TV Hot Spot: News

The Hills: Obama Gets Involved!

Post by: Sal


Source: MTV & E! Online


E! Online Video:





Take Care,

Sal

TV Hot Spot: News

Letterman, Leno Start Booking Guests!

Post by: Sal


Source: Zap2It

With their returns to the air only a couple days away, the network late-night shows are starting to book guests.

Five network late-night shows -- ABC's "Jimmy Kimmel Live," CBS' "Late Show" and "Late Late Show" and NBC's "Tonight Show" and "Late Night" -- are scheduled to return to the airwaves Wednesday for the first time since the writers' strike began in early November. Only a couple, though, have confirmed guests for their first night back.

"The Tonight Show with Jay Leno" will welcome former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee on Jan. 2, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The appearance will give Huckabee a national audience the night before the Iowa caucuses, where he's among the front-runners in the Republican field.

David Letterman, meanwhile, will have Robin Williams and country artist Shooter Jennings on his first "Late Show" since the strike. He'll also have his writers: Production company Worldwide Pants, which owns both "The Late Show" and "The Late Late Show," made its own deal with the Writers Guild of America last week to allow scribes for the two shows to go back to work.

Leno, Kimmel and "Late Night" host Conan O'Brien don't have that luxury, as their shows are owned primarily by the media companies that air them.

"Late Night," "The Late Late Show" and "Jimmy Kimmel Live" haven't announced guests for their first shows back. Neither have "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report," which are slated to return to Comedy Central on Monday, Jan. 7.



Take Care,

Sal

TV Hot Spot: News

Writers Guild Makes Deal With David Letterman!

Post by: Sal


Source: Zap2It

NEW YORK -- David Letterman's production company has struck an independent deal with the Writers Guild of America that will allow "Late Show With David Letterman" and its sister program, "The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson," to return to the air Wednesday, Jan. 2 with its writing staffs, according to a person familiar with the agreement.

Worldwide Pants, which produces and owns both programs, is the first company to strike a deal with the guild in the nearly 8-week-old strike. The terms of the agreement were not immediately known.

The accord means that when Letterman and Ferguson resume production next week, the CBS hosts will be the only late-night comedians back on the air with their writers. NBC's Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien, ABC's Jimmy Kimmel and Comedy Central's Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert said earlier this month that they would also return with new shows in January, but without their writing staffs. (Because their programs are owned by their respective networks, those hosts could not make the kind of separate arrangement with the union that Worldwide Pants did.)

So while Letterman is reeling off his famous Top 10 List, Leno -- who is prohibited from writing under strike rules -- will have to rely on improv, musical guests and celebrity interviews.

The Worldwide Pants deal is a small bright spot for the guild, which is engaged in a bitter standoff with the studios. While the agreement covers only a small fraction of the 10,500 striking writers, it allows the union to make the case that it is willing to work with reasonable producers.

Still, even with Worldwide Pants offering to give the union the terms it sought, it took nearly two weeks for an agreement to be reached between the two sides.


Take Care,

Sal

TV Hot Spot: News

David Letterman Seeks Deal with Writers!

Post by: Sal


Source: Zap2It

NEW YORK -- David Letterman's production company, Worldwide Pants, jumped at the chance Saturday to negotiate independently with the Writers Guild of America, saying it was eager to make a deal with its striking writers and get new episodes of its late-night shows back on the air.

The move by Worldwide Pants, which produces "The Late Show With David Letterman" and "The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson," could bolster the union's efforts to break apart the alliance of studios and networks with which it has been at loggerheads.

Hours after the union told its members it would try to break the logjam by dealing with individual companies, Worldwide Pants chief executive Rob Burnett said the company would take the guild up on its offer.

"Because we are an independent production company, we are able to pursue an interim agreement with the guild without involving CBS in that pursuit," Burnett said in a statement. He added that the company told the WGA when the strike started that it would be willing to make such a deal consistent with the guild's demands: "It is our strong desire to be back on the air with our writers, and we hope that will happen as soon as possible."

