Joss Whedon was a goner. He had no intent of going back to the smallscreen, and in fact was trying hard to sort out his options for a pre-strike feature writing offer. Then he got a ring from his faithful friend and former "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" colleague Eliza Dushku, who was looking for some advice on how she should make the most of the development pact she'd signed with Fox and 20th Century Fox TV during the summer.

In mid-September, the two went to lunch at Santa Monica's at Ivy at the Shore, and over a meal, almost by accident, Whedon came up with the concept for "Dollhouse," as Variety's Michael Schneider details in his report on the seven-seg commitment that Fox and its studio sib 20th have given to Whedon's idea for a show about a super-secret (what else?) world of folks who are walking tabula rasa -- blank slates who are programmed with different personalities each time they're dispatched for a mission.

"It was a mistake!" Whedon says. "I sat down with her to talk about her options, and acted all sage, saying things backwards like Yoda and laying out what I thought she should do. But in the course of doing it, I accidentally made one up. I told it to her, and she said, 'That's exactly what I want to do.' "

At the moment Eliza beckoned, Whedon was at work on his fantasy-thriller "Goner," for producers Mary Parent and Scott Stuber at U, and he was fielding a whole bunch of options for a pre-strike feature writing project. Although Whedon didn't have such a grand time during his last hitch at Fox in 2002-03 with "Firefly" (which begat the 2005 U feature "Serenity"), times change and so do networks.

Whedon gamely took a meeting with Fox's Peter Liguori and Kevin Reilly, and walked out with a sizable commitment for a project the net hopes to have in production by the spring -- in an ideal, strike-free world. Fingers crossed.

(Pic of Whedon and Dushku at a 2003 "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" charity event by Albert L. Ortega/WireImage)

A writers strike could ruin your whole day. Or night.

My hard-working Variety colleagues spent all day Tuesday turning over rocks and looking into every aspect of what a scribe work stoppage would mean for this town, and none of it is good. TV editors Joe Adalian and Michael Schneider did a fine job of explaining how quickly a strike would KO our favorite latenight companions -- read their reportage by clicking here, and check out the rest of Variety's team coverage by clicking here.

Speaking of our fave latenight companions, here's a look at what David Letterman looked like the last time the WGA went out. While some part of Letterman might want to turn back the clock to those lazy-hazy days of July 1988 when this pic was snapped (actually, he seems so happy these days as little Harry's proud papa I'll be he wouldn't go back for nothin'), fans of quality television do not want to be deprived of our daily and weekly fixes of our fave primetime raves. (No more visits to "The Office," a dimming of "Friday Night Lights," a busted "Big Bang Theory," losing "Lost" in midstream, uprooted "Pushing Daisies," etc.)

So here's to hoping the federal mediator or somebody can bring about a meeting of the minds in the ultimate writers' room this week.

(Letterman pic by Ron Galella/WireImage)

Stephen Colbert comes across as so comfortable in the skin of his "Colbert Report" arch-conservative pundit persona that it's easy to forget he's playing a character that has been developed by him and the writer-producers on his Comedy Central skein.

Chief among those "Colbert Report" truthiness-deciders is Allison Silverman, who was upped last month to exec producer of the show along with Colbert and Jon Stewart. Silverman, whose resume includes stints as a writer-producer on "The Daily Show" and "Late Night with Conan O'Brien," has worked closely with Colbert during the past two years to fine-tune the character that walks a fine line between arrogant jerk and arrogant-but-lovable-jerk. (And arrogant-but-lovable presidential candidate as of Oct. 17, so long as those pesky Federal Election Commission rules don't drum him out of the race.)

"In the beginning we were conscious that he could turn out to be a real jerk of a character, and we still think about it a lot. We've always wanted him to be arrogant and willfully ignorant, but not someone you'd just hate," says Silverman, who joined "Colbert" shortly after it was picked up to series in 2005. "A lot of times it's all about the tone. Sometimes he'll do something that comes off as too repugnant. He'll say the exact same things but change the tone just a little bit and it makes all the difference."

She got laughs just by looking at the stagehand who put on mike on her. She made a 40-minute Q&A fly by in about 15 seconds with funny and fond memories of "The Carol Burnett Show," her time in the hot seat on game shows, how she never really cared for her famous charwoman character and how all she really wanted to be when she grew up was Mary Martin or Ethel Merman.

Carol Burnett turned all of her natural charm at the Paley Center for Media on Thursday night at the premiere screening of the "American Masters" docu "Carol Burnett: A Woman of Character." On hand in the aud for the Q&A by yours truly and screening were "Burnett Show" alums Tim Conway and Harvey Korman, Phyliss Diller, Jon Cryer, Carl Reiner, Burnett couture-ist Bob Mackie and Kyra Thompson, producer of the spesh.

