'Pan Am' Is Huge in Europe
The Call Sheet sifts through the day's glut of Hollywood news to find the stories even non-industry types care about. Today: ABC has an international hit in Pan Am, The CW officially invites Carrie Bradshaw to the party, and Alec Baldwin is a busy man.
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Remember Pan Am? It was that ABC series about 1960s stewardesses that premiered all the way back in the fall and then kinda disappeared? Well it just won what is basically Europe's biggest television award, the Rose d'Or, for best series. So... how about that! The award is given out in Michele Bachmann's adopted home country of Switzerland, but the award is big across all of Europe. What does this mean for the show, which was never technically canceled? Apparently Sony, which produces the show, wants it to go on because it sells like gangbusters in Europe, but ABC hasn't released it yet so its fate remains to be seen. All we do know is that this basically means that Christina Ricci is the new David Hasselhoff. Pre-floor hamburger, of course. [Deadline]
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Oh god, it begins. The CW has officially picked up the Sex and the City prequel The Carrie Diaries to series. So we'll soon have more of Carrie Bradshaw traipsing around New York City, only this time she'll be young and it will be the 1980s and the show will be on The CW and produced by Josh Schwartz, so. AnnaSophia Robb plays Carrie, while Eileen Atkins guests in the pilot as a young Samantha. [The Hollywood Reporter]
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This is nice little news: ABC has renewed its perfectly serviceable, sometimes audible-chuckle-worthy sitcom Happy Endings for a third season. It's mostly nice news because I feel bad for Damon Wayans Jr., who couldn't do New Girl even though he was in the pilot because he was tied up with Happy Endings. So if this show got canceled he'd be out in the rain while the guy who took his part yuks it up on New Girl. So this is working out for everyone, really. Now if only they'd bring New Girl's Schmidt back on to Happy Endings as the gay guy, the world would, in some small way, be a more at peace place. [Vulture]
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Terrific, America. The family of recently deceased singer Whitney Houston has just landed a Lifetime: Television For Lonely Looky-Loos reality series. It will be called The Houston Family Chronicles. Houston's teenage daughter, Bobbi Kristina, will be one of the cast members. Awesome! That sounds like a great show to produce and watch. Congratulations to everyone involved in this wonderful, completely uncynical project. [The Hollywood Reporter]
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Alec Baldwin has two movies in the works. One is another picture with Woody Allen set in San Franciso of all places, so what, might there actually be gay characters in a Woody Allen movie?? Who knows! Bradley Cooper and Cate Blanchett might be in that one too. The other movie is a comedy with Russell Brand about a harried dad who hires the world's best nanny and it turns out to be Russell Brand. Sounds pretty zany. Or is it madcap? Wacky? Screwball? It's hard to say. Anyway, enjoy the work, Mr. Baldwin. Remember when you were doing all those serious movies like Heaven's Prisoners and The Juror? That was a weird time, huh? This is better. This is much, much better. [Deadline]
Here is a trailer, an actual trailer not just fake ads, for The Campaign, the election comedy starring Will Ferrell and Zach Galifianakis. It looks fun? As noted before, Ferrell is basically just doing a slight tweak of his George W. Bush thing, while Galifianakis is doing some kind of out to lunch business that I can't quite identify. The biggest surprise of this trailer? The Dylan McDermott reveal. Because of course. When I think comedy, I immediately think Dylan McDermott.
