Tuesday, June 30, 2015

Benson and Soap Reunions on Hallmark Channel's Home & Family; Buzzr Celebrates 4th of July

Robert Guillaume - Home & Family

There is a special episode of Home & Family airing today (Tuesday, June 30) at 10am on the Hallmark Channel that reunited some of the stars of the hit sitcoms Soap and Benson. The tribute to living legend Robert Guillaume (Benson, Soap) features guests Katherine Helmond (Soap), Robert Mandan (Soap), Jay Johnson (with puppet Bob!) (Soap), Rene Auberjonois (Benson) and Missy Gold (Benson). But that's not all! There was a video from Billy Crystal (Soap) and he congratulated Robert on his surprise award from the Hollywood Appreciation Society. If you missed the episode, watch the encore tomorrow (Wednesday, July 1) at 12 noon, but you can also watch a clip below:



H&F Photo Credit:
Copyright 2015 Crown Media Family Networks/Photographer: Jeremy Lee

Buzzr

FremantleMedia North America's new digital multicast network, BUZZR, is set to celebrate Independence Day with a lineup of some of America's favorite game shows, but this time with a special twist! Airing in primetime at 8:00 PM ET/5:00 PM PT with a re-airing at 11:00 PM ET/8:00 PM PT, viewers will be pulled into the game show time capsule with 4th of July episodes from decades past. The patriotic celebration will kick off with the memorable July 4, 1985 episode of Body Language, featuring host, Tom Kennedy and some familiar celebrity faces, including Lisa Bonet (The Cosby Show) and Jason Bateman (It's Your Move). The festivities will continue with episodes of Match Game, Press Your Luck, Card Sharks, Super Password and Password Plus, making this special television event the perfect post-fireworks party!

Episode airtimes are as follows:

8:00 PM ET/5:00 PM PT Body Language (July 4, 1985)
8:30 PM ET/5:30 PM PT Match Game (July 4, 1974)
9:00 PM ET/6:00 PM PT Press Your Luck (July 4, 1985)
9:30 PM ET/6:30 PM PT Card Sharks (July 4, 1980)
10:00 PM ET/7:00 PM PT Super Password (July 4, 1985)
10:30 PM ET/7:30 PM PT Password Plus (July 4, 1980)

Monday, June 29, 2015

More Celebs Lined Up for TLC's Who Do You Think You Are?; TBS Orders Comedic Late Night Series from Funny Or Die

Who Do You Thin You Are?

The two-time Emmy nominated series Who Do You Think You Are? returns this summer to share more fascinating stories, and shed light on surprising revelations, of the real life family history of celebrities. Executive Produced by Lisa Kudrow and Dan Bucatinsky, the new season premieres Sunday, July 26 at 9/8c. The celebrities featured are: Tom Bergeron (Dancing with the Stars), who is aware of his French Canadian roots on his paternal side, but wants to know what brought his ancestors to North America. He goes as far back as his 10x great grandmother to find the answer. Bryan Cranston (Breaking Bad), who comes to discover an unfortunate pattern amongst the men in his family. Ginnifer Goodwin (Once Upon a Time), who sets out to learn about her mysterious paternal great grandparents, whom her father, regretfully, does not know much about either. Alfre Woodard (State of Affairs), who strives to find out more about the paternal side of her family, and explores how her surname came to be. Additionally, TLC will air the U.S. premiere of J.K. Rowling's (Harry Potter author) episode of the series, where the best-selling author sets off to uncover her maternal French roots. She finds that a family war story might not be what she thought when military records reveal a surprising twist.

Ancestry, the leading family history company, is teaming up again with TLC as a sponsor of the upcoming season. As part of the show sponsorship, Ancestry provides exhaustive family history research on each of the featured celebrities to help make discoveries possible and build out the story of each episode.


Funny Or Die Presents America's Next Weatherman

TBS is about to bring some stormy competition to late night with the brand new series Funny Or Die Presents America's Next Weatherman, produced by Funny Or Die, Mark Burnett and United Artists Media Group (UAMG). Funny Or Die Presents America's Next Weatherman features 12 competitors vying for a job as America's next great weathercaster. Matt Oberg (The Comedians) hosts the competition, which will be judged by longtime weather personalities Johnny Mountain (KABC, KCBS) and Jillian Barberie (Good Day LA). The series is set to premiere Saturday, Aug. 8, at 11 p.m. (ET/PT) on TBS, with availability across TBS's on-demand, digital and mobile platforms the following day. Funny Or Die Presents America's Next Weatherman marries the comedic and subversive voice of Funny Or Die with the production value and compelling storytelling of a show from Mark Burnett. Each classic reality show element - from the physical challenges to the dramatic vote-offs - will be tweaked through the Funny Or Die prism to create an original viewing experience. However, the stakes are 100% real as the contestants will be vying for $100,000 and an appearance on TBS's sister network CNN forecasting the national weather for the morning show New Day. TBS has ordered eight one-hour episodes of Funny Or Die Presents America's Next Weatherman, which is based on a concept and format by the creative teams at Funny Or Die and UAMG, including Seth Morris (Kroll Show), who will serve as a producer on the show. Funny Or Die's Mike Farah and Joe Farrell serve as executive producers, along with Mark Burnett and Dean Houser.