Thompson (pictured above with Burnett) noted that one of the most eye-opening aspects of researching the Burnett docu was just how much physical comedy she'd done over the years, and how it made her stand out among femme actresses. Thompson also described how excited she got when she laid her hands on a clip of the very first physical stunt Burnett did, as part of the Garry Moore variety show in the late 1950s. "Woman of Character" bows Nov. 5.

(Pics by Kevin Parry/Paley Center. Forgive the self-indulgence with the pic at right.)

Now this sounds like fun. An "Office" convention this weekend in Scranton, Pa.? Surprised somebody didn't think of it sooner. Per this AP report, a host of cast members and writers (but not Steve Carell, John Krasinski, Rainn Wilson or Jenna Fischer) are winging in for the Friday-Sunday event.

Al Roker is set to cover part of the event live Friday morning for Peacock's "Today" will broadcast live from the University of Scranton on Friday.

"The show has been the vehicle by which we can tell our story, and cities rarely get that opportunity," says Scranton Mayor Chris Doherty, who counts himself as an "Office" fan.

NBC's tack in promoting the return of "Scrubs" on Thursday seems kind of unusual for the show.

Peacock's on-air tubthumping has emphasized that show is in its final season and playing up the will-they-or-won't-they? angle regarding Zach Braff's J.D. and Sarah Chalke's Elliot. The on-again, off-again sparks between those two have been a running thread of the laffer, fer sure, but not as much as you'd think from watching the promos.

Opening seg of season seven, "My Own Worst Enemy" -- penned by exec producers Garrett Donovan and Neil Goldman and helmed by creator/exec producer Bill Lawrence -- and is zany-funny in typical "Scrubs" fashion but not one of the series' highest notes, perhaps because of its emphasis on laying plot track.

The highlight is a quick detour into the "Who Caresies" awards ("take that, Tony Shalhoub!," J.D. declares  in his acceptance speech), which comes on the heels of John C. McGinley's Dr. Cox calling J.D. an "annoying whiny manchild" more than once.

Those who have stuck with "Scrubs" through its ups and downs the past seven years won't be disappointed but here's hoping they return to laugh-out-loud form in the coming weeks.

Here's a news flash: Younger viewers are watching more TV on their DVRs.

Sure, we know this anecdotally but ad giant Magna Global has been churning out detailed reports during the past few weeks that paint a vivid statistical picture of how DVR viewing is changing the game for all nets. For starters, let's look at median age. For live airings, ABC's median age so far this season is 50; in the DVR universe, it's 39. CBS shaves 10 years from its median age in live (53) versus DVR (43); so does NBC, going from 46 to 36. Fox, already younger-skewing in general than its old network sibs, loses eight years, from a median age of 43 in live viewing to 35 via DVR.

The aud comp stats are equally eye-opening. For live telecasts overall, about 13% of ABC's overall aud falls between the 30-39 age range, compared to 26% with DVR viewing. CBS aud comp jumps from 12% to 26% in the same age group. NBC's comp climbs from 17% to 33% and Fox's grows from 15% to 26%. The gain are not quite as significant in the 12-29  and 40-49 age groups, but they are all in the plus column (ABC's aud comp in 12-29 grows from 9% to 18%), which goes a long way toward answering the question of where in the world all the 49-and-unders have gone this fall.

Among the shows that show significant variances in median age between live and DVR playback:

ABC's "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" (47 vs. 34)

ABC's "Private Practice" (48 vs. 36)

CBS' "How I Met Your Mother" (48 vs. 35)

CBS' "The Big Bang Theory" (48 vs. 36) -- pictured above

CBS' "CSI" (50 vs. 40)

There are a few shows that get older with DVR viewing, including CW's "Gossip Girl" (23 vs. 27) and "Everybody Hates Chris" (32 vs. 35).

Get ready for the invasion of the "cheeky chappies" from British TV. Ant and Dec, the TV hosts who are hotter in the U.K. than Simon Cowell and his sneer are on this side of the Atlantic, are prepping for their Stateside debut in the ABC gameshow "Wanna Bet."

William Morris Agency is looking to get the word of mouth going about these former kidvid producers turned nighttime hosts with an intimate cocktail party for the duo, aka Anthony McPartlin and Declan Donnelly, set for Sunday at the Beverly Hills home of WMA's John Ferriter. Ant and Dec are already at the top of the U.K. TV heap as presenters on ITV's "Britain's Got Talent," "Saturday Night Takeaway" and formerly of "Pop Idol" renown.

