News Roundup: Half of May is Over!

by Amy K. Bredemeyer

If you're looking to find out which broadcast network shows were renewed or cancelled, try here instead. A few new additions include CBS renewing Two and a Half Men and canceling Unforgettable, Rob, and NYC 22 and FOX canceling Napoleon Dynamite and renewing Bob's Burgers.

We'll also be doing a post or two about the new pick-ups later in the week, so be on the lookout for that. The below will focus on cable shows with renewals/cancellations and leave off some "shows in development," but will otherwise give you a nice round-up of what's been announced recently. 

Renewals, Cancellations, & Scheduling:
HBO has renewed Real Time with Bill Maher for two more seasons.

ABCFamily has renewed The Lying Game for a second season. The network has canceled Make It or Break It, with the series finale airing tonight, May 14th. 

The NBC Sports Network has renewed NFL Turning Point for the 2012, 1013, and 2014 seasons.

E! has renewed Keeping Up with the Kardashians for three more seasons, with the seventh beginning May 20th.

True Justice, REELZ's Steven Seagal show, has been renewed for a second season of thirteen episodes.

HBO has renewed Girls and Veep.

TLC has renewed Long Island Medium for a THIRD season!

Showtime has renewed The Borgias for three seasons.

Southland has been renewed for a fifth season on TNT. Maybe NBC should have kept it after all, huh?

WEtv has renewed Mary Mary for a second season.

Mob Wives has been renewed for a third season on VH1.

AMC has renewed Comic Book Men and Talking Dead.

Flashpoint will end after this season, its fifth on ION.

Lifetime's The Client List has been renewed for a second season of 15 episodes.

ABC has renewed Shark Tank, Dancing with the Stars, and The Bachelor. Plus, America's Funniest Home Videos and Wife Swap.

NBC has canceled Fear Factor, Minute to Win It, Who Do You Think You Are?, The Marriage Ref, and The Sing Off. Their renewal of 30 Rock will be its final season.

History has renewed Top Gear for a third season.

Bravo's Pregnant in Heels is back tomorrow, Tuesday, May 15th at 10pm ET/PT.

TLC has two specials premiering on Thursday, May 17th. At 9pm ET/PT we have Obese & Expecting, and at 10pm ET/PT we have Birth Moms.

Current's The Gavin Newsom Show debuts Friday, May 18th at 10pm ET.

TLC's long-awaited On The Fly begins Thursday, May 24th at 9pm.

Remember How to Be a Gentleman? CBS pulled it back in October, but they're going to burn off the episodes this summer, beginning at 8pm on Saturday, May 26th.

A&E's Gene Simmons Family Jewels will be back on Monday, May 29th at 9pm ET/PT.

Comedy Central's Workaholics is back Tuesday, May 29th at 10:30pm.

Dogs in the City will premiere on CBS on Wednesday, May 30th at 8pm ET/PT.

Mountain Men on History begins Thursday, May 31st at 10pm.

Drop Dead Diva's fourth season will begin on Sunday, June 3rd at 9pm.

Also on Sunday, June 3rd, you can catch Head Games on the Discovery Channel at 10pm ET/PT. It's an interactive series where "both viewers and on-screen subjects are challenged with brain games, mind puzzles and social experiments." It's a three-part series.

FOX's Hell's Kitchen will begin the summer at 9pm ET/PT on Monday, June 4th, followed immediately by Masterchef at 10pm ET/PT.

Storage Wars is back June 5th at 10pm ET/PT.

SyFy's Haunted Collector begins its second season on Wednesday, June 6th, at 9pm.

The Choice premieres 9pm ET/PT Thursday, June 7th on FOX. 

A&E's Barter Kings will premiere Tuesday, June 12th at 9pm ET/PT.

Ready for another competition series? ABC has The Glass House beginning Monday, June 18th at 10pm ET/PT, where 14 contestants will live together, trying to win $250,000. It's going to be really interactive, using social networking to decide what players wear or where they sleep, for starters.

Monday, June 18th will also be the premiere of Bravo's Miss Advised, a docuseries about three single relationship experts.

Spike's new Diamond Divers, an unscripted series, will begin on Wednesday, June 20th at 10pm ET/PT.

Comedy Central's Futurama will return on Wednesday, June 20th at 10pm ET/PT.

Bad Girls Club: Mexico premiered Monday, July 9th at 10pm on Oxygen.

Travel Channel will premiere season six of Bizarre Foods America on Monday, July 9th at 8pm ET/PT.

ABCFamily's Beverly Hills Nannies will begin Wednesday, July 11th at 8pm ET/PT.