Sunday, June 28, 2015

Summer 2015 Week 5 Sitcom Ratings

Summer has now started and we will be back with our normal weekly ratings report with the first four nights numbers and analysis in the fall, but we still will have our regular how the sitcoms did all summer long! Here are our summer ratings:


Summer Week 5 (June 22-28) How the Sitcoms Did
(Sun comedies are previous week and Fri/Sat are prelim ratings)
Sorted by 18-49 Rtg
TitleNetworkTimeDayTotal Viewers18-49 RtgNotes







Modern FamilyABC9:00PMWed3,760,0000.98REPEAT
Mike & MollyCBS8:30PMMon4,770,0000.92REPEAT
The MiddleABC8:00PMWed4,010,0000.89REPEAT
black-ishABC9:30PMWed3,200,0000.85REPEAT
The GoldbergsABC8:30PMWed3,530,0000.82REPEAT
2 Broke GirlsCBS8:00PMMon4,440,0000.77REPEAT
Fresh off the BoatABC8:00PMTue3,140,0000.72REPEAT
black-ishABC8:30PMTue2,330,0000.59REPEAT
The Big Bang TheoryCBS8:00PMThu

preempted
Mike & MollyCBS9:30PMThu

preempted
The Odd CoupleCBS8:30PMThu

preempted
MomCBS9:00PMThu

preempted
Family GuyFox9:00PMSun

preempted
The SimpsonsFox8:00PMSun

preempted
Brooklyn Nine-NineFox8:30PMSun

preempted
Bob's BurgersFox7:30PMSun

preempted
Golan the InsatiableFox9:30PMSun

preempted
Bob's BurgersFox7:00PMSun

preempted
Modern FamilyABC10:00PMSun

preempted
black-ishABC10:30PMSun

preempted
The GoldbergsABC9:30PMSun

preempted
The MiddleABC9:00PMSun

preempted
The Big Bang TheoryCBS9:00PMThu

preempted
Weird LonersFox9:30PMTue

canceled
One Big HappyNBC9:30PMTue

canceled
Marry MeNBC9:00PMTue

canceled
About a BoyNBC9:30PMTue

canceled
CristelaABC8:30PMFri

canceled
The Mindy ProjectFox9:30PMTue

canceled
MulaneyFox7:00PMSun

canceled
The McCarthysCBS9:30PMThu

canceled
Bad JudgeNBC9:00PMThu

canceled
A to ZNBC9:30PMThu

canceled
The MillersCBS8:30PMMon

canceled
SelfieABC8:00PMTue

canceled
Manhattan Love StoryABC8:30PMTue

canceled
Two and a Half MenCBS9:00PMThu

canceled
Parks & RecreationNBC10:00PMTue

canceled
UndateableNBC9:00PMTue

completed
The Last Man on EarthFox9:30PMSun

completed
New GirlFox9:00PMTue

completed
Last Man StandingABC8:00PMFri

completed
GalavantABC8:00PMSun

completed
American Dad!Fox9:30PMSun

completed

SOURCE: Nielsen Media Research

Saturday, June 27, 2015

SitcomsOnline Digest: Nashville to Head to AXS TV; Beverly Hills, 90210 to Get an Unauthorized Story; Growing Pains Season 5 to Arrive on DVD in July

Welcome to SitcomsOnline Digest! It's another slow summer news week, but we've got news of Nashville heading to cable, yet another unauthorized story from Lifetime, another season of Growing Pains on DVD, and more. Let's get going!

HIGHLIGHTS FROM SITCOMSONLINE.COM AND AROUND THE WEB
  • Reruns of the series Nashville will be heading to cable soon on AXS TV. (Deadline
  • It looks as if Lifetime is going to keep milking the "Unauthorized Stories" franchise of movies, as they are now working on an Unauthorized Beverly Hills, 90210 Story.
  • We've accepted for years that Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy are the two hottest shows on syndication, but Family Feud has been creeping up on them both, and last week, Family Feud topped the ratings for syndicated series. (Cinema Blend)
  • Dick Van Patten died this week at the age of 86. (NPR)
  • Character actor Tony Longo, who appeared in series such as Alice and Laverne & Shirley, also died this week. (Hollywood Reporter)
  • With the Confederate flag being removed everywhere this week, Warner Bros has announced that they too will remove the Confederate flag from merchandise based upon the series Dukes of Hazzard. (Deadline)
  • TV Land continued their re-branding this week with a new logo, yet another reminder that TV Land is absolutely nothing like the network it was 19 years ago (or even five years ago). (SitcomsOnline)

HOME MEDIA HIGHLIGHTS
  • Fans of Growing Pains have had to wait, on average, over two years between each release (there were five years between the release of the first season and second season even). But now, only three months after the release of the fourth season, it looks like the fifth season will come sometime next month.

