Emmy's picks for writing and directing nominees in the series categories are kinda like a state of the craft report card every year. They're often the category where new and innovative programs are recognized long before they crack the more prominent races.

But in a year when Emmy voters seemed to embrace new and different, the choices in the writing and directing heats seem more pedestrian, though some of this year's contenders were so obvious (Bryan Fuller and Barry Sonnenfeld for "Pushing Daisies" Pie-lette, Matthew Weiner and Alan Taylor for the "Mad Men" pilot) as to take some of the suspense out of the race this year. Sonnenfeld (pictured left) and Taylor (pictured right) have already bagged DGA Awards for their work on these pilots.

Sonnenfeld, IMHO, can safely begin rehearsing his acceptance speech for comedy helmer. (Coming from him, it oughta be a doozy.) The competish is strong -- a six-nominee category meaning that there was one tie in the nom ballotting -- but nothing was quite so inventive and visually distinct as that first slice of ABC's "Pushing Daisies."

From my viewfinder, the dark horse in the race could be James Bobin of HBO's "Flight of the Conchords." Bobin, co-creator of the series with Kiwi comedy-rockers Jemaine Clement and Bret McKenzie, is up for the "Sally Returns" episode of "Conchord's" 12-episode frosh season.

Dan Attias nabbed a nom for the "No Cannes Do" installment of "Entourage." Paul Lieberstein has shown that there's no end to his talents by performing, writing and directing segs of NBC's "The Office," and now he's up for helming the seg "Money" Parts 1 and 2 (sounds like a James Brown hit from the early '70s). Also nommed from "Office" is Paul Feig, for handling the season finale, "Goodbye, Toby," which happened to mark the farewell of Lieberstein's character. Michael Engler of NBC's "30 Rock" is up for the "Rosemary's Baby" installment.

Congrats to the all the winners of this year's DGA honors. On the small screen side, winners were all first-time DGA honorees with the exception of Larry Carpenter, victor in the daytime serial category for his work on ABC's "One Life to Live," who now has a matching set of the DGA's shiny round medallions.

Barry Sonnenfeld won the TV series comedy heat for his work on the "Pie-lette" of ABC's "Pushing Daisies." Alan Taylor prevailed on the drama side for the pilot of AMC's oh-so-stylish "Mad Men." Yves Simoneau took the longform honor for HBO's "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee."

Bertram van Munster added to his trophy collection for his work on CBS' "The Amazing Race" in the reality competish. Glenn P. Weiss' navigation of CBS' 60th annual Tony-cast brought him the musical/variety nod. And Paul Hoen looked sharp in the children's programming field for his helming of the hit Disney Channel telepic "Jump In."

(Pictured top left, Barry Sonnenfeld and Debra Messing; top right, Alan Taylor; below, Yves Simoneau. Pics by Steve Granitz/WireImage.com)

The significant progress made in the DGA's tentative contract agreement with the majors stands as a hopeful sign that labor peace may soon be at hand. And it's also provides perfect examples of what's gone wrong to date in the fitful negotiations between the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers and the WGA. The lack of communication between the studios and the scribes has been devastating to the creative community, below-the-liners included, and a failure of leadership on both sides of the picket lines.

The DGA rightfully touted on Thursday its victory in achieving big gains in residuals for electronic sell-through (aka paid downloads) based on a percentage of distributor's gross, not the despised producer's gross homevideo formula that took 80% of the distributor's revenue off the table, leaving 20% for the scribes and helmers to take a slim percentage of (1.5% or 1.8%, for sales after $1 million) as a residual. It's understood that the AMPTP wanted to base the deal on some definition "producer's gross" in the deal but the DGA held firm, on the rationale that it's too easy for the majors to move money around to make the producer's gross a lot punier than the distributor's haul.