Big Brother will be back on Thursday, July 12th at 9pm ET/PT.

3, CBS' new dating series, will begin Sunday, July 22nd at 9pm ET/PT.

Cast & Plot Updates:
Jennifer Morrison's Dr. Cameron will be appearing on House's series finale.

Betty White will appear in June 10th's season finale of The Client List, playing a character who gives marriage advice.

Not only will Ryan Seacrest be coming back for American Idol, but he's also joining Today as a special correspondent for two years.

Teen Mom 2's Jenelle Evans is trying to sell photos of her new 34C chest.

Teen Mom's Amber Portwood is back in jail, having been caught lying to get out of her drug test and court date.

Pregnant in Heels' Rosie Pope live-tweeted her labor yesterday.

Mitchell Guist of History's Swamp People died after a seizure today.

Shows in Development & Other Fun Stuff:
While not everyone would consider it a "fun fact," the CW's debut of LA Complex managed to get the very lowest broadcast drama premiere EVER, at just 646,000 viewers.

ABC's got Tony Danza and Vince Vaughn working on a multi-camera comedy about "three old friends whose lives have taken them down very different roads."

SyFy will be making Stephen King's Eyes of the Dragon into a movie or miniseries.

Axe Cop will be joining FOX's late-night cartoon block that launches in 2013. Five episodes aired in January 2010, but another six 15-minute episodes have been ordered now.

Oxygen will be adding My Shopping Addiction (folks obsessed with shopping), I'm Having Their Baby (women deciding if they'll place their babies up for adoption), All the Right Moves (following So You Think You Can Dance's Travis Wall and friends), and NYC and LA editions of Girlfriend Confidential to the fall slate.

E! has some new one-hour series in development, including Amy Devlin Mysteries (a procedural about a twentysomething detective), Anne of Hollywood (the story of Anne Boleyn), Dorothy (a modern Wizard of Oz), Fascination Street (two brothers in a band), The 400 (following the Vanderbilt dynasty), Juror #9 (a twisted trial show), King David (a billionaire playboy in Washington, DC), Upstarts (three guys trying to gain power and money during the dot-com boom), and the Untitled Assistant Project (some office assistants want more power).

truTV has some new series in the works as well. Killer Karaoke is singing with physical challenges. Guinness World Records Gone Wild has folks setting out to break dangerous records. Container Wars is like Storage Wars but with shipping containers. Hardcore Pawn: Fort Bragg is another pawn shop show. There's also a possible Shaquille O'Neal show, a weight loss show with a comedy duo, and a game show where contestants fly around the country.

There's a possibility that Murphy Brown will be back on the air in a series of specials full of political commentary.

Netflix is interested in reviving Jericho, which CBS canceled in 2008.

Amazon is jumping into the television business, inviting original ideas for primetime comedy and children's series!

Starz is getting Michael Bay to develop Black Sails, an eight-episode season show about Captain Flint and his pirate adventures.

CMT is working with Stone Cold Steve Austin for a ten-episode series called Redneck Island, which will have 12 Southerners competing for $100,000.

TNT's new medical show, originally known as Chelsea General, will now be known as Monday Mornings, and the 10-episode first season will debut in summer 2013.

A fan of Burn Notice? You can vote on the new main title sequence! Head to the official website or the facebook page.

TLC has two more specials of Virgin Diaries to air later this summer.

A&E is working on Southie Rules, about the iconic working class of South Boston.

DirecTV's first original series will be ten episodes of the drama Rogue, which will focus on a cop who lost her son.

7 Fun Facts from Kirsten Prout

by Amy K. Bredemeyer

ABCFamily's The Lying Game is in a steady groove now. Plus, the back 12 episodes for the first season were ordered, so it's looking like it's in good shape. We had a chance to talk with series regular Kirsten Prout, who plays Charlotte "Char" Chamberlin on the series. You may also remember her as Amanda Bloom on Kyle XY and Brittany Morgan in the Once/Twice Upon a Christmas TV movies.

If you're new to the series, it is basically about how twins Sutton and Emma are unclear on their background - Sutton was adopted into a wealthy family while Emma grew up in the foster care system. Sutton has gone to research the situation, and Emma masquerades as her twin in the meantime. Char is one of Sutton's best friends. She takes ballet and has a troubled home life (mom is an alcoholic frequently in and out of rehab), but she's still a snarky prankster alongside Sutton and Mads. Char is a little self-absorbed and a bit of a worrywart, but she's loyal.

Now, onward to the fun facts from Kirsten - about the show, the character, and herself!

