SitcomsOnline.com News Blog

No surprise, CBS will premiere virtually all of its new and returning series during the official premiere week (Sept. 24-30) for the 2012-13 season. For the 10th time in the past 11 seasons, Survivor will get an early start to the season. Survivor: Philippines will be the only series to open a week earlier with a special 90-minute premiere on Wednesday, Sept. 19 from 8-9:30pm leading into the season finale of summer staple Big Brother from 9:30-11pm. Then during premiere week for its new series, the new comedy Partners premieres Monday, Sept. 24 at 8:30pm, followed by freshman dramas Vegas debuting Tuesday, Sept. 25 at 10pm, Elementary on Thursday, Sept. 27 at 10pm and Made In Jersey on Friday, Sept. 28 at 9pm.
View the entire CBS Fall 2012 premiere date list. With CBS' announcement, only ABC has not officially announced its fall premiere dates yet. Sources tell SitcomsOnline.com that we will probably have them this week and to expect the following for Friday nights: Shark Tank and What Would You Do? will have their season premieres on Friday, Sept. 14 from 8-10pm. Then six weeks later, sophomore sitcom Last Man Standing will then have its season premiere (likely two episodes) on Friday, Oct. 26 at 8 leading into the new time period debut for Shark Tank at 9pm, replacing What Would You Do, which would return later in the season. Then, following the night of the CMA Awards (Thursday, Nov. 1), new sitcom Malibu Country starring Reba McEntire will launch on Friday, Nov. 2 at 8:30pm. ABC is expected to launch its other new fall series during premiere week like new Wednesday comedy The Neighbors, new Thursday drama Last Resort and new Sunday drama 666 Park Avenue. However, due to the Presidential Debate on Wednesday, Oct. 3, ABC may opt to save the premiere of The Neighbors until Oct. 10 and double up on Modern Family on Sept. 26. It is highly expected that new 10pm drama Nashville will premiere on Wednesday, October 10. Stay tuned until all of this is official.

Moving on, today is the day of premiere of the new webseries Lovin' Lakin starring Christine Lakin (Step by Step), which we covered last week. Make sure you watch this hilarious new series on Hulu or YouTube! Christine gave us so much information last week when we talked to her, we want to share more from her today. Plus she also spoke to our good friend Chris Mann of Reimagine That! for the latest episode of his awesome podcast! So please find that below.

Christine told us that she filmed some of her episodes on the set of the big screen movie You Again (starring Kristen Bell, Jamie Lee Curtis, Odette Yustman, and many many more stars like herself): "We were actually filming You Again when I started to film this series, I wrote it right before You Again and we were filming in L.A. that summer and of course I took advantage of the opportunity working with so many great actors. And you know the Jamie Lee Curtis episode, unfortunately we can't air, I mean it's brilliant but unfortunately a little too "blue." Not for I think the world, but for I think for Jamie and the kinds of stuff she does these days, for some of her branding she had a little bit of a problem with it. She did say she would come back to do another episode, so I hope we get to do another season, cause she's just brilliantly funny and such a gifted comedic improviser, and a lot of people probably don't know that about her! So yeah, I sort of took advantage of having all of these great people around, and asked Kristin Chenoweth obviously, Jamie Lee, Kristen Bell, and you know Patrick Duffy had always said he would do an episode with me and again that was perfect timing, he was in L.A. doing a couple of days on You Again, so it worked out great. Staci Keanan came by that day, and then you know Seth MacFarlane, you know I pop in and out of the Family Guy offices, he was kind enough to come in on a Saturday to the (Oops Doughnuts) office when nobody else was there and do that for me. So I cannot express enough that making something like this is a labor of love. Everybody did it as a huge favor to me!"

