Credit Kevin Reilly for keeping his sense of humor in tough times.

The Fox programming chief was contemplating a question from a scribe at TCA about what he thought of NBC running Jay Leno five nights a week at 10 p.m. He thought about it awhile and responded, “NBC is the crazy ex-wife I can’t get away from.”

Reilly’s tenure at NBC ended a few years ago the moment Jeff Zucker decided to bring in wunderkind Ben Silverman (how’s that working out, by the way?), yet he smartly takes the high road when commenting on anything Peacock related.

“I give them a lot of credit for signing up Jay. It’s a smart strategic move for them.” He was quick to add, however, that NBC has struggled with scripted programming at the 8 o’clock hour going all the way back to “The Fresh Prince of Bel Air," and having Leno at 10 isn't going to panacea for all that ails the folks in Burbank across the primetime landscape.

While Fox remains in strong shape as behemoth “American Idol” starts up tonight, and other dramas continue to perform well – “Fringe,” “Bones,” “House” – the live-action comedies continue to be a drag on the network.

Despite a renewal of “Til Death” – a decision that feels based much more on economics than creativity – there is little in the pipeline to generate much enthusiasm.

Again, Reilly used humor to deflect reality.

“We made a lot of year-end lists with ‘Do Not Disturb.’ Our comedy brand is the animation block, but we need to rebuild the live-action brand. It’s down to a low-pulse level. It’s very tough when you lose your blocks and protection. I give CBS credit. Their Monday comedies, like ‘How I Met Your Mother,’ are one of the best stories of the year.”

He added: “We’re going to be methodical. We’ve order five half-hour pilots. We’ll see whether one makes it on the fall schedule.”

-- Stuart Levine

POSTED BY STUART LEVINE

Of all the entertainment toppers at the broadcast nets, Fox's Kevin Reilly comes across as a guy who gets it.

Unlike his counterparts, Reilly doesn't arrive at TCA just to read off the latest ratings stats or tout the company line -- "We love this show!"; This is a game-changer"; We couldn't be happier!"; -- but actually seems to be thinking and processing the questions from info-starved scribes.

One of his most well thought out answers came while addressing the current state of network comedy. He could've given the standard response -- "It's cyclical. It'll come back"  -- but instead sees the genre as having a difficult time making a complete recovery. He even took a shot at Fox.

"We've talked about it every year. A lot of confidence has left the creative space. I see talented people coming in skittish and not knowing what to pitch, and what will sell," Reilly explained. "NBC has a cohesive thing, something I worked on while I was there. We're going to mix it up this year. We're not taking our pitches in our office, but go out on their own turf. To a restaurant, house, anywhere to get it out of a sterile environment. We're going to pay writers to shoot something before they come in."

"Our comedy brand has a bit anemic, and we're looking for the next 'Malcolm in the Middle."

One comedy project Reilly seemed particularly enthusiastic about is midseason single-camera laffer "Boldly Going Nowhere," from the team behind FX's "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia."

"It's 'The Office' in space," is how Reilly described it, and he should know something about what makes "The Office" a hit as he was head of NBC Entertainment when the show arrived in Burbank via London. "It's about petty jealousy and incompetence on a long-term mission."

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.