The two signed up for the pilot of "Wanna Bet" in March (it was picked up in June), and in April inked a mega-bucks two-year exclusive pact with ITV for the U.K. Ant and Dec are merry pranksters, for sure, but also described as basically wholesome in most of their material. There's no word yet on the premiere date of "Wanna Bet," but it's a safe bet that if a strike sidelines production on "Grey's Anatomy," "Desperate Housewives," et al, we'll be seeing Ant and Dec on ABC very soon.

The pair are known for excelling at live TV and for donning elaborate costumes and disguises as part of the "Undercover" segment of their Saturday night variety skein. Here's a clip courtesy YouTube of the two putting one over on their sometime-boss, Cowell, during an open "American Idol" audition.

(Pic above of McPartlin, left, and Donnelly, right, in May at the British Academy Television Awards by Ferdaus Shamin/WireImage.com)

Yes, the season finale of this underrated dramatic gem is Tuesday night. The bigger question now is will this episode in which all answers are revealed also mark the series finale?

It's tough to say. Ratings have been disappointing, no question. Yet, that's no fault of the writers, cast or FX, which marketed the show extremely well before the July 24 launch, splattering L.A. with numerous billboards of star Glenn Close. And there were also plenty of print ads in everything from a full page in the L.A. Times to consumer-friendly Entertainment Weekly.

The numbers have gotten better in recent weeks. Series got its highest 18-49 demo last week in over a month and it's currently beating "The Shield" and "Dirt" in total household viewers. The 18-49 numbers over the full season, however — the ones that really count — is not what the network had hoped for.

FX topper John Landgraf said Monday morning he was "modestly hopeful" for a renewal. Not a ringing endorsement by any means, but there's little doubt that, if he can align the stars and make it financially viable for both his network and producer Sony, Landgraf wants to make it happen.

With reviews for the most part being fairly strong, it's difficult to pinpoint why this one hasn't been a breakout hit. And it's not just "Damages" that has failed to excite the masses. AMC's masterful "Mad Men," which just ended last week, was far from a ratings smash. The basic cabler announced a few weeks back that the series will return. Despite the small viewer turnout, a cancellation would've been wrong on so many levels it's not even worth discussing.

One reason "Damages" has made for compelling TV has been the work of Ted Danson, who seems a million miles away from his days as Beantown barkeep Sam Malone. Danson got to sink his teeth into being a baddie — one of the few times his characters have been on the wrong side of the law.

"I have to say it's been liberating to play this part because it's so well written," Danson said. "He's so human, so complicated. He loves his family but is so narcissistic. He did something wrong and has been scrambling ever since, hoping not to get devoured by Glenn Close.

"He's fully human, just making the wrong choices. He's totally understandable to me."

While there was reason to believe Danson's Arthur Frobisher was being unfairly bullied by Close and her firm early on in the series, Frobisher showed his true colors as the series progressed. While he hasn't directly put the hit out on antagonists, his complicity in allowing heinous crimes to be committed is a solid indicator of his moral compass.

The New York ambience is also integral. Close, who lives on the East Coast, signed on with the contigency that the show be shot in Gotham, and it's tough to say if the series would've worked as well being set anywhere else.

Danson believes the New York backdrop makes a difference not only for the storytelling but the actors as well.

"There's an emotional rush of being back in New York. I studied and lived there for six or seven years. I'm not knocking L.A., but when your show is supposed to be set in N.Y. and you're not, you know it. It's a great city to shoot in. It's not Toronto and it's not downtown L.A.," he said.

Credit must also be paid to brothers Todd and Glenn Kessler, and Daniel Zelman, who co-created the series and oversaw production all the way through. Todd worked under the tutelage of David Chase on "The Sopranos" in 2000-01 and certainly the trio will attach itself to another project in the near future if "Damages" is done.

All the praise is not to say the show is perfect. There were times when the story seemed to drag a bit and while a more than professional Rose Byrne filled the bill as lawyer Ellen Parsons, I never felt all that sympathetic to her ordeal,  sometimes not caring all that much if her career and marriage were falling apart.

On the other hand, Zeljko Ivanek — dating back to his days on "Homicide" — might be one of the most underrated actors working today and Close was everything advertised, though even she seemed a bit too stifled at times. It would've been nice to see her leave the office a bit more.

That being said, it would be a shame to bid adieu, a goodbye that would seem premature. FX has already given renewals to "Dirt," which doesn't have a fraction of the smarts of "Damages" and "The Riches" is a fine show but one that doesn't feel as relevant.

And with ratings hit "Nip/Tuck" about to come back for season five, one in which the network will certainly again make a nice profit, one would hope an arrangement could be made to make sure "Damages" could find a place in next season's FX lineup.