The WGA pushed hard in its approach to the studios for a distributor's gross formula, but it was a non-starter, the AMPTP reps repeatedly told the WGA. How come? Because, according to execs from the AMPTP member congloms, they quite weren't sure what the WGA meant by the D- and G-words. AMPTP reps raised the specter of the WGA demanding a cut of advertising revenue from new media exhibition platforms (ABC.com, NBC.com, etc.) if they were owned by the same company that distribbed the program to the Internet (as is more often than not the case in post fin-syn Hollywood).

So why didn't the companies just ask for clarity? Why didn't they demand a simple, declarative sentence, a la the DGA's snappy "Distributor's gross is the amount received by the entity responsible for distributing the film or television program on the Internet." AMPTP says they did; WGA says it was the majors who refused to define their understanding of distributor's versus producer's gross. I can't imagine a first grade teacher accepting such a "did too/did not" explanation for why the entire class flunked the math test.

An astute friend who has been through more than one showbiz strike made the observation this evening that in the history of Hollywood labor negotiations, there's never been a situation quite like today, where the membership of DGA, WGA and SAG have as much information about the nitty-gritty details of a contract agreement at the same time as guild leaders. Membership of all three guilds were able to form their opinions in real time along with their respective leaders in the era of insta-communications, websites, blogs and email alerts. Guild leaders don't even have the time to put their spin on it. The devil is in the details, indeed.

Now in its eighth year, the ABC DGA TV Directing Fellowship is among the industry's most successful apprenticeship programs.

It's a 36-week paid fellowship designed for minorities and women who already have a little bit of experience, and thus will make the most of a program that calls for participants to shadow directors on Disney-produced shows, have an a Disney or ABC exec mentor assigned to them and attend seminars and workshop presentations from industry heavyweights. Alumni of this program can't say enough good things about it. (Click here for a previous On the Air item on last year's fellows.)

Recent success stories include Seith Mann, class of '05, who's gone on to be a very busy helmer on such skeins as "Friday Night Lights," "The Wire," "Cold Case" and "Brothers and Sisters"; and Dennis Lee (class of '06) who just wrote and directed the Julia Roberts starrer "Fireflies in the Garden," set for release later this year.

Deadline for submissions for this year's program is Feb. 29. Applications and details can be found at http://www.disneyabctalentdevelopment.com/.

"Playhouse 90" -- what a legacy. If Martin Manulis had only produced Rod Serling's "Requiem for a Heavyweight," he would forever have earned his place in TV history books.

But as the creator and chief steward of CBS' high-end dramatic anthology series, Manulis, who died last week at the age of 92, presided over many more great hours of television, most of them live, though "Playhouse 90" also ran "filmed presentations" about once a month. (Click here for Manulis' Variety obit.) Thanks to the Archive of American Television, click here for vid of a comprehensive 11-part interview of Manulis in 1997.

It's maddening that those of us born long after the skein ended its 1956-61 run have had scant opportunities to see these smallscreen gems. I've seen a kinescope of the original "Requiem," and it lived up to every inch of its advance billing. (With all due respect to Anthony Quinn and the 1962 feature version, once you've seen Jack Palance as the hard-luck boxer, you can't never go back.) I've also seen a beat-up copy of another breathtakingly good Rod Serling teleplay, "The Comedian," helmed by John Frankenheimer with a fearless perf from Mickey Rooney. And that's about it.

I'd love to see the original "Days of Wine and Roses" starring Cliff Robertson and Piper Laurie. I'd love to see Serling's "A Town Has Turned to Dust," with Rod Steiger and James Gregory. And I'd like to see at least some of the "Playhouse 90" segs that I've never heard a thing about. If I can turn on the tube any time day or night and find a repeat of the Ultimate-Fighting-Xtreme-Street-Skate'n'Spandex-Challenge semi-finals from 1997, why can't we have the Ultimate-Badass-TV-Dramatists-Showdown airing once a week or so on an artsy channel? Or how about a comprehensive, anotated DVD set? A "Playhouse 90" download-on-demand website?

