3-D mavens have have been saturated with stereo this week -- the two-day 3-D Entertainment Summit in Century City on Monday and Tuesday, Thursday's presentations of "Monsters vs. Aliens" footage at DreamWorks Animation in Glendale and, that same night, the first-ever live, 3-D telecast of an NFL game, beamed to theaters in Hollywood, New York and Boston.

Chances are Thursday's telecast will be remembered long after the game itself, a one-sided matchup between the mediocre San Diego Chargers and the awful Oakland Raiders. 3ality Digital scored a genuine first with the show.

Here are my takeaways from the telecast:

1) Surprise hit of the evening: 3-D televisions in the VIP lounge. The picture in the theater was good, but suffered for being blown up to bigscreen size. However, the flat-screen TVs (using RealD's polarized glasses) delivered startlingly clear images and knockout stereo. I'm betting 95% of the people who walked into that room had never seen a 3-D TV set before and almost all will be abuzz over it. I could easily see sports bars putting them in and fans having a fine time watching their favorite team in 3-D.

2) Everyone's still learning how to shoot a football game in 3-D. The traditional staple of NFL coverage is the high side angle, but it was used sparingly as it's too far from the action to take full advantage of the stereo. Sideline and end-zone camera positions got a big workout. When those angles are good, they're fantastic. When the ball's coming toward the camera, as on a pass over the middle or a punt, the stereo effect is terrific. But those low angles sometimes make it very difficult to follow the action.

3) In 3-D, you are much more aware of how enormous the players are. Or, in the case of the Chargers' Darren Sproles, how small he is -- which fits with one of the strengths of stereo: It's good at revealing scale. (That's something DreamWorks is taking full advantage of in "Monsters vs. Aliens.") Also, supporting my personal theory that people in general are more interesting to watch in 3-D, I can attest the cheerleaders got even more than the usual attention when the cameras cut to them. My friend Matt and I agreed that this wasn't only because they are, well, cheerleaders. Though that didn't hurt.

4) The technology still isn't perfect. RealD's Lenny Lipton was holding forth on some technical decisions he disagreed with in how the 3-D cameras were set up. (He was complaining about the convergance settings, I think.) His eye is more practiced than mine, but I saw problems with the 3-D whenever a ref or player was at the edge of the screen or when there was an out-of-focus object in the foreground (both known issues for 3-D). And sometimes the stereo would just be way off for a moment and we'd howl and whip our glasses off. On balance, Matt and I felt there's a way to go before you'd want to sit through an entire game in a theater. Our eyes felt strained and tired after about an hour. But hanging out in the lounge watching on those 3-D TVs was pretty darn good and not only because of the buffet and bar. Though that didn't hurt, either.

5) The event was a success. I'm reminded of the story of the first hot-air balloon flight in 18th-century Paris. Someone asked "What good is it?" and got the reply, "What good is a newborn baby?" Live 3-D TV is a newborn baby. It has some growing up to do. But on Thursday night, I think that we saw enough good things to be confident it will get the chance.

-- David S. Cohen

True tales of adventures in online dating will be shared Wednesday night at the Pico Playhouse.

It's not a group therapy session, but a staged reading for "The Good, the Bad and the Unbelievable: Real Life Stories of Online Dating," a book-in-progress by Robin Mesger, senior veep of the Lippin Group, and Stacey Levin, director of current programming at 20th Century Fox TV.

Mesger and Levin have been pals and professional colleagues for years. "Unbelievable" grew out of a plan for a chapter in a novel on which Mesger was toiling. When Mesger and Levin put their heads together, they realized they had more than a chapter involving online dating; they had a book.

With the book almost complete, the pair hope to generate buzz among lit agents for the property as they finish it off and prepare to shop it to publishers. Actor pals who have volunteered to help them with buzz-generation at the reading include Pamela Adlon, Krista Allen, Mike Bortone, Kimberly Caldwell, Jessica Collins, Sarah Michelle Gellar (pictured top left), Tony Hale (pictured top right), Amy Sloan and Liza Snyder (pictured right).

Discovery Channel takes over the Greek Theater Wednesday night for a concert and party to tubthump the June 4 debut of its Planet Green channel (the channel formerly known as Discovery Home). Perfs are skedded to include Ludacris, Tommy Lee, ZZ Top's Billy Gibbons, Blue Man Group and others. Proceeds will go to a fund established to help rehab areas around Griffith Park that were torched by recent wildfires....

Thursday's a day for serious yakking. In the afternoon, the Hollywood Radio and Television Society hosts a luncheon event at the Beverly Hilton devoted to how the biz can help keep health care issues at the top of the nation's public policy agenda. Sally Field and Jeffrey Katzenberg are set as speakers. Leeza Gibbons will moderate a panel that is set to include top showrunners of shows that work in scrubs: Neal Baer of "Law & Order: SVU" (who really is a licensed physician), Bill Lawrence of "Scrubs" and John Wells of "ER"... In the evening, the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences parses LGBT issues in TV with a sesh at its North Hollywood HQ that will include thesps Billy Baldwin, Billy Crystal, Ron Rifkin, "Dirty Sexy Money" creator Craig Wright and Showtime's Robert Greenblatt. Bruce Vilanch is sure to keep things interesting as moderator...

On Sunday evening, Elmo's in town for the fourth annual presentation of the Fred Rogers Memorial Scholarships, also at the Leonard Goldenson Theater at ATAS' NoHo home base. Three $10,000 scholarships will be presented by ATAS and Ernst & Young to three grad students pursuing careers in children's media, in honor of the late host of PBS' enduring "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood." Also on hand for the 5 p.m. presentation will be Mrs. Mr. Rogers, Joanne Rogers, and actor David Newell, aka Mr. McFeeley.

I was too beat to make the green-scene at Area on Monday night for the Fox Fall Eco-Casino Party, but a  splendid time was had by all, I'm told. A little too splendid, perhaps, for Kiefer Sutherland, who got arrested for investigation of drunken driving after leaving the event and making a U-turn where he shouldn't have, according to the AP. (Who among us hasn't been tempted to take those kind of shortcuts after a long night of work-related schmoozing?)

The Fox soiree was a eco-friendly, carbon-neutral fundraiser that brought in more than $25,000 for enviro-charities the Nature Conservancy, Habitat for Humanity and Earth Share, all in keeping with the net's tubthumping this season for a "Cool Change." Event drew about 500 people to the club, which was decorated entirely with recyclable and renewable materials. Partygoers left with a baby tree ready for planting, and swag bags made out of recycled Fox billboards.

(Yes Virginia, some good did finally come of all those "Happy Hour," "Standoff" and "Justice" marketing materials.)

The show of force among Fox execs included the dynamic duo of Peter Liguori and Kevin Reilly, exec veeps Marcy Ross, Preston Beckman and Joe Earley, and a talent roster that included Kelsey Grammer and Patricia Heaton, Fred Willard, Rashida Jones (pictured above with Reilly), Emily Deschenal, Omar Epps, Thomas Dekker (pictured right with Liguori), Joely Fisher, Spike Feresten, Jennifer Morrison, Lisa Edelstein, Seth MacFarlane, Kal Penn and John Cho.

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.

For as much fun as we all had backstage at the Shrine Auditorium on Sunday night, it seems that America (the country, not the actress) didn't play along. Viewership of the Emmycast fell to near-record lows with only 13.1 million viewers. For the details click here for Variety's Sunday night ratings report. And don't take my word for it: For a complete rundown of the winners, click here.

Another big win for a frosh ABC show. "Ugly Betty's" America Ferrera besting tough competish for lead comedy actress. She's earned it, she deserves it and like her character Betty Suarez, she's always demonstrated nothing but a fantastic attitude toward her work. Here's to you, America.

Al Gore looked real happy as he and partner Joel Hyatt came backstage to talk up theirr win in the interactive TV category for cabler Current TV. First question lobbed at Gore was whether he, as a survivor of many controversies and media flaps, had any advice for Britney Spears, and did he plan to run in '08?

Gore didn't miss a beat, and got a big laugh with this quip: "I kinda figured the first question would be about Britney Spears."

Finally, a probing question of an actress that elicited something we really wanted to know.