Sure, money and ratings matters most, but it can't always be the deciding factor — especially for a network known for taking risks.

— Stuart Levine

Fox is getting an early start on the tubthumping for season seven of "24."

Net has a countdown clock ticking off the minutes to the debut of the "Day 7" trailer at 1 p.m. ET on Oct. 25. (Click here to watch the seconds fly by for yerself at 24trailer.com). Website also alerts "24's" die-hards that the trailer will bow at the same time on the big-big screen in Times Square, and that the first promo for the new season will air Oct. 25 during Game Two of the World Series.

Hard to believe Kiefer Sutherland's been on the job as Jack Bauer for seven years now. The upcoming frame promises to find Cherry Jones in the White House and president Allison Taylor; Bauer on trial in Washington D.C. for "his actions in the pursuit of justice" (not gonna go there with the cheap DUI jokes out of respect for Kiefer Sutherland's rep among the "24" staff as being the nicest guy in the world to work with); and the return of Carlos Bernard as Jack's erstwhile colleague Tony Almeida (wasn't he dead?).

Clock begins anew for "24" on Sunday, Jan. 13 with a two-hour opener, followed by another hour on Jan. 14 in its regular Monday 9 p.m. berth. I have to confess that I'm still catching up with segs from season six, and so far I can't stop thinking about how great the underrated Powers Boothe is as veep Noah Daniels (pictured right).

Whoo-hoo, it's a collision of two things I love: Betty White and "Ugly Betty."

The indefatigable Ms. White has booked a guest shot on the ABC dramedy, playing herself. Seg that begins filming next week finds Vanessa Williams' Wilhelmina (or Wilhel-MEAN-a, more accurately) trying to change her image as a nasty you-know-what, but she's dealt a setback when she's caught on a cellphone vid manhandling an older woman to snare a cab. The victim happens to be none other than America's Beloved Betty White...and really, what else do you need for a set up?

I've said it before, I'm sure I'll say it again: I adore Betty White. She stands for all that is good and fun in our business, and we know she's kind to animals. She can't be on the smallscreen too much for my liking. Go Betty, and "Betty"!

(Pictured above: Betty White gets into the spirit of shopping for free stuff at the Daytime Emmys gifting suite in June. Pic by Jesse Grant/WireImage.)

"Mad Men" ended its first season with a tour de force episode offering numerous highlights, but the pinnacle might have been the consecutive scenes in which Don Draper (Jon Hamm) and his wife Betty (January Jones) each confronted truths that they had been denying. What follows is a transcript of their two monologues — no doubt the two best-written speeches (or scenes, for that matter) that we'll see on TV for the rest of the year.

This just in...Somewhere, Pat Paulsen is smiling.

Now here's some good news for a town that could use a good laugh. Judd Apatow is lending his talents to FunnyorDie.com, joining the the comedy website promulgated by his pals Will Ferrell and Andy McKay as a partner.

"I am beyond thrilled to have Judd join us at FunnyorDie. However I do find him to be odd in social situations," Ferrell quipped. "This is very awkward but I don't know who Judd Apatow is," said McKay, adding that "Although, after looking him up on IMDB, he seems very impressive.”

Apatow's milieu already has been popular on the site through faux outtakes and clips from his raunch-coms "Knocked Up" and "Superbad."

“Adam and Will and myself have been friends for many years and we thought this would be the perfect opportunity to create a situation where the friendship could not survive." Apatow said.

FunnyOrDie.com, in which users are invited to vote on the mirth merits of various clips, launched in April and can already hang up the "over 35 million served" sign.

Here's a vid clip of Ferrell, McKay and Apatow heralding the news of his arrival. Fair warning, it's a little randy, as you might expect from these guys.

(Pictured above: Ferrell and Apatow at the June 2004 preem of "Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy." Pic by Lee Celano/WireImage)

Who's this guy pictured at left? Can you whistle? If so, pucker up and think Andy, Opie, Aunt Bea and Barn...It's Earle Hagen, composer of the music for many a famed TV theme song, including "The Andy Griffith Show," "The Dick Van Dyke Show," "Make Room for Daddy," "That Girl," (he was clearly a favorite of Danny Thomas and Sheldon Leonard's) and my personal fave, "I Spy" (love that pulsating bass line, very Brian Wilson-y).

Hagen was among the notables who took part last week in the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences tribute to theme music scribblers, "Another Opening, Another Show: A Celebration of TV Theme Music." The gentlemen on the right is Vic "they're altogether ooky" Mizzy. Not only did he write "The Addams Family" theme, he sang it too, thanks to budgetary constraints at production company Filmways. He managed to top himself a few years later with one of the most enduring TV tunes ever, "Green Acres." Face it -- you can't flip past that tune (and "Green Acres" is always playing somewhere on the dial) without belting out "You are my wife"...."Goodbye city life..."