(Pictured above: "Requiem" stars Keenan Wynn, Jack Palance and Ed Wynn. Pictured right: Manulis in 2004.)

Some Emmy tidbits I really should have written up Sunday night before going off to parties:

Consistency, thy name is David Chase. "It's open to interpretation," the "Sopranos" creator said backstage at the Emmys when asked, inevitably and more than once, about the series' famed blackout finale. In a convoluted way, after being pressed by multiple questioners, Chase seemed to say that he knew in his mind what happened to the family, but he had no intention of sharing it with the intimate room full 200 or so reporters. Chase did say that he'd had the notion to take the show out in the way that he did for a long time....

Earlier in the night Alan Taylor told us backstage scribblers that Chase was pleased by the fact that even members of "Sopranos'" production crew debated what the finale really meant. Chase wanted it to be something people would chew over and talk about, Taylor said...

And as for the Emmy snub of James Gandolfini after the tour de force he turned in? Paulie Walnuts had his back, backstage on Sunday. "I think it was a shame. He should've won tonight...but we won all around (for drama series)," Tony Sirico (pictured right) said. "We've been honored. I speak for Jimmy when I say he can handle it." .....

America Ferrera was such a doll in the backstage quip room. She displayed her usual humility and gratitude for the career-making break that "Ugly Betty" has been for her. And she's happy that her star turn has come on a show that is light and frothy on the outside but meaningful on the inside, where it counts, by challenging the conventional notions of beauty and body image for women.
"It's fun and it's funny and entertaining and I feel so incredibly blessed," Ferrera said. "To be acknowledged for it, to know peep are watching it and enjoying it -- it's just a dream for me. This is what I have wanted to do since I was 5 years old. It just reassures me in the power of dreaming. Now I can set my (career) heights even higher." And she was channeling the self-assured Betty Suarez when a questioner tried to pry into her love life. "I don't talk about my personal life. Thank you," she said in a Betty-esque polite-but-firm tone....

Don't ask Terry O'Quinn what's going on in "Lost" in its upcoming fourth season, because he doesn't know. Is John Locke really Jacob? Is he going to somehow kill Jack? Will he ever get near a shower again? I'm telling ya, don't ask because Quinn doesn't know. (And no, winning an Emmy doesn't entitle him to a few free plot points.) Backstage after his win for supporting drama actor, Locke showed off his hot pink shirt and black tie with glittery rhinestones. When asked, Quinn admitted that early on in the show's run he would go on the Internet to see what the fans were speculating about the Deeper Meaning of it all and where the castaways were headed. But not any more. "I'm sated," he said....

Sally Field was feeling strong, confident and not ready to suffer any cliches on Sunday. She made fast work of a question about actresses of a certain (out-of-the-demo) age enjoying a renaissance on cable ("The Closer," "Damages," "Saving Grace," etc.) and why aren't there better roles for women in features and blah blah blah...."I don't listen to any of that stuff. You guys are the ones who are listening to that," Field shot back.

Where fore art thou, Oscar? Jon Stewart had a cheeky response for the reporter who just had to know what it meant to him to be asked to host the Academy Awards a second time. "Whatever emotional hole I had in my soul vanished at that moment and I was complete," he deadpanned. "That's why I decided to do it."...

And thus brings to a close this inaugural edition of live blogging at the Emmys. I'd be remiss without giving a special thank you to the shooters of WireImage, who moved Emmy photos lickity-split last night and thus livened up this blog considerably. Honorable mentions go out to Steve Granitz, Jeffrey Mayer, John Shearer, Jeff Vespa and Todd Williamson.