No, Helen Mirren hasn't met up with Queen Elizabeth in the year since she triumphed on screen with her role as QEII in Miramax's "The Queen." But, Mirren did say that she had received a royal invite but had to turn it down because, as befitting a great actress, she couldn't make it because she was working.

"It was very sad for me; it was probably not so sad for her," Mirren joked, adding later that she's not sure if she gets a raincheck or not. "I guess only time will tell."

Mirren won her Emmy for PBS' "Prime Suspect: The Final Act," was a good sport about the obvious non-question thrown at her about 'Wow you've had a good year" after winning the Oscar earlier this year for "Queen." "I call it my amazing year. I don't believe in astrology but I'm curious to see what my astrological sign said about this year. 'You will meet disappointment,' probably."

Jeremy Piven, supporting comedy actor winner for the second year in a row for HBO's "Entourage," was feelin' sweet backstage (kinda like the Ari Gold aw shucks moment in most "Entourage" segs), expanding on his remarks about how much his parents, the late Byrne Piven and Joyce Hiller Piven, influenced his life with the "corner theater" they ran in Chicago, in which he grew up steeped in a life of trodding the boards.

"He's a man who worked his entire life to find a brilliant role, and his last role was "King Lear" so he found it," Piven said of his dad. Piven noted that his mother was busy directing a play in Chicago so she turned him down as his date for the Emmys for a fifth time in a row.

"And for the record, I'm straight. I'm the only straight man to bring his mother four times and now his sister. You can look it up."

Back to the serious side, Piven noted when pressed on the "what does it all mean to you, Jeremy" question, especially being a back to back win. "For a guy from Chicago, the dream for me was getting on stage in Chicago, not being celebrated like this. So I'm having an other-worldly experience."

Good for Jaime Pressly! She won for supporting comedy actress for her bravura turn as a trailer prima donna Joy Turner on NBC's "My Name is Earl." Backstage she admitted that Joy is an amalgam of four or five people she grew up with in North Carolina. The win is important to her because after toiling for 13 years, "I finally changed everybody's mind...and had the opportunity to show what I could do."

I'm especially happy for her because I went out on a limb on Friday and noted that I was rooting for her in the category. I was also rooting for Rainn Wilson in the supporting comedy actor heat, but it went to Jeremy Piven. I'm 1-2.

At left, Julia Louis-Dreyfus hands Pressly the trophy for the category that she won once and was nommed seven times for during her "Seinfeld" days.

Pity the poor Emmy announcer. She mispronounced the surname of "Grey's Anatomy" star Katherine Heigl, who joined the achingly handsome Kyle Chandler on stage to present the trophy for supporting actor in a movie/miniseries. First thing Heigl sez as she hits the mike: It's "Hi-gull."

Winner in the category added a heap of sweet to Heigl's sour. Thomas Haden Church (pictured below), a victor for the AMC oater "Broken Trail," thanked "David and Lynn Angell, who were there at the beginning." Sweet of him to remember David Angell and his wife. David, of course, was part of the Angell-Casey-Lee triumvirate who created the show, "Wings," that provided Church's breakthru role. David and Lynn died in one of the hijacked planes on Sept. 11, but their legacy, clearly, remains strong.

This just in: Katherine Heigl (that's Hi-gelle) has won in the supporting drama actress category for her role as the mixed up Izzie on "Grey's Anatomy."

OK,  we're here. Backstage at the Shrine. Stuart Levine and I are in place in the winners quote room, trying to get adjusted to tight squeeze that they have reporters in and we're both vowing to work hard not to knock our water bottles over into our computers. Mercifully, I'm having no tech problems (that I know of!) and it's not 100 degrees in the tent yet, so by the standards of Emmys past, I've no reason to complain. Gonna head out to the red carpet and see what's up. I can see by the pics that are already posted on WireImage (thanks Jeff Vespa) that stars, such as best drama actress nominee Edie Falco pictured at left, are starting to arrive.

NBC Universal's pre-Emmy party at Spago on Saturday night was as relaxed as a shoulder-to-shoulder schmoozefest can be. Place was hopping with NBC U execs, agents, scribes and helmers and stars of NBC U productions -- it seemed everywhere you looked there was a staffer from "The Office" or a savior from "Heroes" holding court.

"Heroes" trouper Hayden Panettiere looked particularly fetching in a white minidress that flattered her cheerleader-worthy figure. Alec Baldwin of "30 Rock" was surrounded by a hub of well-wishers and back-slappers. Kathy Griffin picked up compliments while in line in the ladies room for her win  (unveiled at the Creative Arts ceremony) for Bravo's "My Life on the D-List"; there was some discussion of whether her show's title needed to be adjusted in light of her victory. And there was much chatter throughout the night at Spago of the goings-on the previous night at the private affair thrown by new NBC U co-chairman Ben Silverman and impresario Brent Bolthouse. (Among the more talked-about elements of the affair at a rented 10,000-square-foot mansion in the Hollywood Hills: the caged tiger that greeted guests, the number of bikinis running around, and of course, Paris Hilton).

NBC U graciously pushed back the start time of its Spago party to 8:30 p.m. to accommodate the dance cards of those who also attended Saturday's "Evening Before" benefit in Century City for the Motion Picture Television Fund home, co-sponsored by Variety. Among those who took in both parties on Saturday were "Top Chef" star Tom Colicchio, whose new Century City restaurant Craft pitched in with "Evening Before."

(Sorry, no pics posted yet of the NBC U party. Above shot of Kathy Griffin at the Sept. 8 Creative Arts ceremony by Jeffrey Mayer/WireImage.com.)

Here it comes, the big night. By midday Sunday showbiz journos will converge in tents at the Shrine Auditorium for the 59th annual Primetime Emmy Awards.

Seems like there's been precious little pre-show buzz for the kudofest this year. Is it because it looks like a cakewalk to the top of Mount Emmy this year for the dearly departed "The Sopranos"? Is it because ratings for the show have ebbed precipitously in the past decade? Who knows. Really, the most pre-Emmy buzz I've heard this week is about the bash that NBC Entertainment co-chair Ben Silverman is throwing late tonight (Friday) with the help of L.A.'s premier nightclub dude Brent Bolthouse (who's also handling DirecTV's inaugural Emmy night party) at a rented mansion in the Hollywood Hills. The guest list and the security plans are said to be super-tight.

I've always had kind of a love-dread thing with the Emmys. Love because I do love the smallscreen and its players and it's fun to see your colleagues all dressed up in their finery. (As my old boss at UPI used to say: It's prom night for the media.) Dread because of course a big awards show means a looooong work night for showbiz reporters, especially those of us who file live on deadline and have to get everybody's name and award category right, etc., or there'll be snickers the next day.

POSTED BY JOSEF ADALIAN

Yes, that was Mark Itkin walking around the corridors of CAA Thursday night. But no, the William Morris Agency’s dean of unscripted programming isn’t defecting.

Itkin made a trip to what he called “enemy territory” in order to appear on a CAA/BAFTA-sponsored panel dubbed “Another British Invasion.” Powwow brought together six of the biggest names in the reality biz, ostensibly to discuss the past and future of Blighty-produced TV in the States.

Night actually turned into a broader discussion encompassing the history of the biz and the challenges it faces, with “American Idol” showrunner Nigel Lythgoe (pictured left) moderating a lively hourlong-plus conversation.

Panel also included CAA reality chief Michael Camacho, unscripted superlawyer Jeanne Newman, Fox alternative prexy Mike Darnell, CBS reality guru Ghen Maynard and Lifetime supremo Andrea Wong (who until recently headed up unscripted programming for ABC).

Group of Six repped a sort of Mt. Rushmore of the modern reality age, collectively repping some sort of involvement in just about every major unscripted skein since “The Real World” kicked off the alternative boom.

Itkin talked about putting together the deal for “Real World” (MTV wanted a soap but didn’t have the coin to pay for actors), while Newman (pictured right)outlined how she got all the major nets to bid on “Big Brother.”

“We had a true bidding war, not like the ones we make up,” Newman quipped.