- In giving fans something to look forward to on the show (without giving anything away), Prout said that viewers should "really pay close attention to the little hints that are dropped. The show drops clues everywhere and sometimes it's hard to pick up on them or they seem like completely unrelated little snippets. But pay attention because they'll always come out a few episodes ahead. And, you'll figure out that little clues could really help you start figuring out something in Emma's past."

- Char does ballet on the show, but Kirsten was not classically trained. In preparation for the roles, she met with a ballet coach who helped her with bar work, stretches, and some basics. Ironically, the two cast members who knew ballet, Sharon Pierre-Louis (Nisha) and Allie Gonino (Laurel) do not dance on the show.

- Char's very fashionable. She wears four-inch heels to school and very over-the-top outfits, which works since "fashion is such a big part of the show." Looking at just the early episodes, Prout's favorite outfit is the father-daughter dance dress, which "fit like a glove."

- In addressing her similarities to her character, Prout said that "we're both a little bit neurotic. Char's neurotic about social things. I'm neurotic about when I was in University, academically. We are essentially opposites but we do have a few things in common. Char is... she has a meltdown if there's a social snafu or if there's anything in the political system of the high school wrong... where, with me, I was always focused on my literature mark and how high it was. And now it's me fretting over my garden - what's going to make it, what's going to die. So, we both have our panicky side. But I think Char is a little more wrapped up in the social side of things."

- Prout's fans have given her a lot of positive feedback about her role as Char. "The reaction to Char has been overwhelmingly positive. And I've really appreciated all the encouragement and all the positive words that have been sent to me."

- Prout is Canadian, so filming in Austin has been a real experience for her. She is "slowly exploring America and Austin is definitely one of my favorite cities so far. It's great. The live music and the heat is a little much but you can escape it at Barton Springs. So, I'm not complaining for sure. It's really fun."

- If Prout could go back in time and give herself advice as a seven- or eight-year-old, she would tell herself to "relax a little, because I was such an intense kid... My mom was always trying to get me to relax and calm down and just take it one day at a time... I've gotten to the point now, where, in my life, I realize that I can't sweat the small stuff."

News Roundup: lots of cancellations, a few renewals, a bunch of orders

by Amy K. Bredemeyer

Renewals, Cancellations, & Scheduling:
Big Brother got renewed for Summer 2012.

ABCFamily's The Nine Lives of Chloe King and State of Georgia were canceled. [we hardly paid any attention to the former, so not upset there. The latter only had a few truly "good" episodes, and was just straying too far from the premise to work.]

ABCFamily did renew Make It or Break It. And, The Lying Game received an order for the back 12 episodes of the first season.

Momster of the Bride premiered this past Sunday on Style. It looks at mothers who try to control their daughters' weddings. Look for this half-hour show Sundays at 10pm.

Style also renewed Tia & Tamera for a second season.

USA renewed Covert Affairs, Royal Pains, and Necessary Roughness, each for 16 more episodes.

Bones had another four episodes ordered... which will either run over the summer or be part of an eighth season should one happen. It's really a tiny mini-season. I can't recall something like this ever happening before...

Hung returns to HBO on October 2nd. This third season will have ten episodes.

Cast & Plot Updates:
Frances Bay, the actress who played Aunt Ginny on The Middle, has passed away. She was 92 and had appeared in more than 100 film and television roles. You may remember her as the grandmother on Happy Gilmore or as the Marble Rye Lady on Seinfeld.

Charlie's Angels, which hasn't even premiered yet, has changed the order in which the second and third episodes will run. Interesting idea, and many are skeptical of possible continuity issues and publicity stunts.

The Price is Right is celebrating 40 years on the air. Episode 7500 will air on the 28th. A special celebrity week will start January 2nd, 2012, and will feature Neil Patrick Harris, Snoop Dog, and Jenny McCarthy. I know I'm looking forward to that!

Shows in Development & Other Fun Stuff:
CBS is developing a Sherlock Holmes series. I know one of TheTalkingBox's writers will be thrilled to hear that!

ABCFamily is developing several new shows, including Intercept, which will be a drama about college students fighting crime, and Strut, about a Vegas Showgirl who marries a Texan and moves to a small town. Other shows coming up for them include Village People, Baby Daddy, and Bunheads (which might be the same as Strut, from what I can tell).

Downton Abbey, in addition to winning a ton of Emmys this week, has also been awarded a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records under "highest critical review ratings for a TV show."

FX ordered an animated comedy to be called Unsupervised, about two teenage friends with no parental supervision. So... Rugrats with older kids?