JUNE 30 HOME MEDIA RELEASES
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00UUOV8D4/ref=nosim/happydaysonline5-20
  • The Donna Reed Show - Season Three (DVD, $29.99): MPI comes "full circle" with their re-releases of the classic sitcom, with this completing the first five seasons of the series on MPI. Seasons six, seven, and eight remain in the hands of Sony, and we're hopeful that something can be worked out to get those released.

FOLLOW ME

Who to Follow: Laura Prepon (Twitter)
Claim to Fame: We're featuring another That '70s Show cast member again this week, and this time it is Laura Prepon. Born in 1980, her first role literally was on That '70s Show, when she was already 18. She remained on that series until it ended in 2006. It wasn't long after that until she came back to TV, with October Road in 2007. Unfortunately, it also didn't take long (two seasons, consisting of a total of 19 episodes) for that to get canceled either. She moved into guest starring roles for a little while after that before jumping into her next role in the NBC comedy Are You There Chelsea?, which, again, didn't last long. But despite those two less than successful series after That '70s Show, she came back in a big way in 2013 with what may be one of her biggest roles, as Alex Vause in the Netflix series Orange is the New Black, a role that doesn't seem like it will be ending at any time in the near future.
Pick of the Tweets: "Always love my visits with debrajorupp #that70sfamily #donnaandkitty http://instagram.com/p/qZwDWZG638/ " (July 13, 2014)


Sitcoms Airing Tonight / Sitcom Stars on Talk Shows

Wednesday, May 7

Tyler Perry's House of Payne - "Doing the Work" (BET, 9:00PM ET/PT)
House of Payne is the hilarious comedy about Retired fire chief Curtis Payne and his lovely wife Ella.

Tyler Perry's Assisted Living - "Wobblewham" (BET, 9:30PM ET/PT)
Reginald must face a daunting truth with his son Brandon; Vinny starts a business venture that throws Pleasant Days into a chaotic spiral.

The Ms. Pat Show - "The Book of Denise" (BET, 10:30PM ET/PT)
Denise and Junebug can't stop looking for love in all the wrong places, and both aunt and nephew are in for rude awakenings when the objects of their affection aren't all they seem to be.

Complete TV Listings


Sitcom Stars on Talk Shows (Week of May 5)

Wednesday, May 7

  • Lunell (Lopez) - Watch Luenell on Jimmy Kimmel Live! at 11:35pm on ABC.
  • Kerry Washington (UnPrisoned) - Kerry appears on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon at 11:35pm on NBC.
  • Christine Baranski (The Big Bang Theory/Happy Family/Welcome to New York/Cybill) - Christine is a guest on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert at 11:35pm on CBS.
  • Paul Feig (Sabrina, the Teenage Witch/The Louie Show/The Jackie Thomas Show/Dirty Dancing) and Anna Kendrick (Love Life) - Paul is a guest and Anna makes a special appearance on After Midnight at 12:37am on CBS.
  • Geena Davis (The Geena Davis Show/Sara/Buffalo Bill) - Geena talks about The Girl Who Was Too Big for the Page on ABC News Live Prime with Linsey Davis at 7pm.
  • Jim Gaffigan (The Jim Gaffigan Show/My Boys/The Ellen Show/Welcome to New York) - Jim stops by for a chat about his new comedy special The Skinny on Live with Kelly and Mark, so check your local listings.
  • Natasha Lyonne (Russian Doll) - NBC's Today catches up with Natasha in the 9am hour.
  • Ana Gasteyer (American Auto/People of Earth/Lady Dynamite/Suburgatory) - Ana drop by with a rousing round of fast five questions for Martha Stewart on The Drew Barrymore Show, so check your local listings.
  • Jenny McCarthy (Two and a Half Men/Jenny) - Jenny talks about Fox's The Masked Singer on Access Daily with Mario & Kit, so check your local listings.
  • Carrie Preston (Crowded/Happyish/Emeril) - Carrie talks about CBS's Elsbeth on Access Daily with Mario & Kit, so check your local listings.