It's come to this for Joan and Melissa Rivers. After losing their berths on E! and more recently, TV Guide Channel, on Emmy night they'll be nowhere near the red carpet at the Shrine Auditorium but live blogging in New York for VH1Eyecandy.com. That site is described by its mothership cabler as "VH1's recently launched site that offers a host of tools for users to grab, embed, blog and remix photos, videos and news stories," and VH1 boasts that it has 150,000 photographs and 5,000 hours of video housed on the site for users' mash-up pleasure, with more coming every day. (It's part of MTV Networks' new bid to grab, embed and remix many more pairs of youthful eyeballs to its cablers and websites.)

VH1Eyecandy.com promises to have a dedicated emmyswithjoan.com site running start at 5 p.m. ET on Sunday, which will include their live blog snark about the action on the red carpet and during the ceremony. It'll also have Joan's red carpet video podcast recap and Emmy podcast recap. It's the on-demand part of this equation that people might have trouble with. But in a funny way, for awards-season vets it's good to know that on some level, the tradition of groaning over what tumbles out of Joan Rivers' mouth on Emmy and Oscar day hasn't completely gone away but is safely out of the way on the red carpet.

Joan and Melissa Rivers pic from this year's Oscars by Dan MacMedan/WireImage

You just know he did this for his mom. David Letterman's appearance on the campus of his alma mater Ball State University was big news in Muncie, Ind. today. He was there to attend the dedication of the school's new $21 million communications building, which is named after its famous alumnus.(Click here for Ball State's coverage)

As the pics on the (Muncie) Star Press website make clear, the normally press- and publicity-averse Letterman endured all the big to-do because it made his mom, Dorothy Mengering, proud. And given the fact that she's been a contributor to his latenight shows over the years (he sent her to cover the winter Olympics in Nagano, fer chrissakes) TV shows over the years, it's the least he could do.

Here's the Star Press' take on Friday's dedication ceremony ("If reasonable people can put my name on a $21 million building, anything is possible," Letterman observed to the SRO crowd, per the paper), but even more amusing is the paper's set-up story detailing all of the preparations and anticipation for this state visit from a beloved native son. It was covered live by local TV outlets and streamed live on the school's website.

(Full disclosure: Pic above was filched from the Ball State website.)

I walked out of the Paley Center for Media in Bev Hills a tiny bit unsatisfied after taking in "The Bob Newhart Show" reunion tonight. The discussion among the core cast members (minus Peter Bonerz) was fun and funny, but low key. There were no jaw-dropping anecdotes or side-splitting stories of episodes gone wrong or saved in the clutch by a quick-witted crew member, etc. But it hit me by the time I got to my car. In all of its low-key-ness, it was the perfect tribute to "The Bob Newhart Show."

As discussed by Newhart and panelists Suzanne Pleshette, Marcia Wallace, Bill Daily, Jack Riley and helmer Dick Martin, "Bob Newhart" was a quiet ground-breaker in its 1972-78 run on CBS. While "Mary Tyler Moore," "All in the Family" and "MASH" soaked up the headlines for being convention-busting and envelope-pushing, Bob and Emily Hartley quietly shot scenes in bed together, with the emphasis on together. Newhart staked his claim to "Bob Newhart" being the first TV comedy to eschew twin beds for a more realistic queen-size mattress. And as fans of the show know, those talking-in-bed scenes are some of "Bob Newhart's" greatest moments.

Also unusual for the era was the concept that from the get-go, there were no kids in the picture for Bob and Emily, despite the fact that they obviously had the hots for each other; maybe Emily a little more so than Bob. As Pleshette put it in her trademark gravely-snarky voice, "If you listen quietly (in the bedroom scenes) you can hear me sticking my foot up his ass" to get her co-star going in the intimate setting.

Pictured above left: Suzanne Pleshette and Bob Newhart. Above right, clockwise from top, Marcia Wallace, Bill Daily, Jack Riley, Pleshette, Newhart and Dick Martin. Pics courtesy Paley Center/Kevin Parry Photography.

Looking forward to "The Bob Newhart Show" event tonight at the Paley Center for Media, which happens to fall on Newhart's 78th birthday. (Happy birthday Bob).

Panel promises to reunite Newhart with cast mates Suzanne Pleshette, Peter Bonerz, Marcia Wallace, Bill Daily, Jack Riley and director Dick Martin for clips and Q&A and "gawsh I just loved doing that show" oratory. But it outta be a good, clean fun. Event is timed to TV Land's extensive 35th anniversary tribute to the show, which has been a staple of the vintage TV cabler for more years now than the series had in its original run on CBS (1972-78). (Pictured from left in 2005, Wallace, Pleshette, Newhart and Tom Poston, Pleshette's late husband, longtime friend of Newhart's and co-star of Newhart's other long-running CBS sitcom, "Newhart.")

On Monday, TV Land plans a marathon of eight Newhart-selected favorite segs, starting with "Last TV Show," in which Newhart's group therapy group urges him to accept an invite from the local PBS outlet to conduct a session live on air. The 10:30 p.m. seg "Some of My Best Friends" in which a young and swinger-looking Howard Hesseman joins the group, is not to be missed. Also next week, TV Land.com plans to stream those eight episodes, through Sunday, plus a bunch of other Newhart-ana, new and old.

Among the guests on the next seg of CNBC's "Conversations with Michael Eisner" is the peacock's Ben Silverman. Episode is set to air Sept. 26 and also features L.A.'s hizzoner Antonio Villaraigosa and celeb blogger Perez Hilton....

Among the events of particular interest (to me) on the Paley Center for Media (fka the Museum of Television & Radio) sked of events for the 2007-08 season include seshes at the New York outposts with the writers from CBS' "Late Show with David Letterman," set for Nov. 9; a so-long-farewell-Auf-Weidersehn-etc. to "Scrubs" (Nov. 10); and an "Evening with" sitdown with the inimitable Angela Lansbury (Nov. 14), pictured left. At the Bev Hills branch, good times outta be had at the Oct. 1 "Inside 'Robot Chicken' panel -- that's gotta be a bizarre 90-minutes; the 100th-seg salute to "Two and a Half Men" (Oct. 3); and the "Lou Grant" reunion (Nov. 16)...

Kinda sad to see that Don Bellisario didn't appear to make it to the "NCIS" 100th-episode cake-cutting photo op on Tuesday. I never did figure out the story behind Bellisario's abrupt exit from the drama he created (one of many) at the start of last season -- some reports blamed it on a clash between him and star Mark Harmon. Oh well, Bellisario will soon (one day?) be able to take comfort in his syndie residual and profit-participation checks.

Tuesday p.m. update: Jerry Lewis has issued an apology for using a foul slur on air Monday during the waning hours of his annual MDA telethon:

"I obviously made a bad choice of words. Everyone who knows me understands that I hold no prejudices in this regard," he said. "The success of the (telethon) and all the good that will come from it shouldn't be lost because of one unfortunate word. I accept responsibility for what I said. There are no excuses. I am sorry."

Tuesday a.m. update: It's widely reported on the wires today that Jerry lost it toward the end of the telethon on Monday and called someone an "illiterate fag" on air. TMZ.com has a clip of Lewis' unfortunate comment posted on its website, and it sure sounds like he's making that reprehensible statement, though it's unclear exactly who is the target of his ire. Why Lewis would sully his annual moment in the good-works spotlight by using such a slur on air is unfathomable, but then again, people have always said that Lewis is his own worst enemy.

Say what you will -- LA LA LA NICE LLLAAADDDYYY -- about Jerry Lewis, but every year he raises a boatload of money for a worthy cause with his Labor Day weekend MDA telethon, and there's no way that this is not a good thing in the grand scheme of things.

The haul from this year's 21.5-hour show, broadcast from Las Vegas, was $63.8 million, nearly $3 million more than last year, as detailed on the telethon's website. Lewis has been hosting the telethon for half of his life. (He's 81; the telethon is 42 this year.)

The live shots of a goggle-eyed Jerry panting, sweating, crying and yukking it up with Norm Crosby and Ed McMahon, et al, interspersed with cutaways to local news anchors in formal wear, is one of those TV traditions (for those of us born before the Ford administration) that we'll miss, sorely, when it inevitably ends.

I'm not sure if "Friday Night Lights" is the kind of show that lends itself to the "High School Musical" viewing-party treatment, but it's at least good to see that NBC is engaged in promoting the soph season premiere of the show.