CBS, which broadcasts the two late-night shows, said it respected Worldwide Pants' desire to help its employees. But network spokesman Chris Ender said that "should not confuse the fact that CBS remains unified with the [Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers] and committed to working with the member companies to reach a fair and reasonable agreement with the WGA."

WGA officials did not have an immediate response as to how quickly negotiations with the company could proceed.

Bill Scheft, a veteran Letterman writer and the program's WGA strike captain, greeted Saturday's developments with relief. "This would be too good to be true," he said. "It's totally pro-writer, which is what Dave has been throughout. Ideally, other people would then fall in line."

On Saturday, guild officials sent members a letter detailing their new strategy, which they plan to present to individual studios on Monday.

"We want to do everything in our power to move negotiations forward and end this devastating strike," the guild's negotiating committee wrote. "The internal dynamics of the [alliance] make it difficult for the conglomerates to reach consensus and negotiate with us on a give-and-take basis."

An AMPTP spokesman dismissed the union's tactic, saying the guild was "grasping for straws" and that its members were unified.

The deal would be a major boon to Letterman, allowing him to return to the air with his writing staff at a time when his rivals are sidelined.

The CBS host is in a better position to make an individual deal with the WGA than late-night hosts Jay Leno, Conan O'Brien and Jimmy Kimmel, whose programs are owned by their networks.

They may return to the air without their writers -- a move considered likely to happen after the new year -- but could face problems getting guests to cross the picket line.

Since the strike began, all the late-nights hosts have worked to ensure that their non-writing staffs continued to get paid, with many doling money out of their own pockets. It's unclear how long they would be able to continue doing so; Letterman alone has been spending $300,000 a week on payroll.

For the last six weeks, the Letterman show writers have been a constant presence on the New York picket lines and have produced a lively blog about the labor stoppage.

Scheft said that while the show's writers would be thrilled to be back at work, "you think about all the people still left on the line."

"The longer it's gone on, the more I believe in what we're doing," Scheft said.


Take Care,

Sal

TV Hot Spot: News

Late-Night Hosts Ponder Return!

Post by: Sal


Source: Zap2It

Jay Leno, David Letterman and their fellow late-night hosts have stayed away from work since the writers' strike began, but speculation is rising that they'll be back on the air early next year.

All the late-night hosts (save Carson Daly, who's not a Writers Guild member and began taping new shows last week) have kept their shows dark since the Writers Guild of America began its strike in early November. As the strike heads toward the two-month mark with no sign of resolution, though, the hosts are reportedly considering when the right time to return might be.

While stressing that nothing is official and no one is commenting on the situation, Variety reports that "several hosts" will return to their shows shortly after New Year's. The trade paper also says that people involved with the NBC and CBS late-night shows have been informally discussing going back on the air at roughly the same time.

Daly has received some harsh criticism for crossing the picket lines -- and for an e-mail soliciting jokes that was leaked to news outlets -- but there appears to be a little more understanding for Letterman, Leno and Co. should they decide to return.

"If you ask people on the line, they would have been thrilled if the guys just stayed off a month for sweeps," long-time "Late Show" writer Bill Scheft told the Los Angeles Times earlier this week.

Scheft also thinks having his boss on the air could help the writers' cause: "David Letterman, on the air without writers ... is the greatest ally the writers would ever have, because he would rail nightly," Scheft told the Times. "He could be more influential as an on-air stone in people's shoes. The leverage for us might be him and Jon [Stewart] and Conan [O'Brien] talking trash."

There is precedent for hosts returning to work during a writers' strike. Johnny Carson returned to "The Tonight Show" about two months into the 1988 strike, citing concern for show staffers who were going without paychecks. Letterman followed suit and memorably spent most of one episode getting a shave.

Letterman's production company, Worldwide Pants, is covering the salaries for employees of "The Late Show" and "The Late Late Show," which it also owns, through the end of this year. Leno and "Late Night" host O'Brien, who don't own their shows, are also paying their employees, as is ABC's Jimmy Kimmel.


Take Care,

Sal