Disney-ABC Television Group has selected its three directing fellows for the 2007-08 season. The Disney  Directing Fellows program is an intense year-long apprenticeship program run in conjunction with the DGA that is designed not for novices but for people who already have already shown some promise and spunk in getting their foot in the door. The plan is to give them exposure to sets, mentors, seminars with real relevance to those in the trenches, and generally giving them access to execs, writers, producers and other directors in the Disney orbit who can help them take it to the next level, if they have the right innate stuff. I've been impressed with the level of commitment Disney and ABC brass have made to this program (it's a pet project of ABC Entertainment prexy Steve McPherson's, among others on the Burbank lot) as well Disney's similarly structured writing fellowship program. It's basically grad school on the studio/network lot, and those who have been through the program in the past few years have thrived as helmers, A.Ds, staff writers, supervising producers, etc.

Selected from more than 300 applicants, this year's directing fellows are:

Nandi Bowe, who studied at Howard University, Temple U and AFI, and has logged time as an A.D. on numerous movies and TV series. She also had a stint as a staff writer on Fox's "X-Files" spinoff, "The Lone Gunman."

Oscar Daniels is a recent AFI grad and past winner of Showtime's Black Filmmaker Showcase contest. He had a short film, "Among Thieves," in competition this year at Sundance. In a previous life, Daniels worked as an intelligence analyst for the National Security Agency (no kidding).

Sharat Raju, a graduate of U of Michigan and AFI whose thesis film "American Made" has been on the festival circuit and racked up a number of short-film kudos and aired as part of the PBS indie film series "POV."

Pictured above, left to right: DGA's Regina Render, Bowe, Raju, Daniels and Disney-ABC TV Group's Tim McNeal, veep of talent and diversity.

NATPE's inaugural LATV fest celebrating the smallscreen gets underway in earnest tomorrow. I'm planning to start my day on Wednesday at Hollywood & Highland moderating a panel, "Blowing Up the Boob Tube: How the Digital Frontier Has Changed our Relationship with TV," that aims to make sense of what all of the new digital options available to the masses mean for the old-fashioned business of television. (Wish us luck!) Panels, seminars, NATPE Boot Camp (TV producing/pitching/selling 101) sessions are going on all day Wednesday at H&H, and all day Thursday at House of Blues. Here's Variety's story from a few months back on why NATPE decided it was high time this town had its own TV industry-themed panel sesh-fest.

The series writing and directing noms are always a good bellwether of what shows or individuals are deemed best of breed by industry standards. There's so much politicking and campaigning that goes into the race to grab top series and acting noms. Writing and directing noms are a little more above the fray, though it does seem that Emmy voters sometimes see them as consolation prizes for deserving shows that don't crack the top series categories. To wit, "Battlestar Galactica" (pictured left) was recognized for drama writing and directing, but the show's rabid fans will have to keep the faith until next year to see it break into the top echelon of nominees.

POSTED BY STEVEN ZEITCHIK

Showtime is a step closer to airing a series from Steven Spielberg.

A kind-hearted, TV-loving woman in Watertown, N.Y., is orchestrating an elaborate campaign to get some overdue recognition for one of television's most active players in the 1960s, '70s and '80s.

Bill Bixby (pictured far left) was one of those actors who seemed to be everywhere on TV when I was a kid: "Courtship of Eddie's Father" reruns, "Love, American Style" reruns, "My Favorite Martian" reruns, countless TV movies and series guest shots, and, of course, "The Incredible Hulk," a show that was well-placed on CBS' Friday night sked so that pre-teens could stay up for it. (I'm not too proud to admit that it scared me when I was about 8.)

Bixby died young, at age 59 in November 1993, the victim of a late diagnosis of prostate cancer. He was nominated three times for Emmy glory during his 30 years in television -- once for "Courtship" and twice in 1976, for a guest shot on "The Streets of San Francisco," and for his role in the mammoth hit mini "Rich Man, Poor Man." But for all of his work as an actor and director (his interest in helming began during his "Martian" chronicles), Bixby never took home the gold. Renee Tufo thinks this is just plain wrong.