Peacock has pacted with Houseparty.com to mount a viewing party contest for "1,000 lucky hosts" who'll get the chance to throw their own "FNL" themed affair complete with a sneak peek at the season premiere on Sept. 14. For people willing to apply at Houseparty.com for the privilege of promoting the show's Oct. 5 debut in its new Friday 9 p.m. slot, NBC will pick 1,000 of them to receive party kits full of "FNL" themed tchotskes relating to the show about a life in a small Texas town that is crazy about its high school football (megaphones, stadium cushions, rally towels, a DVD of the first four segs from last season with a special introduction from "FNL" stars Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton) and of course, a bonus DVD of the pilot of "Bionic Woman." (Don't know of the "FNL" crowd will be flocking to "Bionic" but you can't blame them for trying...)

Plans for the parties will be tubthumped all across NBC.com (it's already started on the "FNL" page), local affiliate stations' websites and each party host gets a page on Houseparty.com. (Gee, whatever happened to picking up some beer, wine and a few extra-big bags of potato chips and making an effort to vacuum before guests show up?)
NBC's longtime marketing guru John Miller sez it's all about (staged) word-of-mouth promotion:
"With word of mouth advertising being so effective, we wanted to create a natural venue for that kind of experience in the comfort of people's homes," he said.

Of course, fans who don't make the cut can strike back by downloading illegal copies of "FNL" episodes off the Internet, grabbing images of the show off of Google to scan on to T-shirts and generally getting drunk and unruly at their own "FNL" themed parties on Sept. 13. (Just a little joke. Don't send the piracy police after me, please.)

We knew going in that Disney Channel's "High School Musical 2" was going to be the Super Bowl for kids this year. And in landing as the most-watched single telecast in the history of the medium among kids 6-11, it's fair to say that Troy, Gabriella, Sharpay and the rest of the East High gang didn't disappoint.

This time around, there were were nearly 10% more boys and a whole lot more adults tuning in to the tuner. Among the 6.1 million kids in the 6-11 age range, the gender breakdown for the Friday premiere airing was 62% girls, 38% boys, compared to a 70-30 split for "High School Musical," which became a not-so-sleeper hit early last year. This past Friday night, two out of three kids who were watching TV were tuned to "HSM2." In the girls 6-11, the audience share was an astounding 80, translating to four out of five girls in the vicinity of a TV set, as Variety's Rick Kissell reports in his detailed look at "HSM2's" perf. (And just wait until the Live-Plus-7 numbers accounting for a week's worth of DVR playback viewing roll in next week...)

But of all the impressive stats generated by the sequel, the sweetest number for Disney Channel stewards may be the fact that one-third of the telepic's aud was comprised of adults 18 and over. The number of young adults (18-34s) and older-younger adults (18-49s) who watched stand as empirical evidence for Disney Channel programming execs that their master plan is working. For a network oriented around grade-schoolers, engaging the attention of voting-age viewers is a coup. Getting kids and moms and dads to all sit still at the same time and gather round the electronic hearth as in the days of yesteryear and three networks (NBC, CBS and DuMont) is an absolute slam dunk in our frantically fragmented age, even even for a commercial-free cabler that isn't worried about selling soap.

Humongous. Gi-normous. Cable record-setting. The Friday preem of Disney Channel's "High School Musical 2" brought in an astounding 17.24 million viewers (17,240,884 to be exact) in its Friday 8-10:05 p.m. ET/PT preem. Take a bow, Disney Channel entertainment prexy Gary Marsh (pictured below), Rich Ross and the rest of the exec team that backed the notion of a kid-friendly tuner last year when most of us were going, huh?For the kids of today -- singing and dancing, Mickey and Judy style? Just goes to prove the industry cliche about zigging when others are zagging....and finding talent, good-looking comers a la Zac Efron to showcase.

"HSM2" tuner now ranks as the most-watched TV movie ever with kids 6-11, drawing 6.1 million viewers in that demo, and the most-watched ever with tweeners 9-14, drawing 5.9 million viewers in that demo, according to Disney Channel. In total households, pic drew a massive 9.4 million cable homes, putting the telecast behind only a handful of sports and news telecasts in cable history in total households deliver. The high total viewer tally also indicates that pic was a family viewing event in most of those 9.4 million households. And as Disney Channel's hard-working PR maven Patti McTeague observed this a.m., who knows how many were really watching given all the viewing parties set around "HSM2" last night.

Disney Channel followed "HSM2" with a sneak peek of the upcoming animated series "Phineas and Ferb," which held onto a healthy 10.8 million viewers from its windfall lead-in. And at 10:20 p.m., a fresh seg of Disney Channel hit "Hannah Montana" was socko enough to rank as Disney Channel's second most-watched telecast ever, with an average of 10.7 million viewers. "Hannah" also set all kinds of series records for Disney Channel and the basic cable biz in general, including most-watched seg with kids 6-11 (4.1 million), and most-watched seg with the 9-14 crowd (4.2 million).

I'm told a splendid time was had by all last night at the "Pushing Daisies" screening at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery. Pilot was said to have been enthusiastically received by the non-pros in the audience, just as it has been by industry insiders during the past few months since it was picked up by ABC back in May. Pilot helmer and exec producer Barry Sonnenfeld looks like he was having a good time, all decked out as a pink cowboy. And here's a pic at left of something we're unlikely to see anytime soon on the show -- stars Lee Pace and Anna Friel smooching!

"Daisies" revolves around a guy, Ned, with an unusual talent to bring the dead back to life with the touch of his hand -- with the catch that if he touches them again, they're back to .... pushing daisies. Chuck happens to be Ned's long-lost childhood sweetheart who Ned reconnects with, unfortunately a little too late when she's already been bumped off. He revives her and the flower of their youthful love re-blossoms in a big way...but only if they don't actually touch.

"Pushing Daisies" has a few tough tasks ahead of it. It's got great industry buzz that it has to live up to. It has to open a night for ABC (Wednesday) at 8 p.m.; and it has to build on the Ned-Chuck storyline without the "no touching" rule feeling tired, and it has to keep the franchise murder-mystery element of Ned reviving murder victims to catch their killers from running out of steam too. If anyone's up to the task, it's "Daisies" creator Bryan Fuller, a man with a naturally sunny-morbid disposition who spent the past season on "Heroes" and has a loyal cult following for his previous offbeat dramas "Wonderfalls" and "Dead Like Me." And he's got formidable help from fellow exec producers Dan Jinks and Bruce Cohen (who flank Sonnenfeld and Fuller in the pic at right, with Bruce on the far right). Go, Bryan, go...

(Group pic by Jean Baptiste Lacroix/WireImage.com)

Now here's a clever promo idea. ABC has skedded a promo screening of its buzzed-about dramedy "Pushing Daisies" at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery on Thursday night. "Daisies" creator/exec producer Bryan Fuller will be on hand to introduce the screening, and ABC is promising "a limited number of special treats at the conclusion of the event for attendees." The Hollywood Forever midnight screenings of movies, morbid-themed and otherwise, have been a local treat for a few years now. With its focus on a guy who has the ability to bring people back from the dead, briefly, the lighthearted (really) "Daisies" is a perfect fit with the Hollywood Forever series, especially now that billboards for the show are sprouting up all over town. "Pushing Daisies," starring Lee Pace and Anna Friel, bows at 8 p.m. on Oct. 3.

For more info on "Pushing Daisies," read this On the Air column with Bryan Fuller from a few months ago, and this dispatch from TCA last month.

Yes, she named him Idol. A preggers woman who toughed it out Monday at the Dallas open-audition for next year's "American Idol" competish wound up going into labor while waiting her turn in Texas Stadium. Antoria Gillon wasn't about to give up her hard won spot in line, so she braved the long wait (doing the 'hee-hee-hee-ho' breathing exercise the entire time, no doubt) and finally got her turn, in between contractions. (Would love to know what her audition number was. "Ain't No Stoppin' Us Now"? "Be My Baby"? "Get Ready"? ).