The Oct. 11 event drew an interesting range of people, from Mike "ching- ching" Post to Sherwood Schwartz (the writer-producer who gave us "The Brady Bunch" and "Gilligan's Island," theme lyrics and all) to Lindsay Wagner (pictured left), the "Bionic Woman" of another era, to the power-couple of another era (circa "St. Elsewhere"), William Daniels and Bonnie Bramlett (pictured right).

To whet your taste for TV themes, click here for TV Land.com's very informative page, or click here for TelevisionTunes.com's well organized and easy-to-use archive.

(Pics by Mathew Imaging/WireImage)

Stephen Colbert never fails to make me laugh.

I don't know how he pulls off his righteous indignation schtick without a wink but I'm glad he can. His angry-American persona is so ingrained that we can easily read a newspaper column by him (Colbert, in character, subbed this past Sunday for Maureen Dowd of the New York Times) and hear it being delivered in his "TV's Stephen Colbert" voice.

Here's a pearl from his "I Am an Op-Ed Columnist (And So Can You!) offering to the axis of evil, the New York Times, which served as great product placement for his new tome, "I Am America (And So Can You!).

Our nation is at a Fork in the Road. Some say we should go Left; some say go Right. I say, “Doesn’t this thing have a reverse gear?” Let’s back this country up to a time before there were forks in the road — or even roads. Or forks, for that matter. I want to return to a simpler America where we ate our meat off the end of a sharpened stick.

(Pic by Jeff Vespa/WireImage)

It happened about a week ago. I was on duty, sifting through a stack of screeners of second and third episodes of fall series, not feeling particularly eager to view any of them, and as my thoughts wandered I felt a pang of "Hey, wait a minute..." excitement.

The new season is underway, I thought, and that means fresh segs of "Lost" are coming soon...

For a split second, my mind raced, my heart soared and I lunged toward my computer to look up the premiere date. And then it hit me. Four. More. Months. Or at least three and a half. "Lost" won't be back until early February. (I knew that already, of course, but after watching too many screeners in a row you often have to smack yourself upside the head to get the synapses firing properly again.)

It's going to be worth the wait, no doubt. Our heroes -- "Lost" exec producer/co-creator Damon Lindelof and exec producer Carlton Cuse -- are using the time to painstakingly map out the flight plan for "Lost's" remaining 48 episodes. "Lost's" chief creative stewards and ABC announced an agreement back in May to bring the show to an end in 2010 end  after three more seasons of 16 episodes apiece.

ABC's decision to sked the show "24"-style without repeats over consecutive weeks makes perfect sense -- ergo, the February preem date. It's all very logical and forward-thinking, but when we were applauding these decisions a few months ago, I don't think any of us rabid fans had a clue how tortuous it would be to have to wait so long. Drat and Deuteronomy!

But it's just my luck that Lindelof (pictured above left) and Cuse (pictured right) were cool and kind enough to respond to a pleading email from a jones-ing fan. The two got on the horn last week to discuss how their work process has changed in the new 48-episode world order.

"She's not a cartoon character; she's an avatar."

"CSI: NY" is diving into Second LIfe. CBS skein's Oct. 24 seg, "Down the Rabbit Hole," will find Gary Sinise's stern-faced Mac diving into the virtual world of avatars and alterna-life stories to help solve -- what else? -- a murder case.

I'm guessing that "CSI" guy Anthony Zuiker is way into the Second Life thing. (Some would say he's already living in an alterna-reality, in a charming way).

Zuiker's planning to hold a conference call with journos on Oct. 17 just to talk up this episode.  Click here for a clip.

It may have taken them a little longer to get there than most shows, but Fox's unsinkable "Family Guy" is prepping a 100th episode party for Oct. 29 at the ever-fashionable Social Hollywood. Seth MacFarlane and his crew are known to know how to celebrate their "freakin' sweet" milestones. This bash might lend itself to some TMZ moments, if Stewie gets out of hand...

There might be some TMZ action coming out of next week's Hollywood Radio and Television Society gathering of the heads of the five network families. The selection of Barry Sonnenfeld, helmer and exec producer of ABC's "Pushing Daisies," as moderator of the Oct. 16 luncheon has raised some eyebrows among rival nets. It's a head-scratcher for others, given that Sonnenfeld isn't exactly known for his emcee-ing skills. But for those of us who've complained about milquetoast HRTS moderators in the past, we've got to give Barry the benefit of the doubt. It outta be a lively sesh, anyway, with ABC's Steve McPherson, CBS' Nina Tassler, CW's Dawn Ostroff, Fox's Kevin Reilly and NBC's Ben Silverman...