The stakes are high. Nerves are on edge. Sniping is on the rise. And that’s just among the judges in this week’s edition of “On the Lot.”

Our regular arbiters of short-film taste, Carrie Fisher and Garry Marshall, go at it a bit, mostly playfully, in their discourse over this week’s five flicks.
The contestant field is quickly narrowed to 10 helmers after “Lot” host Adrianna Costa delivers the grim verdict to Shira-Lee Shalit (pictured) at the top of this week’s show. We see a montage of Shira-Lee at work in her trademark straw hats, and then she’s on her way, positive attitude in tow.

“It’s sad to leave, but it’s also: ‘What’s next?’ This is not the end,” Shira-Lee says confidently as she walks off, suitcase rolling behind her.

More than any TV series in recent memory, “John from Cincinnati” seemed to be nearly done in by bad buzz long before it premiered.

“Why would HBO think people would want to watch this?” one blog poster opined on AOL’s TV Squad site nearly a month before the show premiered June 10, on the coattails of “The Sopranos’” finale.
“One department has a pool going as to when HBO is going to pull the plug and not complete the season at all,” read a post on the popular TelevisionWithoutPity.com site way back in February. (The author of the missive claimed to be someone who worked on the “John” set.)

Sure, all shows endure a fair amount of post-pickup/pre-premiere drama and “oh boy is it in big trouble” rumor-mongering. But “John” endured a surprising amount of early carping, especially for an HBO skein with a solid pedigree as the creation of revered dramatist David Milch and cult-fave novelist Kem Nunn. Milch took a beating from many fans of his previous HBO creation “Deadwood,” who felt that he and HBO decided to drive a stake in “Deadwood” prematurely in order to free Milch up to work on “John.” (Given the tone of “Deadwood,” Milch surely couldn’t have been surprised when its hard-core fans were quick to express their hostile, profanity-laden revenge fantasies.)

The cast that Milch and Nunn put together last fall and winter for “John” was undeniably strong: Rebecca De Mornay (pictured above left), Bruce Greenwood (pictured right), Ed O’Neill, Matt Winston, Luke Perry, Luis Guzman, Willie Garson, and up and comers Brian Van Holt and Austin Nichols. But when the pilot script started to make the rounds, there was a lot of head scratching.

If “Deadwood” was a surrealistic Western, then “John from Cincinnati” was a psycho surf-themed family drama, as inter-preted via a bad acid trip. The talk was that it was not just unconventional, it was unbound, merely an indulgent exercise in how obtuse (with curse words) two talented writers could be if given the chance. The consensus opinion seemed to be that HBO had come to the crossroads and was at a loss at where to go next after its storied run of success.

Why were we not surprised that Kenny would be the one to be most excited about the horror assignment on this week’s episode of “On the Lot?”

“I’m ready to get bloody, bro,” Kenny said to no one in particular as host Adrianna Costa and judge Garry Marshall set this week’s six contenders off to work. This was moments after Costa and Marshall played the part of a two-headed Grim Reaper again by descending on the group of 12 remaining contestants to dispense with the loser of last week’s comedy shorts competition. As most viewers probably surmised, it was bye-bye David May, whose attempt at a sexy rom-com last week fell flatter than “Gigli” with the judges, and apparently, voters. On the other end of the scale, we found out that Will Bigham’s short “Nerve Endings” got the most votes.

As the six up for short-duty this week set off to work, Marshall gave them a few pointers: “Get characters, get pace and have a little gore,” he said, emphasizing little. Then we cut to a confessional clip of Shira-Lee Shalit admitting she never watches horror movies, which only made her stock go up, in our eyes.

Guest judge this week is “Hostel” meister Eli Roth (pictured above), who’s introduced by Adrianna as “the future of horror.”

POSTED BY ERIN MAXWELL, NEWS EDITOR EXTRAORDINAIRE OF VARIETY.COM.