Would you watch an all-Simpsons channel? That's the hot question on the internet lately, as apparently it's a possibility...

MTV has ordered six new shows - and only two are going to be scripted. But neither of those two are really standing out yet - one is about a guy fresh out of HS, the other is about a group of friends a year out of college.

Nicholas Sparks has sold a drama to ABC.

Looking forward to Holiday Specials already? FOX is! On November 24th, they will air Ice Age: A Mammoth Christmas and Happiness is a Warm Blanket, Charlie Brown. I know I'm in for both!

Quick Q&A with The Lying Game's Blair Redford

by Amy K. Bredemeyer

The Lying Game premiered on ABCFamily last month and has been pulling in a fan base thrilled with the intricate storyline. We shared some fun facts about co-star Alexandra Chando shortly after the show premiered, and this time we're going to share some interesting things we learned from Blair Redford, who plays Ethan on the show. Many thanks to him as well as ABCFamily and New Media Strategies. And, without further ado, let's take a look!

Many fans of Blair Redford saw him in the early episodes of another ABCFamily hit, Switched at Birth, where he played Ty, who lived in Daphne and Regina's old neighborhood. He later becomes a boyfriend of sorts to Bay, but leaves to join the armed forces. However, one of Redford's earliest roles was on The Young and the Restless. Redford said that working on the soap was "definitely like a TV boot camp." He describes the differences between working on daytime television and primetime television as "in prime time you are spending almost a week and a half on an episode, and you're on location a lot. With soaps you're pretty much in the studio the entire time doing interiors." I thought it was interesting that Chando was also asked about her previous soap opera experience, and she also learned a lot about "the business" from it.

As with any new show, a big question on everyone's minds regards how the series will attract viewers. Redford had a strong response to this question, believing that the way the story is written will keep the audience tuning in. In short, it's "the cliffhangers they leave every week" that attracts viewers, Redford said. "I think if a person can just be sold on watching one episode then they are going to get hooked from there. Every week when they turn in new scripts to us to look over, I'm just really pleased and blown away at how strong the cliffhangers are, and it makes you want to see the next script immediately." I have to agree with Redford... as annoying as it can be to realize that it's 9:55pm and there's a loose end, I have a tendency to make sure I'm tuned in the following week to see how everything resolves!

When asked about the similarities to himself and his character, Ethan, Redford mentioned that he tries to "merge myself and put myself in the character's shows as much as I can... I'd say just off the page Ethan has a really strong sense to protect his friends, protect those that he's close to and his loved ones. I think I do that as well in life. I'm really quick to stand up for people that are in my circle. I think that's a big part of Ethan's makeup."

And, when a show is so young, people are generally dying to find out anything they can about what's to come. One thing that's really stood out in Redford's memory regarding the shooting of the show so far is Ethan's bike-riding. Redford has had to train on motorcycles and dirt bikes, and a scene he finds particularly memorable is when he's "just cruising through the desert on my bike at night. I pull up to [Emma], it's just one of those scenes, you kill the engine, you hop off your bike, and pull your helmet off and the wind is blowing. It was pretty fun. It felt pretty epic." As someone who hasn't ridden a motorcycle since I was a child with my father, I can imagine that such a scene would stand out to me, too.

The final question that stood out in the interview? What is he planning to do next, of course! Redford said that it's hard to say, as his schedule is so unpredictable at the moment. "I'm really hoping we do well with this show, and if that's the case, I'll be busy through the majority of the year and other seasons with this. That's what I'm hoping for, for now. I really like this characters and I like this show, I like the writing, I like where they're going with it. So, boeyond that, I'd love to fins a nice film to do during my hiatus, whether it's between this and our pick-up or a backorder or if it's between first and second season. I'd love to find a nice film to do in that spare time." I think Blair Redford has great potential as a film actor, particularly in a rom-com or an action flick. I look forward to seeing what the future holds for him (and if he'll make any future appearances on Switched at Birth as well!), but for now, I'll certainly settle for his weekly appearance on The Lying Game, airing Mondays at 9pm EDT on ABCFamily!

Fun Facts from Alexandra Chando

by Amy K. Bredemeyer

With ABCFamily's Switched at Birth on hiatus, a new show moved into its 9pm ET slot on Mondays this week. The Lying Game (not to be confused with the network's Pretty Little Liars) premiered and will continue to hold that weekly time for its first season. The show is based on novels by Sara Shepherd, who did write the Pretty Little Liars books as well. Alexandra Chando, who plays Emma and Sutton on the show, was available for a Q&A last week and we learned a lot about the show and her approach.