Undoubtedly impressed by her fortitude and determination, the local judges invited her to come back for the next round of auditioning. On the heels of that good news, Gillon got herself to a local hospital, and in the wee hours of Tuesday, the world welcomed Jamil Labarron Idol McCowan, all six pounds and seven ounces of him. (Wonder what Simon would've made of her performance in the delivery room? Paula surely would've gushed.) Just think, in another 18 years, he can audition for the 2025 edition of "Idol."

POSTED BY STUART LEVINE

If it's Saturday night, then shuffle up and deal.

Yours truly was invited to a charity poker tournament at UCLA for the Scleroderma Foundation, a group that does its best to create awareness and raise funds for this nasty and debilitating autoimmune disease.

Playing their cards close to the vest were not one, not two but three ex-"Survivor" contestants — Alex Angarita, "Survivor: Fiji" (left); Cristina Coria, "Survivor: Cook Islands"  (second from right) and Bruce Kanegai, "Survivor: Panama" (right), pictured with exec director Brian Adams of the Scleroderma Foundation (not Bryan Adams of "Cuts Like a Knife" fame).

Typically, I lost early on a bad river beat but, more importantly, money was raised for a good cause … and we got to find out what former "Survivor" contestants do after their TV fame has come and gone.

With their torch on being a celebrity long ago flamed out, it was nice to see these folks use their Andy Warhol moments for such a good cause.

For more information, check out www.sclerodermasocal.org.

— Stuart Levine

He is a very special young man. Muncie, Ind.-based Ball State University is naming its new communications building after its most famous alumni, David Letterman.

Letter-mom Dorothy Mengering was on hand Monday for the announcement with Ball State prexy Jo Ann Gora (click here for cute pic of Dorothy, known to viewers for her occasional work as a "Late Show"/"Late Night" correspondent). The $21 million, 75,000-square foot facility houses all kinds of state-of-the-art digital media stuff, a surround sound recording studio and post-production facility, is set to open on Sept. 7. Letterman and his mom are expected to attend the ceremony.

"I'm so thrilled that David finally let them do this for him," Mengering told the AP. "He's a very special young man, and I'm proud of him."

Gora noted that Letterman's frequent mentions of the school on his NBC and CBS late night shows have exposed Ball State to millions of people who otherwise never would've heard of it. He's also quietly been a huge supporter of its various institutions, from the Letterman Scholarships established in 1985 to the checks he's written to help launch the school's radio station, among other initiatives. Letterman graduated from Ball State in 1970.

"I'm proud to have been a student at Ball State, and I'm deeply honored to have this recognition for me and my family," Letterman said in a statement.

(Pictured above: Letterman, right, and George Clooney. No, Clooney didn't go to Ball State but I found this nice shot on the CBS press Web site and let's face it, Clooney livens up any post.)

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.

A fantastic time was had by all at Fox's post-TCA party on the Santa Monica pier on Monday night, as evidenced by this pic of "House" star Hugh Laurie in action on the bumper cars. The network took over the whole pier and gave TCA-ers the run of the joint, which had to fulfill childhood fantasies of anyone who ever spent time on the pier as a kid and ran out of quarters. TypePad's power-outage woes and a busy day back in the office kept me from weighing in on much of anything today. But this Laurie pic was too cool to pass up.

What Emmy didn't giveth on Thursday morning, the TCA Awards bestowed on Saturday night at the Beverly Hilton.

NBC's "Friday Night Lights," conspicuously snubbed by Emmy voters, got its due in nabbing best new program. Michael C. Hall of Showtime's "Dexter," another near no-show in the Emmy derby, was deemed best drama actor at the ceremony hosted by "Daily Show's" John Oliver.

Overall the Peacock swept the Television Critics Assn. kudofest with four trophies, including best comedy for "The Office," natch, and Alec Baldwin of "30 Rock" for top dog among comedy actors.TCA-ers didn't overlook NBC's other big frosh drama of last season, picking  "Heroes" the program of the year.

(Pictured: Connie Britton and Kyle Chandler of "Friday Night Lights")

It wouldn't be Emmy noms morning without running into a sleepy Mike Darnell, Fox's exec vp and guru of all things alternative and specials, and his super-nice wife Carolyn (pictured right on the Emmy red carpet in 2005), who works as an awards consultant to HBO and Fox, among others. Mike staked out his usual spot on the stairs in the lobby of the Leonard H. Goldenson Theater where all the hubbub goes on at 5:40 a.m. "I can't believe we're here," Mike chuckled as he slouched against a huge planter. "We look pretty good for this time of the morning, don't you think?" He had an omelet-looking item on a paper plate next to him but he didn't seem to be hungry. Carolyn noted that this year makes it an even 20 years that she's been rising before dawn from their home in Calabasas to take in the Emmy noms announcement.

Mike was happy, of course, to see "American Idol" in the running for reality series though it will once again face four-time winner "Amazing Race." He was disappointed for "So You Think You Can Dance" (especially with ABC's "Dancing with the Stars" nabbing a series nom alongside "Idol," "Race," "Project Runway" and "Top Chef") but hey, at least it's a contender for choreography.

As I kept running around the theater lobby trying to find a spot that would grant me four precious green bars indicating a WiFi connection (no such luck), I also did my best to drag details of the Sept. 16 Emmy telecast out of Mike, who is overseeing the show for Fox. The big question is, who's going to host?

Fox is always in something of a bind when it gets its quadrennial Emmycast because it doesn't have too many host-type talents a la the other nets. Ryan Seacrest? Jeff Foxworthy? Wayne Brady? who's now on Fox's air as host of "Don't Forget the Lyrics." "House" star Hugh Laurie would also be a good choice -- he's nominated this year (after inexplicably being left out last year) and so is the show, and Laurie's very much on record as being a funny guy from his "Bit of Fry and Laurie" days in Britain. Mike smiled and shuffled his cowboy boots a little but wasn't about to give me any insights on the host, but he did drop a big hint that the Emmycast set is getting an extreme makeover and will look very different this year.

POSTED BY STUART LEVINE

Following the frantic exec session with Ben Silverman and Marc Graboff, NBC's next panel focused on the network's Sunday Night Football package. And, despite Silverman's success on "The Office" and "Ugly Betty," this was a group with just a few more accomplishments between them.

Sitting in the front row of the stage were NBC Sports topper Dick Ebersol, John Madden (pictured right), Al Michaels, Bob Costas, Cris Collinsworth and Keith Olbermann. Behind them were producer Fred Gaudelli, reporter Andrea Kramer, future Hall of Famers Jerome Bettis and Tiki Barber, and production exec Michael Weisman.

Michaels, forever known for his 1980 Winter Olympics call "Do you believe in miracles" on the U.S. upset of the USSR in hockey, is an announcing institution. He's appeared in more live primetime network broadcasts than any person in history.

Madden coached the Oakland Raiders to a Super Bowl win but that almost seems an afterthought at this point. His gravelly signature voice has become ingrained into the minds of football fans that the week's big game only matters if he's doing the color. That's not true, of course, with Fox and CBS also doing a steller job covering the league, but Madden's presence always raises the game up a notch.

Costas has won 19 Emmys and feels old school ... in a good way. There's no doubt about his first sports love, which is baseball, but his football acumen remains strong.

The lightning rod of the NBC football shows this year will be Olbermann, who has become a champion for liberals over the past few years. On his increasingly popular MSNBC "Countdown" show, Olbermann pokes and prods the Bush Administration. Whether he does the same thing to Peyton Manning and Terrell Owens remains to seen.

"If I say something negative about Reggie Bush, then I have to say something negative about Clinton Portis," Olbermann joked.

He'll get that chance early on. The network's first game is Thursday, Sept. 6 when Bush and his New Orleans Saints travel to Indianapolis to face the world champion Colts.

But, certainly, his appearance will bring in viewers who might not be as much fans of the game as fans of him.

"With Keith, there comes an interesting heat," said Ebersol. Referring back to Olbermann's days on "SportsCenter," "With Dan (Patrick), he changed the way generation of fans looks at highlights."

-- Stuart Levine

POSTED BY STEVEN ZEITCHIK

Now debuting on U.S. cable--either the vanguard of 21st century diversity or another weapon in the arsenal of overbearing parents.

That would Nick Jr.'s bilingual animated show "Ni Hao, Kai-lan," which the net unwrapped during Friday morning's cavalcade of TCA announcements and sessions from the many channels in the MTV Networks family.

