming, released the following statement welcoming his network's orange cash cows back to pasture: "We're thrilled to reunite these friends to bring fans more of what they love -- laughs, love, drama and of course, GTL." [THR]
Oprah spawns another television show, ABC wants to produce Better Americans, and more TV Bites after the jump.
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Like Jay Leno himself, there was nothing shocking about Oprah's Leno-spectacular yesterday. The denim deity greeted Lady O. ("Hello doll, you look wonderful") with his American flag pin squarely on his lapel, sat down and then devoted forty minutes trying to convince viewers at home that he had no choice but to take back the Tonight Show. The only two surprising moments occurred when Oprah flat-out told Leno that his below-the-belt joke about David Letterman last week ("You know the best way to get Letterman to ignore you? Marry him!") was not funny. And the second was when she revealed that 96 percent of her viewers America were Team Coco. Twenty-four hours later, it appears that America still does not believe, despite Jay's protests, that he really is "just a good guy."
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Last night's episode of Project Runway throttled every decent viewer's spirit to the core. Chinese-born designer Ping Wu was eliminated during a team challenge in which she was paired with the huffy, cuss-spewing Jesse LeNoir. While Wu's rather spacey approach to design may not have been very partner-compatible, the verbal beating she took from LeNoir seemed like overkill. Movieline spoke with Wu this morning about leadership, LeNoir's lies, and the model who sold her out to the judges.
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Project Runway's second trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art was decadent and devastating. The judges ordered one of our favorite miniature seamsters to clean up his/her space, and Nina Garcia's criticisms got really mean. Like, meaner than Michael Kors after the tanning salon clerk mentions that "Firewood" isn't his color. Trot along with us as we rediscover the season's most artful -- and stupefyingly bitchy -- episode yet.
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Nearly a year and a half ago, HBO announced that it was teaming up with Judd Apatow and Funny or Die creators Will Ferrell, Chris Henchy and Adam McKay, for a ten episode series called Funny or Die Presents. And finally, Will Ferrell & Co. have released the trailer for their sketch comedy orgy, which features no less than two dozen comedians (count them!), a classic FoD bit (Drunk History), Wayne Newton and at least one hawk. Click through for the insane result.
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