"Buffy the Vampire Slayer" is dead and gone (several times if you count the number of times she perished on the 1997-2003 TV series) but her spirit lives on in many ways, most recently via "Buffy-oke."
Yes, it's just what it sounds like, karaoke, "Buffy" style, based largely on the "Once More with Feeling" musical extravaganza episode that ran during the show's sixth season.

Now touring the country, "Buffy-oke" is a "Rocky Horror"-esque sing-along features audience participation, hand puppets and a fair amount of Dawn-bashing to create a new reason for "Buffy" fans to cheer since their Tuesday nights are now free.

For those who need a recap, the episode features a hoofer-loving demon named Sweet who puts a spell over the beloved denizens of Sunnydale, forcing the Scoobies to sing their innermost thoughts and perform complicated dance numbers.
On June 27, the Los Angeles Film Festival brought the show to the Crest Theater in Westwood, where fans were treated to not only their favorite episode, but fan-made videos that paid tribute to Buffy mom Kristine Sutherland and boy-toy Riley, played by Marc Blucas. A bit of trivia and a two-minute recap of the entire series was thrown in for good measure.

The screening came with an instruction sheets and goodie bags that allowed the audience to fully partake in the showing, such as blow bubbles for Lawrence Welk-inspired ballet numbers and kazoos to help "Buffy" star Sarah Michelle Gellar with the high notes.

At the end of the screening, Marti "Parking Ticket Lady" Noxon (pictured right) took the stage to thank fans and introduced series creator and surprise guest Joss Whedon (pictured above, as if you didn't know that already). Whedon was overcome by the fan response to the episode he wrote and directed, and thanked the audience for the keeping the episode from disappearing into rerun oblivion. He also shared his thoughts on Buffy's younger sis: "Come on. Dawn isn't that bad." (Erin Maxwell)

To investigate "Buffy-oke" further just click right here on this link.

In this week's installment of "On the Lot," we say goodbye to Jess as the competition slims down to the not-terribly-dirty (it is broadcast TV, after all) dozen. And Zach's stock climbs even higher with the judges after he unveils his latest crowd-pleaser, "Die Hardly Working." (Zach is pictured at left at work on the short.)

Once again, the elimination part of the show is dispensed with quickly at the top, following a bit of recap clippage, as judge Garry Marshall and host Adrianna Costa surprise the contestants by showing up unexpectedly as the group huddles on an outdoor patio in one of their "gee I'm so nervous" powwows. Actually, this time around they're all complimenting one another's work, particularly Jess and Jason, who took a pounding from the judges for their films last week.

"Brooklyn girls never give up," Marshall advises Jessica Brillhart as she does the requisite round of hugs before exiting the scene.

Marty, your drive-on has been revoked.

Marty Martin (pictured left) is this week's casualty on "On the Lot." After last week's surge of attitude from Martin, we could have seen that coming as easily as the hackneyed plots of one of his shorts. A more surprising development this week is the crowd turning on judge Carrie Fisher - who had the memorable "you're a big fan of yourself" exchange with Mr. Martin last week.

As few times in this week's episode, Fisher's criticisms of the contestants drew catcalls and boos from the crowd behind her. Fisher took it in stride, as you might expect from a thick-skinned showbiz vet.

"On the Lot" sees some sparks fly in its fourth week as the ever-cocky Marty Martin and judge Carrie Fisher scrap a bit as five more of the remaining 15 contestants screen their three-minute wonders for judges Fisher, Garry Marshall and this week's guest, David "The Devil Wears Prada" Frankel.
By the end of this week's live seg, the group has slimmed down to 14 as Trever James, whose short "Teri" screened last week, is sent packing. Don't ask me why, but "America," as "Lot" host Adrianna Costa is fond of saying, spared Hilary Graham, who delivered the un-funny "How I Met the Finkelsteins" short, but threw over James who delivered the best of last week's batch, IMHO. Worse, Trever and Hilary (pictured above) had to spend all of this week's episode sitting off to the side in director's chairs while Costa plucked this week's contenders from the larger group. Memo to Hilary: Don't wear miniskirts/minidresses on show taping days.

