The late night dark week continues for Letterman, Kimmel and Fallon and while the employees of those shows have earned a relaxing week of Cyber Monday shopping and holiday preparations, the home viewers get the first round of holiday movie promotion on the competing programs. To hawk Brothers, Tobey Maguire told Conan O'Brien how exactly Oprah persuaded studio heads to give him the Spider-Man costume. That video, and the other highlights you missed while replaying your Today Show appearance on loop, after the jump.
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In 2007 she chose Victoria Beckham. Last year she chose Will Smith and Tom Cruise. And now, for this year's "10 Most Fascinating People" special, Barbara Walters will recap 2009 by interviewing another handful of celebrities who come factory-built with soundbites (Kate Gosselin, Lady Gaga) and discussing the most talked-about veiled youngsters of the year -- Michael Jackson's children. I can't decide what's worse: waiting on whether they'll be interviewed by the most self-consciously austere interviewer in primetime, or if "experts" will fill time and weigh in on their strife for an 11-minute segment. A near-full list of fascinating people, and a proposal for a more interesting way to organize this tradition, after the jump.
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It seems like only yesterday that Tareq and Michaele Salahi were lamenting to Matt Lauer that their "lifetime memory" of attending last week's White House state dinner had been destroyed by false media reports that they had entered uninvited. Perhaps because it was yesterday that the rumored cast members of Real Housewives of Washington D.C. claimed to have e-mail proof of invitation, even as White House officials repeatedly said otherwise, and millions of Americans wondered "since when does the White House send out evites?" Well today, the surprising e-mail evidence surfaced, proving that the Salahis had been right about a few things. So throw on your bright red sari and allow Movieline to escort you through the Salahi White House-Crashing timeline.
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· In a recent GQ article, TV's Richest Man, Simon Cowell, outlined a Las Vegas scheme so unlikely, so complicated and so risky, that it sounds like George Clooney's plan to rob the Bellagio vaults in Ocean's Eleven. First, the show will set up production in a Vegas casino-hotel, where Cowell & Co. will broadcast two talent shows a week live over the internet where the American Idol judge expects "20, 30, 40 million" to pay to watch each episode. For reference, American Idol averages 30 million (non-paying) viewers while UFC, a successful pay franchise, draws about one million viewers per fight. After the Vegas X Factor has taken off, Cowell will pack Chinese acrobat Paula Abdul into a briefcase and shop the live competition show around the world. [Hollywood Reporter]
Anne Hathaway returns to Springfield, Charlize Theron heads south with 32 footballers, and more TV Bites after the jump.
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A new study by Horizon Media measuring which TV series' viewership rose and fell this year indicates that most returning series on the CW have suffered double-digit percentage losses in key demographics. That's right, even Gossip Girl has fallen hard (30.9%) despite featuring a frosty bro pullaway. A look at the numbers, and what we can do to gaily help, follows.
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The Pynchonian texts that are The Hills and The City finish their seasons tonight, and for the few MTV viewers without degrees in Comparative Literature or Postmodern Critical Theory, the music channel will help explicate all the moments you might have missed with a live special afterward. Hopefully, the program will include teary goodbyes with Lo and Audrina and a highlight reel of their finest moments over the years.
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Saturday Night Live's newest addition to its writing staff, the New York comedian Jessi Klein, may mark a determined mid-season pivot on the part of Lorne Michaels's series. With cast member Kristin Wiig consistently performing the most memorable material on the show, perhaps the macho mechanics in the writer's room need a douse of Klein's Best Week Ever-circa-2007 magic. In honor of Klein's new position, Movieline revisits five women who changed SNL for the better or, sometimes, found greener pastures far away from the confines of 8H.
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As The Amazing Race thins its pack to three Globetrotter-deficient teams heading into Sunday's finale, it's time to look ahead to next season and ponder that important question, "Which team will your mom email you about every Sunday night to says she hates?" If a couple of observant sleuths can be trusted, we may have already met one of our prime contenders!
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More proof that the President hates freedom and Beagles? The annual run up to the football ends poorly for Charlie Brown tonight. But this time it's President Obama pulling out the primetime pig skin. The president has bumped tonight's A Charlie Brown Christmas so that he can address the nation on his Afghanistan policy. Meanwhile, ABC has found Charlie Brown a new time slot on December 15. [Time]
Letterman, Fallon and Kimmel went dark this week but Conan, G-Lo, J-Lo and the gang recovered quickly enough from the holiday to give us fresh shows last night. Hell, Chelsea Handler filmed a new program after the Thanksgiving weekend and a 14 hour flight back from Australia. But William Shatner wins the Thanksgiving survivor story, for his epic tale of one turkey that just did not want to be deep-fried, told eloquently on the Tonight Show. To prove his resilience, Shatner then donned a pair of toy fangs and offered to swim naked through the freezing ocean to stare at Sarah Palin, where he would then, well...the rest of that story and the other late night moments you missed while trying to scrape together that $4.5 million for bail, after the jump.
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You don't have to be Danielle Staub's prostitution-whore drug dealer to know that Bravo's Real Housewives franchise takes all kinds -- aristocratic and stuffy, desperate and nouveau riche, and even so annoying it hurts, sometimes. The Salahi family, who allegedly crashed a White House state dinner while Bravo cameras followed them in consideration for a new Housewives series, might have severed (or escalated) their chance at stardom with this ballooning fiasco. After the jump, video of their talk with Matt Lauer and a thorough inspection of their telegenic goods.
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· The less-annoying half of The Simple Life cast is returning to primetime with her very own ABC sitcom. Nicole Richie came up with the original idea for the show -- a professional woman with complicated family relationships struggles to figure out what role she'll take as her life and her family evolve -- and will receive a producing credit. Warren Bell (According to Jim) is attached to executive produce and Daisy Gardner (Californication) is set to pen the series. [Variety]
CBS dumps Three Rivers from its Sunday roster, another Saved By the Bell alum is freed into the unemployment pool, and more TV Bites after the jump.
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The other PGA -- the Producer's Guild of America -- returned from a headline-free Thanksgiving weekend to announce the nominees for their 21st annual award show, in the television series and non-fiction television series categories. Click through for the complete list of nominees who stand a chance at winning the coveted prize (a Taylor Lautner poster?) on January 24 at the Hollywood Palladium.
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After missing General Hospital's Thanksgiving celebration, Franco swung back into Port Charles this afternoon for three brief scenes. Each poignantly captured Franco's impatient sensibility, his mysterious fascination with Jason, and his love for multimedia artwork, but one of the scenes revealed a fourth component that writers had definitely not included in the A-lister's script.
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ABC's had a difficult time navigating the wake of Adam Lambert's controversial AMA performance. The Walt Disney Co-owned network claimed no previous knowledge of the "dance moves" which they edited out on the West Coast and defended the performance as a non crisis, yet canceled Lambert's appearance on Good Morning America before booking and dropping a much more controversial guest, Chris Brown. Now, it seems that ABC is pressing forward with an ironclad contractual agreement that will prevent any future crotch grabs, same-sex kisses, middle fingers (and spontaneity) from its live television performances.
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