"Ni Hao" aims to do for Mandarin what "Dora the Explorer" did for Spanish -- that is, give parents another language to fret that their children are (or aren't) learning. Nick execs said that the net chose Chinese because they were trying to reach out to diverse creators. Another unspoken reason might be a desire to appeal to a certain breed of ultra-ambitious, upscale parents who read statistics about the ascendancy of Mandarin as a global language.

The sesh that immediately followed the Nick stuff may have been an education in a more commonly spoken language, and probably a whole lot more intriguing to the overwhelmingly white male demo of TCA-ers. To tubthumb the next season of "Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders: Making the Team," CMT trotted out a clutch of the show's white-booted, high-kicking, smile-wearing stars.

Setting aside the eye candy factor, the clips and interviews for "Cheerleaders" underscored (as did CMT's follow-up presentation for "Ty Murray's Celebrity Bull Riding Challenge) how strong a genre nonscripted can be when it's done straight-up, docu style with the right subject.

"Cheerleaders" will offer no contrived contests or made-for-TV eliminations, just a video-verite peek into how a thousand dancer-athletes go through the rigorous paces of making an elite squad.
And not to avoid the obvious, but they're cheerleaders, fer chrissakes. What's not to like?

--Steven Zeitchik

Here we go again. The summer Television Critics Assn. tour is upon is. Ken Burns is the big draw at the Beverly Hilton today, talking up his 14-hour mini "The War," which looks at World War II from the homefront perspective of four American hamlets: Waterbury, Conn.; Mobile, Ala.; Sacramento, Calif.; and the tiny farming community of Luverne, Minn. "The War," produced and directed by Burns and Lynn Novick, has been six years in the making. It's also been the project that put Burns in the unfamiliar position of fielding some pretty harsh criticism for his take on history, from Hispanic and Native American advocacy groups who claimed his mini overlooked their contributions to the war effort. (According to the AP, Burns addressed this issue during his TCA sesh, saying he's added nearly a half-hour of material featuring Hispanic and Native American stories to the doc.) I just got my screener copy on Monday and am eager to set aside some time to watch it. If nothing else, Burns is meticulous about his research and has surely turned up some amazing images to tell this tale, like the one at left from somewhere in the South Pacific in 1944. PBS is bolding going to "War" during the thick of fall premiere week, rolling out the series in seven parts across two weeks beginning Sept. 23.

After PBS wraps up today, the wired-world takes over on Thursday for four days of cable-iscious fun. The presentation sked to the best of my knowledge is:

THURSDAY: Lifetime; FX, National Geographic Channel; Hallmark Channel; HBO, which outta be very intriguing given that it's the first major public event for the post-Albrecht regime.

FRIDAY: MTV Networks; BBC America; Discovery Networks; E! and G4

SATURDAY: Disney-ABC Cable; ESPN; GSN; Sundance Channel; Showtime

SUNDAY: Turner nets; BET; Rainbow Networks; History Channel; NBC Universal Cable

As of MONDAY, the broadcasters take over starting with two days of NBC, which also outta be interesting with the new Ben Silverman-Marc Graboff regime taking the stage for the first time.

WEDNESDAY-THURSDAY is all about CBS, which as usual is coming off another season of stability, making it hard for the scribe tribe to find much to grill entertainment prexy Nina Tassler about, other her love for musical theater and how it led to the pickup of "Viva Laughlin."

FRIDAY belongs to the CW. Co-toppers Dawn Ostroff and John Maatta probably have a bet going as to how quickly the "so why didn't you grow by leaps and bounds in your first year?" question is lobbed.

SATURDAY is a day of rest and awards, as the TCA's annual honors will be handed out to worthy programs ("Friday Night Lights," anyone?) and individuals, no doubt. (Click here for noms.)

SUNDAY-MONDAY ought to be good too as Fox, not to be outdone with NBC, brings out its new regime of ex-NBC-er Kevin Reilly and newly promoted Peter Liguori. Those two probably have a bet going as to who gets the first "how long can 'American Idol' keep it up?" question.

And finally, after a day of rest on Tuesday (July 24), the network that comes first alphabetically heads up the final two days of the tour, WEDNESDAY-THURSDAY (July 25-26), a cruel slot that no network with a show as good as "Lost" and a pilot as charming as "Pushing Daisies" should have to endure. But if anyone's got the spine to fend off back whatever a group of cranky critics have to throw at him, it's ABC Entertainment prexy Stephen McPherson.

So let 'er rip! Look for a steady stream of TCA dispatches here from yours truly plus my talented TV colleagues at Variety, including two, Mssrs. Zeitchik and Learmonth, who have winged in from Gotham just for the occasion.

And please, oh gods of auto-congestion, let the self-park garage at the Hilton not be too clogged...There's nothing like inching your way down those steep ramps when all you really wanna do is get back to the real world.

For all the advance hot air, it seemed like "Live Earth" drew modest crowds, linear or online. NBC Universal says that 19 million viewers tuned in to at least some part of its "Live Earth: The Concerts for a Climate in Crisis" coverage across eight outlets: NBC, Telemundo, Mun2, Bravo, Sundance Channel, Universal HD, CNBC and MSNBC.

Per NBC U, that figure includes viewers who watched at least six minutes or more of the Saturday-Sunday telecasts that served up a cavalcade of contempo music makers, including Madonna, the Police, Bon Jovi, Sheryl Crow, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Roger Waters, Kanye West, Kelly Clarkson and John Mayer (pictured left).

Despite the star power, the Peacock's primetime coverage on its mothership broadcast network drew a 2.8 million viewers with three hours of taped highlights. It's a woeful sign of the times for the state of live (or live on tape) music on the smallscreen; the Live Earth concert block came in dead last on the weakest night of the week (Saturday). It was beaten by repeats of "Cold Case" and "America's Funniest Home Videos." So to get to 19 million, a whole lotta people must've checked out at least six minutes on Bravo's 18-hour telecast that began 8 a.m. ET on Saturday and Sundance's 22-hour Earth-cast that kicked off before the sun rose at 4 a.m. ET Saturday.

Meanwhile, MSN is claiming  10 million video streams (and counting) for its coverage. MSN declared it a record for an online concert; execs there were breathless about "history" being made, etc. etc. But somehow, it just felt a little tepid after all the pre-show hype about 24 hours and seven continents and on and on. Then again, I've been a little more conscientious about what goes into the trash can versus the recycling bin during the past few  weeks so maybe the multi-media-marketing-stunt-is-the-message after all...

Sad news last week about the passing of Joel Siegel, ABC News' longtime film critic, at the age of 63 after a struggle with colon cancer. "Good Morning America" plans to devote the second hour of Monday's telecast to a tribute to Siegel, who delivered weekly film reviews for the morning show for 26 years, on top of logging a more than 30-year stint on  WABC-TV New York. "GMA" alumni Charles Gibson, David Hartman, Joan Lunden and Spencer Christian will make guest appearances on the hour, and it's expected that various actors and filmmakers will contribute taped pieces commenting on Siegel's work, per ABC.

Beyond his work as a critic, Siegel led an eclectic life, working as everything from a flavor-inventor for Baskin Robbins to a joke writer for Robert F. Kennedy. He was an eyewitness to history in 1968 when he accompanied the senator from New York to his fateful visit to L.A.'s Ambassador Hotel. He wrote the Tony-nominated Broadway play "The First," about Jackie Robinson, and when he was diagnosed with cancer six years ago, shortly after learning that he was to become a father for the first time, he penned a book of stories, "Lessons for Dylan: From Father to Son," he wanted to pass on to his son and wife, artist Ena Swansea. Monday's tribute ought to be an interesting and emotional hour of live television.

I wanted to like the Mort Sahl 80th birthday tribute event Thursday night at the Wadsworth Theater much more than I did.

The biggest problem was that most of the comics who moved through the turnstile Thursday night didn't offer anything close to political humor in the spirit of Mort. And that really shouldn't have been a surprise -- it's not as if Drew Carey, Jay Leno, Kevin Nealon, Richard Lewis and Paula Poundstone are known for their incisive social commentary. Neither are Jonathan Winters, Norm Crosby or Shelley Berman, but at least they were funny, particularly Winters, who trotted out his Leland Buckhorn dumb-baseball-player persona.