Christine really appreciated everyone working on this show for her: "I would like to go on record thanking everybody who is a part of it. You know there were a bunch of kids in one of the episodes, where I teach an acting class, and they were all so funny and their parents just totally let me abuse them--in all the right ways--and make them do really silly really wrong things and they were such good sports about it. Everything from that to my friend Patrick Day at the Young Actors Space letting me use that space, to people coming in on Saturdays, to Oops Doughnuts letting me use their office, and everyone that came in and did a part on this show, I couldn't do it without that and I think that's a real part of what YouTube is and part of what the internet is and I think that is a really positive thing. So if people like this, that's great, if people don't like it, that's fine, too. But there are so many haters out there, who post really rude and mean comments on YouTube and I don't think it helps the film making community. And I don't think it helps creativity in general. Constructive criticism is great and I welcome that and I would be the first probably to give that kind of advice on something like Internet Icon (where Christine is a judge), but people work really hard, whether it is a two-minute YouTube video or whether it is a webseries. There's a lot of people around that, it doesn't happen because one person just turns on a camera all the time...there's a lot of people that work behind the scenes."

Please watch Lovin' Lakin today! In addition, our good friend Chris Mann (Come and Knock on Our Door, Retroality.TV) also spoke to Lakin herself! Read about it in his own words: Christie Lakin ... The Spoofed Adventures of New Christine ... In this exclusive Retroality.TV interview, Step by Step child star Christine Lakin tells all about her new satirical webseries, Lovin' Lakin -- premiering July 16 on Hulu and YouTube -- while opening up about her experiences as a '90s teen TV star-turned-versatile, multimedia-savvy performer. (Tweet her @yolakin, @lovinlakin, @worstaudition and @OopsDoughnuts, then like her on Facebook here, here, here and (phew!) here!)

"Lovin' Lakin," a ten-episode mockumentary, casts the 33-year-old star as an egocentric, obnoxious version of herself that clearly couldn't be more removed from the real, laid-back Lakin. The fictional Christine -- unlike her steadily employed originator -- is a onetime child star staging a comeback. Along the way, her former co-stars and famous friends (among them Patrick Duffy, Seth MacFarlane and Kristin Chenoweth) suffer fictional Christine's comic misadventures in relaunching her celebrity. (For more info, check out Christine's terrific new interview with Sitcoms Online news director Pavan Patel here.)

Lakin shares with Reimagine That! host Chris Mann her fond memories of playing Al Lambert, the tomboyish daughter of Duffy and Suzanne Somers in the Brady Bunch-esque Step, which ran from 1991 on 1997 as part of ABC's hugely successful TGIF sitcom lineup. (The series ran for one more season, through spring 1998, on CBS and has remained in syndication ever since.) Lakin is especially lovin' on the paternal Duffy, who she says has remained a cherished fixture in her life.

The go-getter actress explains how her new online series affords her a self-made opportunity to express herself creatively on-camera and behind-the-scenes. She also favorably compares her TV sitcom experiences to her background as a stage actress -- and muses about marrying both in her recent turn as Joanie Cunningham in Garry Marshall's Happy Days: The Musical. (Lakin, seen most recently on TV in Melissa and Joey, has also appeared in the Marshall-directed features Georgia Rule and Valentine's Day; her other feature credits include co-starring with Jamie Lee Curtis in 2010's You Again and starring opposite Paris Hilton in 2008's The Hottie and the Nottie. Up next: reimagining the role of Clarice this fall in the West Coast stage premiere of the darkly comic Silence! The Musical. [Oh, yeah, folks. We're talking "... of the Lambs!"])

Finally, the ever-spirited Lakin discusses why she chose online cheekiness to underscore her serious commitment to supporting gay marriage by participating in the Funny or Die video Child Celebrities Opposing Kirk Cameron.

Also ... on a somber note, Chris fondly looks back on the celebrities we've lost in 2012 and shares his thoughts on the 50-year friendship that Andy Griffith shared with his co-star Don Knotts.

And finally, Reimagine That! dream interpeter Yvonne Ryba offers an in-depth analysis of a client's dream involving pregnancy and creative rebirth.

Listen to episode 14 here. View our Christine Lakin Photo Gallery.

Also, if you missed episode 13, Reimagine That! had Johnathan McClain (Retired at 35) on to talk about his TV Land sitcom's sophomore season, his Funny or Die videos and finding his inner Leather. Plus, in part three of his three-part Retroality.TV exclusive, Farrah Fawcett's longtime secret lover, Greg Lott, on Farrah's struggles with Ryan O'Neal, and Redmond's drug abuse. So go and listen to episode 13 as well, if you missed this one!