You may be familiar with Alexandra Chando from her role as Maddie Coleman on As the World Turns. She spent five years in that role, and learned a lot from those experiences. "The soap experience was absolutely incredible. I couldn't have learned what I learned in a classroom on that set. Honestly, like the work ethic and just how incredibly difficult it was to learn 30 pages a day and film 5 episodes in a week. It really, really taught me how to take on that much work and that type of tole, and it's obviously led me to be able to get through these challenging, long workdays for sure." 

First, about the show:
- "it's a little bit dark. There is definitely a lot of mystery to it, but at the same time, it has a lot of heart. It touches on romance and love triangles and relationships between parents and their teenagers. There are definitely a lot of secrets."

- Her most memorable moment that had been shot to date is from the second episode. "Blair Redford and I were out on the set called The Overlook, but they used a crane shot. All you see is grass for miles and miles. It looks like we're in Africa, but we're dancing in this grass."

- "Every episode ends with a cliffhanger." 

- Although only a handful of episodes were filmed, she has already learned a lot. "I feel like I've really learned the amount of focus and work ethic it takes to really hold up a series and maintain great work and produce good work."

- The pilot was shot in December, before the novel was out. She has since read it and finds it helpful in painting a picture of Emma's past, but hasn't gotten to the second one yet.


Audiences may like it because:

- For fans of the book, there are differences between it and the show - "if we were to just follow the book directly then there would be no mystery involved.

- She thinks "a lot of the Pretty Little Liars fans will be able to get into our show as well, because we kind of have a very similar tone, if you will."

- She believes that The Lying Game will appeal to soap fans - "it definitely has the tone of intrigue and mysteries... there are love triangles."


About her roles on the show:

- When asked what attracted her to the role, Alexandra Chando replied that she has "always fantasized" about playing two characters, and these two were "just really solid characters and I thought it would be such an interesting thing to be able to develop these two girls and see where they lead."

-  Playing multiple roles is "a blessing, first of all, to just have the opportunity to play two roles. To be able to develop two characters and kind of find different things about them and explore them each and every day has been incredible. It does come with challenges, though. I have 15-hour work days and I'm working an awful lot compared to what I would be working if I was just playing one character.... It's a challenge in the sense, besides the hours and the exhaustion, just trying to keep them straight sometimes."

- "It's gotten a little bit easier to really feel like these characters and understand them, but there are moments where a little bit of Sutton will creep into Emma and vice versa. It's definitely been a challenge and I'd say, as well, having to act with a green screen or an eye line with an X on the wall has become easier, but it was definitely a challenge in the beginning."

- In keeping track of who is Sutton and who is Emma, Chando mentioned that "hair and makeup is definitely a key element, as well as the wardrobe.... but I also think, on top of that, Sutton talks a bit differently. It's not necessarily an accent thing - she talks just a little bit differently as far as she always has a little bit of a drawl in a way. She kind of grew up in that very privileged way, so she talks in that kind of manner. Her posture is different; she's definitely a little bit more polished." She also tries to bring "a warmth" and "kind of a comedic lightness" to Emma.

- She can relate to both characters. "with Emma, I consider myself a kind person, thoughtful, and I try not to take things for granted... with Sutton, I think, I relate to the way she handles things emotionally. She's less emotional. She kind of compartmentalizes things and I kind of find myself doing that often, especially in this industry and where life has taken me."

- When asked if she prefers one of her characters over the other, "I love both of them. I think both of them are very interesting, very fun to play. Emma is a little bit easier to play - I can relate to her really well, but Sutton is interesting because she's a little bit more work."


And, a few personal notes about Alexandra Chando:

- When Alexandra Chando first sat down to watch the pilot of The Lying Game, she "was squirming in my seat for the first three minutes because it's such a surreal thing.... it's interesting to sit there and see yourself. It's almost as if you're watching somebody else." She does like to watch herself though, "I like to learn things. You can always learn something from a performance: pick it apart but also learn new things. Yes, I try to watch everything that I've done just to learn and grow."

- Getting manicures and pedicures is kind of a guilty pleasure for her. She also loves going to the movies - she loves just "constantly stufying and just allowing myself to enjoy other people's performances."

- The show is shooting in Austin, and the cast likes to explore the city together. For the 4th of July they went to a lake.

- If she could pick a cast member from As the World Turns to appear on The Lying Game, she would say Jesse Soffer, as "he can really play the mystery of it. He can really play that dark character and I think it would be really interesting to see him in a show like this."