Lewis' time on stage in particular felt like a small eternity of jokes all about himself -- parts of himself that I'm guessing no one in the room wanted to hear that much about. George Carlin was funny with his now-familiar buzzword-rap routine, and he brought along a great clip of himself doing a Mort Sahl imitation from a CBS variety show in 1962.

Bill Maher at least felt like he belonged at a Mort Sahl tribute, with a few good Bush-bashing lines and the observation that among the GOP presidential heat, the only contender who isn't on his second or third marriage is Mitt Romney, the Mormon. But Leno and his not-funny jokes about Africa and obesity, Mel Gibson and Michael Jackson just fell flat, as did Carey and his "Paris Travel Lodge" schtick. (Maybe that was the point, to highlight how vapid most of standup comedy has become since the days when Sahl was riffing on Nikita and Ike, the arms race, civil rights, voting rights, etc.)

For me, Albert Brooks delivered the all-around funniest performance with his "I was told Mort Sahl had died" routine, complete with a eulogy that he delivered anyway. Emcee Jack Riley (aka "The Bob Newhart Show's" Mr. Carlin), who subbed for Larry King, had a good line about needing to do the event "to get a credit from this century."

By the time, Sahl came up on stage for the obligatory "this has meant so much to me," even he was underwhelming, red sweater and all. His best bit was noting the causal connection between subpoenas being delivered to key Bush administration figures and Dick Cheney's visits to the D.C. area hospitals.

"They're reconstructing Cheney, a Halliburton corporation," Sahl quipped, "and they're overcharging!"

In closing, audience members -- a crowd that included Hugh Hefner, Tommy Chong, Rob Reiner, Larry Gelbart, George Schlatter, George Shapiro, Fred Willard and Dick Van Patten -- serenaded Mort with "Happy Birthday" (never mind that Sahl's 80th was seven weeks ago). Event raised more than $100,000 for the Heartland Comedy Foundation, which aids older comics who have hit hard times financially.

Pictured above, back row from left: Richard Lewis, Jay Leno, Norm Crosby, Kevin Nealon, Hugh Hefner, event organizer Ross Shafer, Drew Carey and Albert Brooks. Front row from left: Shelley Berman, Jonathan Winters, George Carlin, Mort Sahl and Harry Shearer.

Photo credit: Derek Goes/GOES PHOTOGRAPHY

This just in...

Erstwhile "CBS Evening News" anchor Bob Schieffer (we were just talking about him a few items ago, see 'Rosie wasn't right for 'Price' anyway") is making an appearance on tonight's "Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson," delivering a faux news report about Craig's ongoing campaign to become a citizen of the United States.

Earlier this month Craig began soliciting cities and towns across this fair land of ours for honorary citizenship status. According to CBS, so far the mayors of some 7,200 hamlets have responded, along with the governors of North Dakota, South Dakota, Alaska, Nevada, Montana and Texas, with letters giving Craig his red-white-and-blue due. As they should.

We are a nation of immigrants, and by my yardstick Craig's one of the better ones to have arrived on these  shores in the past 15 years or so. Think about it. The pride of Glasgow's many talents -- actor, writer (and not just short scripts but he pens the trifecta of TV, films and fiction tomes) , producer, host, father, motorcycle rider, keen-eyed pop culture observer, etc. have helped keep people in employed (stagehands, typesetters, craft services, mechanics, etc., etc. ) and he's contributed to the Clean Air Act by maintaining high standards for his double-entendres despite his past-the-FCC's-indecency-policing-jurisdiction time slot of 12:35 a.m.

So by the decree of On the Air, the People's Republic of Variety.com grants Craig lifelong honorary citizenship. He can come hang out in our Miracle Mile digs anytime. After all, Craig's home-away-from-home-away-from-Scotland, CBS Television City, is just around the corner.

Also, as Variety's Joe Adalian reported today, "Late Late Show" is committed to seeing the U.S.A. in a Chevro-..er..Ford this summer by sending two staffers on a road trip full of Ford logos. Maybe afterward one of them will get hopped up on ...coffee... and write the great American buddy-road novel of the early 21st century on one long continuous roll of paper in a sweltering one-room apartment in New York...

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.

Now we know how Neil Patrick Harris is going to spend at least some of his summer. The "How I Met Your Mother" star will make his stage directing debut with what's billed as a "private premiere" rendition of Amanda Rogers' "I Am Grock" on July 17 at the El Portal Theater in North Hollywood.

Play revolves around "a monumental moment in the life of Phoebe Broman, a family therapist, mother and author. Her successful new book promoting raw, uncensored honesty within families has netted her an interview on a national news broadcast. However, things go awry when her entire extended family shows up at her front door an hour before the interview. Phoebe is left with no choice but to heal her own family before the newswoman and cameras arrive."

Sounds like Harris out to have fun with it, given the entirely overblown tabloid circus he faced a few months back over questions of his sexuality. I mean, who really cares? In this day and age? He's a hoot as the lascivious Barney on CBS' "How I Met Your to Mother" -- that's really all we need to know. Harris also is no stranger to the footlights, having appeared on Broadway in "Assassins," "Proof" and "Cabaret."

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.

Journey!?!

Not Tony Bennett? Not The Voice? Not Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons? Not Bruce Springsteen, or even Bon Jovi? Journey!?!

Oh well, maybe that was the point. Mundane. Typical. Pedestrian, even. Maybe it's just right that the series that was so often over-hyped as the best thing television has ever produced would go out on a this-could-be-anyone's-family-gathering-at-a-neighborhood-joint note.

David Chase clearly had fun messing with our minds in building all of the Hitchcock-ian tension into the final scene in the restaurant, as we waited for any one of the suspicious-looking characters that seemed to be circling Tony Soprano's nuclear family (remember what they looked like in season one, as pictured below) to erupt with violence or something that felt finale-ish and fate-sealing. But no, it was a typical family scene, typical, that is, if dad's a New Jersey crime boss on the downside of his career and mom's an overprotective but ruthless enabler. And let's face it, parallel parking is a bitch, no matter who your daddy is.

The instant chatter in the blogosphere on the (not so) fateful episode No. 86 of "The Sopranos" seemed to tilt toward the negative, with many remarking that the abruptly cut-to-black ending first made them think their cable/satellite had gone out just at the money-moment. But perhaps those who were angered or unhappy with the closer were just more motivated to run to their computers to blast away at David Chase, HBO, and anyone else they could think of. There was a lot of insta-speculation that the deliberately-vague ending was motivated by a greedy desire to tee up a "Sopranos" feature film down the road. (Some were even pegging the release date as spring 2009! Everybody wants to play Exhibitor Relations these days.) I've got to believe that David Chase has more creativity integrity than that. If not, somebody show him "The X-Files" feature, quick.

It may sound a stretch but perhaps Chase came to something like the same conclusion that Phil Rosenthal did two years ago with the "Everybody Loves Raymond" finale. The best way to honor a beloved series and the fans who made it so is not with pyrotechnics or gimmicks beyond belief but a tribute to the core character relationships that make or break any TV series. (Then again, there's the "Newhart" ending to beat all endings, which could be called gimmicky, but c'mon...) Appropriately enough, nobody has ever gotten "The Sopranos" better than Alan Sepinwall, the hard-working, hell-of-a-nice-guy TV critic from the Newark Star-Ledger, and he had a smart take on the finale posted barely an hour after it aired. Variety's Phil Gallo also did a good job of sizing up the finale, from a reasoned, not fanboy, perspective.

Furthermore, as On the Air's significant other astutely pointed out, it could have been a whole lot worse. David Chase was at the helm of "Northern Exposure" when that once-great series bowed out in mid-1995 with a finale episode, co-written by future "Sopranos" soldiers Robin Green and Mitchell Burgess (along with Jeff Melvoin). We'll never forgive any of them for the worst-plot-twist-ever in having Janine Turner's Maggie and John Corbett's Chris "suddenly" discover that they're soul mates and destined to be together....yeeecchh! (Having that happen is worse than the public-domain music NBC Universal has put in the modern-day DVD sets of NoEx seasons to save money on licensing.)