The milestone-episode parties continue on Nov. 3 with Warner Bros. Television's celebration of "ER's" 300th at Hollywood's Cabana Club. Hard to believe it was 13 years ago that George Clooney did such an effective job of playing the tipsy Dr. Doug Ross in the famously good two-hour "ER" pilot. NBC skein has had its ups and downs since then but it has earned its place in the pantheon of primetime's longest-running series, and casting history. This party outta be a classy affair to remember, especially if it attracts a full (or even pretty full) complement of thesp, writer and producer alums....

And from the good-cause department, Zimmer Children's Museum will fete Fox talent relations exec Missy Halperin (pictured left) and PBS' kidvid programming exec Linda Simensky (pictured right) at its 7th annual Discovery Award dinner on Nov. 8 at Regent Beverly Wilshire hotel. Brad Garrett and Joely Fisher, the battling spouses of Fox sitcom "'Til Death" will emcee. Zimmer org is focused on teaching small fry about ethics, community involvement and cultural sensivity through interactive and roll-up-your-sleeves exhibits at its museum on the Miracle Mile.

It was a pleasure to see the cast of "Mad Men" out of their workday outfits last night. They were featured at the Paley Center for Media's Beverly Hills locale to talk about about the stellar AMC series.

Christina Hendricks, who plays Joan, and Elizabeth Moss (Peggy) weren't attired in those long and restraining dresses they wear on the show, but rather in much more comfortable duds. At one point, Hendricks was commenting on the clothes she needs to wear all day long and said that after 17 hours in costume, all she wants to do is go home and put her flip-flops on and veg on the couch.

The guys, too, always fashionably attired on the show in classic Brooks Brothers suits came in sweaters and loosely fitting shirts. Jon Hamm, always the most dapper, came in a sports jacket, natch.

But enough about what's on the exterior for these actors and more about what makes them tick on the inside and how "Mad Men" creator Matthew Weiner birthed this show as, basically, a second job.

"I wrote the script at night while I was a comedy writer," said Weiner, who was working on "Becker" at the time.

"Mad Men" could've been under HBO's umbrella and a great post-"Sopranos" addition but the pay cabler never got back to Weiner after he submitted the script, which he sent off with blessings from friend and "Sopranos" supremo David Chase who told him "don't change a word."

"The plot I shot was exactly the same, word for word, as the way I wrote it," he said.

Weiner, a producer and writer on "Sopranos," says he's heard comparisons between the two shows in that, sometimes, the plots take too long to develop and that it's too dialogue heavy. No car crashes, no dead bodies. He doesn't buy the critique.

"We like to focus on the private moments," he said, "and you don't know what's going to happen. If that's not action, I don't know what is. … Although on 'The Sopranos,' we would throw a murder in there once in a while. I admit it."

For Hamm, whose signature role as Don Draper (or is that Dick Whitman?) has quietly become the talk of TV, said afterward that he's getting lots of calls from folks around town looking to cast him in a slew of projects.

He's certainly more than deserving of praise. It's hard to think of many other actors whose character would be so well liked, despite cheating on his wife with more than one woman, barely spending a moment with his kids and often being a bit unsociable in the office. Hamm has mastered the art of mixing debonair with a bit of diabolical and deviousness.

After reading the script, he figured he could fit the bill, but was far from confident he'd win out other more familiar actors.

"This was the best thing I had ever read and said, Too bad they won't cast me,'" he told the sold-out crowd. "It's the only job where I said out loud that I want it. And I'm glad I got it."

(Pics by Kevin Parry/Paley Center)

— Stuart Levine

ESPN 2 has a series coming up that sounds a whole lot like a real-life spin on "Friday Night Lights." Judging by this promo (click here and enter the password: heespn07), "Varsity Inc." is even shot like "FNL." Six-part skein follows the 2007 pigskin season of the West Monroe Rebels, the high school football heroes of West Monroe High School in football-crazy West Monroe, La., where the Friday night games pack the high school stadium with more people than there are in all of West Monroe, according to ESPN.

Rebels are among top-ranked high school squads in the country, having won six state championships ("State!") and two national titles since 1993. Series promises to follow the team's exploits on the gridiron, as well as the players and coaches' personal trials and tribulations. (Sound familiar, Coach Taylor?)

Series, the first from ESPN's Content Development unit, hails from producer Jason Sciavicco and his Horizon Entertainment banner, and is penciled in to preem Nov. 29 at 11 p.m. ET, with repeats on the ESPN U channel. ESPN's also promising more content on its ESPN360.com web platform that fans may want to follow, should the Rebels saga prove as compelling as the fictional drama of "FNL's" Dillon Panthers.