It's only fitting that "Sopranos" creator David Chase would give his first post-finale remarks to TV scribe Alan Sepinwall of the Newark Star-Ledger. In a nutshell, Chase (pictured left) says he'd never say never regarding a "Sopranos" movie, but don't hold your breath. And as far as the clincher scene that has stirred such ire among some viewers, Chase offers: "I have no interest in explaining, defending, reinterpreting, or adding to what is there...No one was trying to be audacious, honest to God." Chase adds: "We did what we thought we had to do. No one was trying to blow people's minds or thinking, 'Wow, this'll (tick) them off.'"

Meanwhile, the numbers are in and Sunday's finale drew about 11.9 million viewers. A little surprising that the closer didn't generate a bigger bounce, given all the breathless anticipation leading up to it last week. But you can be sure that number will spike, if not double, after HBO runs the sprockets out of the finale during the next week or so.

For Bryan Fuller, it all started many years ago, on a hot summer's day in his home town in eastern Washington state, during one of his first attempts at T-ball.

His team was up, and Fuller was caught between first and second base, with no hope of being anything but an easy out for a cocky second baseman. So young Bryan pulled a Kobayashi Maru, long before he knew there was a name for such a maneuver (for the uninitiated, see "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan."). He ran into the outfield. And when the umpire hollered "out," Fuller was incensed.

"I figured if the person who has the ball has to tag you, they should have to chase your ass wherever you go," Fuller recalls, shaking his head. "Why do you have to be locked down to just one way?"

From that long-ago injustice came a good deal of his motivation to build a career on coloring outside the lines, bending the rules of space and time to his own delight as a storyteller. In just a few years Fuller has developed a loyal following among a certain breed of TV junkies and a growing reputation in the biz as the writer-producer behind such stylish drama series as Showtime's "Dead Like Me" and Fox's "Wonderfalls." Fuller spent most of the past season as a staff scribe on NBC's "Heroes," except for when he was off developing his latest creation, "Pushing Daisies," for Warner Bros. Television, which landed the Wednesday 8 p.m. berth on ABC's fall sked.

This week's guest judge Michael Bay added some star power to On the Lot and very clearly turned up the pressure for the remaining 15 contestants.
The plugs for Bay's new summer tentpole "Transformers" were pretty consistent, which underscored his heft in the biz that our hopefuls are trying to crack.
Format this week found five of the 15 -- Sam, Trever, Adam, Hilary and Shalini -- getting the chance to showcase their latest productions, three-minute shorts that had to be completed in five days, using mostly their own wits and connections for sets, actors, lighting, etc.

(pictured above: Adam, standing in back. L-R: Sam, Trever, Hilary and Shalini)

Now this is beach reading.

TV and film director John Rich tells tales of his adventures behind the camera in his recently published memoir "Warm Up the Snake: A Hollywood Memoir" (University of Michigan Press). With a career that stretches from "Our Miss Brooks" (Rich is flanked above by "Brooks" stars Eve Arden and Gale Gordon) to "The Dick Van Dyke Show" to "The Brady Bunch" to "All in the Family" to "MacGyver," he's got the stranger-than-fiction stories to make this a delightful and easy read for anyone with an interest in the biz. There are stories of bad (really bad) or curious behavior by actors, producers, executives, writers and the like that fall into the category of the-more-things-change-the-more-they-stay-the-same-in-this-town. And there are plenty of once-in-a-lifetime anecdotes like the time Rich had the high-class problem of having to choose between directing the pilot for "All in the Family" and the pilot for "The Mary Tyler Moore Show." (The calls from Norman Lear and Moore came on the same day.) "Snake" also offers Rich's personal perspective on how TV directors came into their own at once was once known as the Screen Directors Guild, in no small way thanks to Rich's rabble rousing, and other milestones in DGA history during the past half-century.

