Rueben's Ramblings

Hey All,

How is the start of your week going so far, folks? Hope not too bad. The news isn’t too voluminous, but there is a lot of casting news for the pilot season among other items. Let’s get right to it:

TELEVISION

On Friday FOX announced they are pulling the sneak peek airing of their “big” new show Terra Nova from the May TV schedule, holding it back for a fall premiere in order for all the special effects to be laid in properly. The season finale of The Chicago Code will now air Monday, May 23 at 9 PM and the season finale of Glee will now air Tuesday, May 24 at 9 PM. (The Futon Critic)

ABC has teamed with Global Television on a gritty new medical drama called The Hot Zone. This new series has yet to be given a debut date, but it has received an order for13 one-hour episodes. The series is set in 2006 at the only military hospital providing advanced surgical care in all of Southern Afghanistan and charts the frantic lives of the hospital’s resident doctors and nurses from Canada, America, the U.K. and other allied countries. The cast includes Elias Koteas (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button), Michelle Borth (Hawaii Five-0 and The Forgotten) and Luke Mably (The Gates) among others. (The Futon Critic)

DEVELOPMENT NEWS

Actor Scott Foley (Felicity and The Unit), Michael Boatman (The Good Wife and China Beach) and Kyle MacLachlan (Desperate Housewives and Twin Peaks) have landed roles on the CBS drama pilot Doctor that is about Emily Campbell (Christine Lahti), a mother who reconnects with her two adult children – David (Foley) and Natasha (Eva Amurri) – when she joins the family medical practice following their father’s death. Foley will play the aforementioned David, a cardiologist; with Boatman as Robert Brody, the chief-of-staff at the show’s Hartford Medical Center who was once an intern under Emily at Mt. Sinai. And MacLachlan is set as Jason Walden, the best friend of Emily’s late husband and a fellow partner at the practice. (The Futon Critic)

Actress Kate Burton (Grey’s Anatomy) will appear in the drama pilot for NBC called Grimm that is about Nick Burckhardt (David Giuntoli), a police detective who discovers fairy tale creatures live among us and is tasked with defending humans from these mythical beasts. Burton will play his aunt, Marie Brannigan, who indoctrinates him into the supernatural world. (The Futon Critic)

Actresses Zoey Deutch (The Suite Life on Deck) and Della Reese (Touched by an Angel) have landed roles in the ABC drama pilot Hallelujah that is about a tiny town in Tennessee which finds itself being torn apart by the forces of good and evil. Deutch will play Willow, the thoughtful daughter of the hardworking, moral Rye Turner (Donal Logue), who waits tables at the family’s diner. While Reese is on board as Dulcie Prejean, a blind woman with a flair for the autoharp. (The Futon Critic)

Veteran character actor Raphael Sbarge will appear in the ABC drama pilot called Once Upon A Time, which is about Anna Swan (Jennifer Morrison), a woman with a troubled past who is drawn to Storybrooke, a small town in Maine where the magic and mystery of Fairy Tales just may be real. He will play Archie, an eccentric looking gentleman walking a Dalmation and, oddly, carrying an umbrella, who’s also the Jiminy Cricket from Pinocchio lore. (The Futon Critic)

Actors Michael Gaston and Kevin Rankin have joined the CBS drama pilot The Rememberer that is about Carrie Wells (Poppy Montgomery), an ex-cop struggling with the blessing/curse of hyperthymesia – the ability to remember everything – who is drafted back into the NYPD. Gaston is expected to play Detective Mike Costello and Rankin will play Detective Second Class Roe Sanders, the junior member of the squad. (The Futon Critic)

Actor Terry Kinney (The Unusuals) has joined the CBS drama pilot Rookies that is about six NYPD rookies (Adam Goldberg, Judy Marte, Leelee Sobieski, Stark Sands, Tom Reed and another yet to be cast) who balance their personal lives with learning the beat on the streets of Manhattan. He will play Larry “Yoda” Rivers, the group’s Field Training Officer. (The Futon Critic)

Actress Julie Benz (No Ordinary Family and Dexter) has joined the as yet unnamed CBS supernatural medical drama from Susannah Grant, which centers on Michael (Patrick Wilson), an ultra-competitive surgeon whose life is changed forever when his ex-wife (Jennifer Ehle), a doctor running a free clinic, dies and begins teaching him what life is all about from the hereafter. Benz will play Michael’s sister, an unfocused and overwhelmed single mother with a huge heart. (Nellie Andreeva at TV Line)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Hayley Atwell and Charlotte Rampling (both from The Duchess) are to re-team on the upcoming box office movie called I, Anna, which is an adaptation of the Elsa Lewin novel following a woman’s life as its turned upside down after a date gone wrong, and the impossible love of the policeman tracking her down. Rampling will play Anna with Atwell as her daughter. (Dark Horizons)

Here are the top 10 movies at the domestic box office, with foreign grosses when available, according to studio estimates and Hollywood.com:

1. Battle: Los Angeles – $36 million.
2. Rango – $23.1 million
3. Red Riding Hood – $14.1 million.
4. The Adjustment Bureau – $11.5 million
5. Mars Needs Moms – $6.8 million
6. Hall Pass and Beastly (tie) – $5.1 million
8. Just Go With It – $4 million
9. The King’s Speech – $3.6 million
10. Gnomeo & Juliet – $3.5 million

Q& A SECTION (with Matt Roush from TV Guide)

Question: Long time reader, first time e-mailer. How is it that the same parent company (NBC Universal) that can produce good shows for their cable network USA like Burn Notice, White Collar, Royal Pains, etc., can’t come up with a quality show for the flagship network and instead gives us garbage like The Cape, The Event, Outlaw and Chase? Wouldn’t it make sense to at some point soon turn over creative control of NBC to the people who are in development for USA? — Chip

Matt Roush: You’re hardly alone in suggesting such a thing, but from NBC/U’s perspective, why would anyone want to disrupt a well-oiled machine like the USA Network hit factory, which is helping the corporate bottom line during this period of NBC decline. A few things to keep in mind: A show that’s a hit on cable may not look as successful in the broadcast-network marketplace, though it’s hard to argue that NBC wouldn’t be better off with shows as appealing as Burn Notice and White Collar on the schedule. Plus, more pragmatically, a new NBC programming regime led by Showtime vet Bob Greenblatt is about to plant its flag, and some of the pilots in the fall pipeline sound very promising and ambitious, in the same sort of out-of-the-box way that revived ABC’s fortunes back in 2004 (the year of Lost, Desperate Housewives and Grey’s Anatomy). Should NBC’s new leadership bottom out as well, which I hope doesn’t happen, then maybe it will be time for the powers that be to take a hard look at what USA is doing right and see if that formula could be adapted to the NBC big top.

That’s it. Enjoy!