Jesse James, who has become the Oprah Winfrey for grease monkeys as the producer and star of Discovery Channel's "Monster Garage," is relocating his TV garage to Spike TV.

Viacom-owned cabler has cut a two-year deal with James and his Payupsucker Prods. that calls for him to get under the hood to produce two primetime speshes and two pilots per year. First pilot under construction is "Metal Church," described as a vehicle for showcasing James' "vast welding and fabricating talents."

"I look forward to busting my a**," James said in announcing the new pact.

Before his TV career took off in 2000 with the Discovery skein "Motorcycle Mania," James earned his reputation in motor-psycho circles as the founder of West Coast Choppers, where he custom-built bikes for bikers' sake, at the rate of only 12-14 a year. The way James' legend is growing, maybe Brad Pitt will play him some day in a movie too.

It was great to see Marcy Carsey bright and early this morning at the Oxygen Mentors Walk along the Santa Monica shore. She's a television hero, in my book, having done it (mostly) her way in the biz for so many years as one-half of the wildly successful Carsey-Werner Co.

Carsey looked like her respite of the past two years from the day-to-day agita of running an indie TV production company (purveyor of "The Cosby Show," "Roseanne," "3rd Rock from the Sun," "That '70s Show," among others) was agreeing with her. And judging by the line of greeters that wanted to shake her hand, her legacy is not lost on the younger gen.

Carsey ended her active production endeavors with Tom Werner in late 2005 but remains a partner in Geraldine Laybourne's Oxygen Media. And as Laybourne told the mentors and mentees who gathered for breakfast at the Casa del Mar hotel, it was Carsey who helped inspire the Mentors Walk concept that Oxygen has done in several cities (New York, Chicago, Washington, D.C.) for the past three years.

(Pictured left: Geraldine Laybourne and Marcy Carsey. Pic by Michael Bezjian/WireImage)

Fan question: What have you learned from working with Charlie Sheen and Jon Cryer on "Two and a Half Men"?

Cheeky answer: Absolutely nothing!

That was Angus T. Jones on Wednesday night at the Paley Center for Media, where the top-rated CBS/Warner Bros. TV sitcom was feted for reaching the milestone 100-seg mark.

Jones' quip got a good laugh, but in reality the Q&A sesh with the thesps and "Men" co-creators Chuck Lorre and Lee Aronsohn was a full-on love fest among people who genuinely seem to like working with one another -- even the notoriously hard-to-handle Sheen.

Event also featured a screening of the triple-digit seg, set to air Oct. 15. "City of Great Racks" features a return visit by the always-funny Jane Lynch as the therapist of Sheen's character.

Pictured above: Jon Cryer and Angus T. Jones. Pictured at right: Charlie Sheen and Chuck Lorre. Pics by Kevin Parry/Paley Center)

Hard to believe a late night cable show involving stop-motion animation and action-figure parodies of celebs, kidvid and other aspects of pop culture (and relentlessly sophomoric sexual humor) could warrant the museum treatment. But sure enough, Adult Swim's utterly ridiculous "Robot Chicken" was the subject of a jawboning "Media as Lens" sesh at the Paley Center for Media in Beverly Hills on Monday night.

Alas, events conspired to keep me from attending but I'm told it was good, surreal fun and that series co-creator/writer/director/voice cast member Seth Green charmed the hard-core fans who showed up. (That must've been a little scary for the Paley Center folks.) For the uninitiated, click here for all the "Robot Chicken" clips and genitalia jokes you could ever want.

(Pictured above, from left: Adult Swim senior veep Keith Crofford, Seth Green and "Robot Chicken" co-creator Matthew Senreich. Pic by Kevin Parry/Paley Center)

It was peanuts and cocktails for the "Jericho" cast and crew members on Tuesday night as the show's extended nuclear family got to escape the cloud they normally live under and live a little at their season one DVD launch party.

Series stars Skeet Ulrich, Ashley Scott, Kenneth Mitchell, Alicia Coppola and exec producers Carol Barbee, Jon Turteltaub and Jon Steinberg were definitely not in Kansas, but at night spot Crimson in deep Hollywood. CBS Home Ent. and Paramount Home Ent. threw a swanky affair for the little-post-apocalypse-show-that-could.

There's still no word yet from CBS about when the show saved by ardent fan-dom will come back to the Eye's primetime sked, but undoubtedly there was much gratitude expressed Tuesday night that there will even be a season two morning-after to wait for. Most likely, CBS will slot in "Jericho" in after a new series or two bites the dust. Until then, the fans will have to be content with the "Jericho" production blog and other appetite-whetting tidbits offered on CBS.com.