Been slowly making my way through the pilot screeners that have been piling up on my desk for the past two weeks. In all good conscience, I won't violate the sacred not-for-review covenant of not weighing in too heavily on the understanding that these pilots are still works in progress that undoubtedly will be tweaked, nipped, tucked and in some cases, recast, before the fall season starts. But some big-picture observations are starting to come together on what I've seen so far.

First off, Jim Parsons is a TV star. He's way-charming as the off-lead buddy opposite Johnny Galecki in CBS' Chuck Lorre sitcom "The Big Bang Theory." "Big Bang" is breezy fun, thanks in large part to Parsons (pictured left), even for someone who wasn't particularly in the mood for a geeky bud-com at the moment that I popped the disc in. But as usual, Lorre delivers the goods, starting with the names of his lead characters, "Sheldon" and "Leonard." (This town doesn't pay enough homage to the late producer Sheldon Leonard, a giant of the TV biz who helped birth "The Dick Van Dyke Show," "The Andy Griffith Show," "I Spy" and other gems.)

"Big Bang's" supporting cast is good too, particularly Simon Helberg as one of Sheldon and Leonard's geeky friends. Galecki's character (pictured right) is definitely channeling the J.J. Abrams geek-hip look. But Lorre's not just poking fun at others. Helberg's character is fer sure satorially inspired by the Lorre look (Davy Jones moptop hairdo, dark turtleneck sweaters) of the late '80s.

The Memorial Day weekend timing of the premiere of HBO’s “Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee” is entirely appropriate. The massacre of about 300 members of the Lakota Sioux tribe at a camp near the banks of Wounded Knee creek in South Dakota occurred on Dec. 29, 1890. Memorial Day is, of course, the federal holiday designated to honor the memory of our nation’s war dead. The men, women and children killed at Wounded Knee that day inhabited their own sovereign nation, but they are most definitely “our” war dead. They were slaughtered by U.S. Army soldiers, without direct provocation and without much in the way to defend themselves. They are war victims that we as a nation should never forget.

pictured above, "Wounded Knee" producer Dick Wolf, left, and actor August Schellenberg, who plays Sitting Bull.

They hail from small towns in Texas, Ohio, Indiana, New Hampshire, Kentucky and Mississippi, from Chicago, New York and Manchester, England to South Africa and Italy. And they all want to be filmmakers, so much so they’ve put their lives and day jobs on hold to compete for a $1 million development deal with DreamWorks on the Fox reality-competition series “On the Lot,” produced by Mark Burnett and Steven Spielberg.

We know how much they want it because, to a contestant, they all gushed variations on the same theme in the first few minutes of the premiere episode. "I want to direct! I love movies! I’ve wanted to direct since I was a kid! I love movies! This is my big break! This is my big shot! I love movies! I want to be a director!" You get the idea. If not, hop over to the show's Web site.

What to say about the new Fox sked? Lotta new shows, lotta familiar faces a la Kelsey Grammer, Patricia Heaton, Julianna Margulies and Parker Posey. Lot of star power behind the scenes, from the "visionary" Lasse Hallstrom (as he's billed in Fox's press release) directing a guy who can't die in "New Amsterdam" to the Farrelly brothers ("Rules for Starting Over") to Mike Figgis (Margulies' "Canterbury's Law") to the drama pilot zen-master David Nutter ("The Sarah Connor Chronicles") who can get a pilot picked up just by touching the script. James Burrows brings his gracious touch to the Grammer/Heaton sitcom-cast "Back to You." I'm curious why Fox is going the "'Til Death" route with that high-profile comedy (which is also graced with the comedy stylings of Fred Willard) by launching it the fall rather during the second front in January when the network has the "Idol" glow around it. But Fox scheduling guru Preston Beckman has been at this game a long time. He knows what he's doing.