New on DVD and Blu-ray

The Wayans Bros. - The Complete Series Frasier (2023) - Season Two Abbott Elementary - The Complete Third Season The Drew Carey Show - The Complete Series* (missing 4 episodes and some music has been replaced or altered) Bewitched - The Complete Series - 60th Anniversary Special Edition (Blu-ray)

01/28 - Wait Till Your Father Gets Home - The Complete Series (Blu-ray)
02/04 - The Wayans Bros. - The Complete Series
03/11 - Frasier (2023) - Season Two
04/01 - Abbott Elementary - The Complete Third Season
05/13 - The Drew Carey Show - The Complete Series* (missing 4 episodes and some music has been replaced or altered)
06/06 - Shoresy - Season 2
06/17 - Looney Tunes - Collector's Vault - Volume 1 (Blu-ray)
07/08 - Bewitched - The Complete Series - 60th Anniversary Special Edition (Blu-ray)

More Recent and Upcoming TV DVD and Blu-ray Releases / TV Shows on DVD, Blu-ray and Prime Video / DVD Reviews Archive


Recent SitcomsOnline.com News Blog Posts

05/07 - Netflix's A Man on the Inside Bulks Up Cast for Season 2; The Studio Renewed by Apple TV+
05/06 - Netflix's Long Story Short Announces Cast; NBC Renews All Chicago Series for 2025-26
05/05 - Antenna TV's The Partridge Family Mother's Day Marathon; Rewind TV's 227 40th Anniversary Marathon
05/04 - Sitcom Stars on Talk Shows; This Week in Sitcoms (Week of May 5, 2025)
05/03 - SitcomsOnline Digest: CBS Cancels The Equalizer; Wisteria Lane Offshoot of Desperate Housewives in the Works
05/02 - USA and SYFY Announce Summer Premieres; CBC in Canada Renews 5 Series, Including Wild Cards
05/01 - ABC Summer 2025 Schedule; Audible Scripted Comedy Podcasts for Summer
04/30 - The Carol Burnett Show Mother of All Marathons; Netflix Renews North of North
04/29 - Lifetime Adds New Ripped from the Headlines Movie; BET+ Orders Season 2 of Series
04/28 - Fox Summer 2025 Schedule; Final Guest Hosts for Saturday Night Live 50th Anniversary Season
04/27 - Sitcom Stars on Talk Shows; This Week in Sitcoms (Week of April 28, 2025)
04/26 - SitcomsOnline Digest: CBS Cancels Poppa's House; Final Season 50 Hosts for Saturday Night Live Set
04/25 - Classic TV's Biggest Auction; Remembering Will Hutchins and Wink Martindale
04/24 - Jerrod Carmichael's 4th HBO Comedy Special; HBO's Pee-wee as Himself Premieres May 23
04/23 - Apple TV+ Announces Comedy Series Prodigies; ABC Renews Unscripted Series Slate
04/22 - Hallmark Channel's May For Moms Month; Prime Video Gets Korean Comedy Action Series
04/21 - Peacock's Twisted Metal Returns July 31; Poker Face Lines Up Big Guests for Season 2
04/20 - Sitcom Stars on Talk Shows; This Week in Sitcoms (Week of April 21, 2025)
04/19 - SitcomsOnline Digest: Clueless Reboot in the Works at Peacock; King of the Hill Cast Reunion and Revival Preview at ATX TV Festival Next Month
04/18 - 2025 TIME100 on ABC; Atsuko Okatsuka: Father Premieres June 13 on Hulu
04/17 - BET+ Orders Martin Spinoff Varnell Hill; It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia Returns in July
04/16 - And Just Like That... Season 3 on Max This May; MGM+ Comedy Series Adds Big Stars
04/15 - HBO's Harry Potter Series; Classic TV Comes to Life in NYC
04/14 - TV Stars Lineup for Summer of 69 Hulu Film; Jessica Kirson Comedy Special
04/13 - Sitcom Stars on Talk Shows; This Week in Sitcoms (Week of April 14, 2025)
04/12 - SitcomsOnline Digest: FX Sets Premiere Date for Adults; Netflix Picks Up Monopoly Themed Reality Competition Series
04/11 - Bounce TV Renews Mind Your Business; AMC Networks 2025 Upfront Highlights
04/10 - David Spade's Prime Video Comedy Special; Brett Goldstein's HBO Comedy Special Filmed in New Jersey
04/09 - Paramount+ Orders Season 3 of Colin from Accounts; FX's Adults Premieres May 28
04/08 - Prime Video's New Comedy Overcompensating; Nine Perfect Strangers Returns on Hulu in May
04/07 - NBC Celebrates Joan Rivers with Special; Remembering Jay North of Dennis the Menace