(Pictured above: Skeet Ulrich and Ashley Scott. Pictured below: Kenneth Mitchell and Ulrich flank Jon Turteltaub.)

"Everybody Hates Chris'" mom and dad, Terry Crews and Tichina Arnold (pictured left), were in D.C. on Friday for a screening of the series third-season opener held as part of the Congressional Black Caucus' 37th annual Legislative Conference, held this past weekend.

CW and "Chris" producer CBS Paramount Network TV hosted a screening and reception for caucus members and other salons and Beltway players at the Grand Hyatt hotel. Crews and Arnold intro'd the seg, "Everybody Hates the Guidance Counselor," which featured Chris Rock in his first on-screen guest shot on his namesake show. Also on hand for the event was "Chris" co-creator/exec producer Ali Leroi.

I was sorry to see that "Chris" didn't do much business for CW in its preem on Monday. It was a funny episode, with Rock playing the guidance counselor, but only 2.6 million viewers showed up for the 8 p.m. premiere.

Following "Chris" was the bow of "Aliens in America," which was also given the D.C. think-tank treatment on Monday by CBS Paramount Network TV. Studio prexy David Stapf and others flew in for a panel at the Brookings Institute on the show and its theme of cross-cultural education and understanding among Westerners and Muslims. Brookings Institute isn't the type of org to suck up to Hollywood, but "Aliens" caught the eggheads' attention with its premise about a typically kooky American family inviting a Muslim exchange student into their world. I enjoyed the pilot of "Aliens" and was also sorry to see that it barely opened for CW, drawing 2.3 million people. Oh well. One night does not a season make, right?

One of the people who took part in the "Aliens in America" confab was Pakistani musican Salman Ahmad, who teamed with P.J. Olsson to record the theme song to "Aliens," a new spin on the Nick Lowe song "(What's So Funny) About Peace, Love and Understanding." Sez Ahmad: "I believe in programs like 'Aliens In America' because music, film and television play a huge part in humanizing culture."

Click here to for a vid of the Olsson-Ahmad collaboration, set for release Oct. 16 on Olsson's CBS Records disc, "American Scream."

The fall season is well underway and so is the fall leg of panel-confab-Q&A madness. The Hollywood Radio and Television Society's annual network chiefs sesh outta be lively this year, what with ABC's Steve McPherson, NBC's Ben Silverman and Fox's Kevin Reilly on the same stage. (Quick quiz: Which net prexy said "Be a man" during the summer Television Critics Assn. press tour about which prexy in regards to the firing of another prexy?) All I can say is, CBS' Nina Tassler and CW's Dawn Ostroff probably shouldn't wear anything they really love to the luncheon, set for Oct. 16 at the Bev Hilton Hotel...

The night before the HRTS soiree, a group of industry vets who remember a time when a panel of entertainment chiefs featured only three male execs, will gather at the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences HQ in North Hollywood to celebrate the release of an industry memoir from Ralph Baruch, founder of Viacom. Event will include a "how-to" Q&A with Baruch, who telegraphs just how much he's seen in his many years in the biz with the title of his tome: "Television Tightrope: How I Escaped Hitler, Survived CBS and Fathered Viacom"...

And for further schooling in smallscreen history, head on over to the Fine Arts Theater in Bev Hills for a conversation among TV publicists who've been through the wars (and then some). The Entertainment Publicists Professional Society panel dubbed "Legends of Television Publicity" will include network and studio vets Cliff Dektar (who was always a gentleman and a friend to me during his days with the Lippin Group), Michael Casey, Doug Duitsman, Hank Reiger, Gene Walsh and Murray Weissman...

OK, this one's kind of a stretch in terms of a TV connection, but I've always loved Raymond Chandler and this event sounds like fun. (And come to think of it there was a "Philip Marlowe" gumshoe skein on ABC in  1959-60. Powers Boothe also played the tough-talking sleuth in a mid-1980s HBO series.) Hollywood Heritage cultural org is offering a three-hour guided tour of "Raymond Chandler's Hollywood on Oct. 20 and Oct. 21. (Think "The Big Sleep," "Murder, My Sweet," Dick Powell and Humphrey Bogart in really great suits.) Tour promises to take the curious to various homes, apartment buildings, streets, hotels and dives where Chandler (pictured right) and his lit alter ego Philip Marlowe hung out in the 1930s and '40s. Hard to tell where the line between fact and fiction is drawn here but it still sounds like good, clean, noir-y fun. For more info high-tail it to http://www.hollywoodheritage.org/.