So aside from the use of "Don't Stop Believin'" in the closing moments, Chase redeemed himself tonight with this finale that he wrote and directed. Despite the level of over-praising that "The Sopranos" has endured during its eight-year run (give or take a few loooong hiatuses), there's no denying the impact it has had, on pop culture, on television, on writers and on what networks and studios are willing to accept in the way of anti-heroes, less than tidy endings, etc. etc. I'll never forget attending an HBO-sponsored screening of the first two episodes (either it was the first two segs or it was a two from early in the first season) at the DGA theater in Hollywood. When the screening was over and the DGA lobby filled with industry cognizati, the buzz was positively electric. People literally could not stop talking about how good -- how different -- the show was.

No one can claim more credit for this than David Chase, for sticking to his vision and his derring-do, and for assembling the company of talented scribes, directors, actors and producers he enlisted to tell his tales. There aren't enough adjectives in the dictionary to express how well James Gandolfini and Edie Falco (oh boy, did she shine this season?!) embodied their alter-egos in a way that ....well, again, not enough superlatives or time to give them their proper due....

By now, the story of how Chase struggled for years to get his baby on the air is well documented. But it bears repeating the names of a few of the suits and such who helped the show along before it found a welcoming home at HBO -- particularly one exec in particular who just faced his own real-life whacking (albeit with no lethal consequences), Kevin Reilly, late of NBC who was a "Sopranos" booster during his time as head of Brillstein-Grey Television. Lloyd Braun, late of ABC, Yahoo and now of NBC Universal-based BermanBraun, was also pivotal in the series' development during his tenure at Brillstein-Grey. Also meriting a shout-out are Robert Greenblatt and Danielle Gelber, now of Showtime but formerly with Fox Broadcasting Co. during "The Sopranos'" time in development-hell there, and of course, Peter Benedek, Chase's loyal rep at United Talent Agency.

Salute.

Congrats to all the Humanitas Prize finalists. The Humanitas honors some times are the subject of a little ribbing for focusing on feel-good and Explicitly Uplifting fare, but the truth is most writers covet these awards, if only because they are so focused on scribes. Plus, these laurels come with cold, hard cash attached, which never hurts.

There are some oddly pedestrian choices on the list this year and some interesting picks. The biggest surprise is the nod to Fox's "The War at Home." It's hardly unusual for the Humanitas to shine a light on a canceled show, but it is in this case. "War at Home" wasn't exactly a critical darling in its two-season run on Fox. I can't really comment, having never watched beyond the pilot seg. I couldn't find an image from the episode "Kenny Doesn't Live Here Anymore," which earned the nom for series creator Rob Lotterstein, but I did find a shot, posted above, of an episode with a guest shot by George Segal. And since I've always loved "Where's Poppa?"...A full list of Humanitas noms, or finalists in the org's parlance, can be found here courtesy of Variety's hard-working, TV-loving Stuart Levine.

Good-bye Museum of Television and Radio, hello Paley Center for Media. It's no secret the NY- and LA-based institution has faced some hard times of late, like many a non-profit these days. (Full disclosure: I have a soft spot for the erstwhile MT&R, an org that has always been gracious to me in terms of offering me classy panel-moderating gigs, my pick of Paley Festival sessions, etc.) The MT&R has always had support from the industry's top movers and shakers -- just take a look at its board of directors -- but nonetheless the handful of major media giants that rule the biz can only write so many checks a year. So I suppose the donor base will be greatly enlarged under the larger Center for Media umbrella. MT&R founder William Paley, who was a businessman through and through (he formed the institution in 1975 as the Museum of Broadcasting), no doubt would have approved. Besides, his name's on the door now.

Let's just make sure they keep up the MT&R's one-of-a-kind program archives. I mean, it's always comforting to know that somewhere in the world, someone has a climate-controlled vault preserving rarities like "You're In the Picture," the Jackie Gleason hosted game show from 1961 that was so bad that the Great One apologized to viewers in its second airing for "that bomb," bagged the game show format and turned it into a talk show that ran a few more weeks on CBS under the "Jackie Gleason Show" moniker.

(pictured above, L-R: Queen Noor of Jordan, CBS Corp. CEO and Paley Center board member Leslie Moonves and Paley Center prexy Pat Mitchell were on hand to toast the name-change Tuesday evening at a reception at the Paley Center's Gotham HQ.)

Oh, it's getting good.
Last night's penultimate "Sopranos" installment laid down more unraveling threads for what will undoubtedly expected to be a monster of a finale this Sunday. "Sopranos" capo David Chase is indicating that he's going to spare no fan favorites. Bobby Bacala, Tony's brother-in-law (played by Steven Schirripa, pictured left), survived actually punching Tony out at the start of this season but couldn't escape Phil Leotardo's wrath in last night's episode. But the most dramatic moment came when Tony's lifeline to sanity, Dr. Melfi, sternly decided to cut him loose. Tony's so desperate at this point he can't even hang on to a truly professional shrink-client relationship. He sounded beyond pathetic in citing the "progress" he feels he's making. Melfi seemed to speak for viewers in pointing out the obvious: It's been seven years, and he's still a sociopath. Yet as always, you couldn't help feel sorry for him in the last shot after he's sent his family off into hiding and he's left to curl up with a gun. Now we've only got about 150 hours to ponder what will be Tony's ultimate fate, coming this Sunday night.

The President called it "pure political theater." But clearly, the Monica Goodling story is a Lifetime movie just waiting to be greenlighted.

It opens with a wide shot of the campus of Pat Robertson's Regent University in Virginia. A bright, driven, earnest and very blond recent law school grad throws her duffel bags into the trunk of her American-made car and heads to Washington, just as the town finds itself in the red-state reverie of a neo-conservative revolution. Connections from school help her land a gig working on research for the GOP. From there she moves quickly to an entry-level public affairs gig at the Justice Department, then further up the ranks to an influential post that keeps her in touch with federal prosecutors night and day. At just 33!

Monica has her Mary Tyler Moore moment of throwing her wool cap up as high as she can inside the Capitol rotunda dome. Dissolve into a quick-cut montage of scenes of Goodling rushing around her office, looking very officious, writing emails, answering phones, keeping tabs on who returns her calls, and how quickly, and gasp, even a few visits to the White House Rose Garden. After the 2004 election she's sitting pretty, expecting only blue skies ahead, and then wham! Heavy minor chord strikes, and it's what-did-you-know-and-when-did-you-email-it time.

Suddenly, her cell phone is ringing off the hook. Scruffy Washington Post reporters are hiding out in her front yard. She quits her beloved job, lays low for a while, takes the fifth on the advice of her earnest, paternal (but totally platonic) lawyer, and then, after a long talk with her mother and father, she takes the immunity deal. The night before she's due to testify before a House committee, she washes her hair, goes to bed early, falling asleep reading the "Book of Virtues." The next morning, she pastes on her million-dollar smile and proceeds to charm a House congressional hearing as she drops small bombshells, leavened by that smile, that tighten the noose on one of the President's men.

Finally, after the scene where she fights her way through a throng of reporters and cameras and liberals shouting rude things at her, inside of a week she's landed a shampoo-endorsement contract, a book deal and a hosting gig on MSNBC.

I see "West Wing's" Janel Moloney as the lead.

(Goodling photo credit: AP Photo)

Does this mean he gets to be even nastier on the show?
Hugh Laurie, who plays the cranky-brilliant Dr. Gregory House on Fox's "House," got the nod today from Queen Elizabeth II at her place and can now call himself a member of the Order of the British Empire. Not a bad way to cap a TV season in which "House" stood tall as one of primetime's precious few shows to actually grow from season-to-season.

Laurie does a swell job of convincing us he's an American on "House," but he's a son of Britannia through and through. Get him and Craig Ferguson going on an interview seg on CBS' "The Late Late Show" and us Yanks are lucky if we can make out every third word or so. We know him best nowadays for his furrowed brow and dramatic intensity on "House," but Laurie first made his mark across the Pond as co-star with Stephen Fry of the wickedly daft 1980s sketch comedy series "A Bit of Fry and Laurie." Bits of that show are strewn all over YouTube for anyone who's curious.