SitcomsOnline.com News Blog

Showtime has cast actor and comedian Jay Pharoah (Saturday Night Live) in the lead role for the new pilot White Famous, a half-hour comedy executive produced by Academy Award winner Jamie Foxx and showrunner Tom Kapinos (Californication). Tim Story, the prolific director who helmed the movie franchises Barbershop, Fantastic Four, Ride Along and Think Like A Man, has joined the project as an executive producer and will direct the pilot. White Famous will be written by Kapinos, based on an idea by Jamie Foxx, who will guest star in a recurring role. A co-production between Lionsgate Television and Showtime, the project will focus on a talented, young African-American comedian, Floyd Mooney (Pharoah), whose star is rising, forcing him to navigate the treacherous waters of maintaining his credibility as he begins to cross-over towards becoming "white famous."

Showtime has ordered a new half-hour comedy project entitled Mating (working title), executive produced by Jason Katims (Friday Night Lights, Parenthood), and written and executive produced by Stu Zicherman (The Affair, The Americans). Taran Killam (Saturday Night Live) has been cast in the lead role. The comedy anthology pilot will center on a recently divorced guy who married young and now finds himself completely unprepared for the brave new, frank and fluid world of dating and hooking up. The project, produced by Showtime, Universal TV and True Jack Productions, is an "annual anthology" as each season will focus on a different protagonist's journey through modern dating and relationships. Showtime announced that it has ordered a new comedy pilot based on Frankie Shaw's Sundance Film Festival Jury Award-winning short film SMILF. Shaw will star, write, produce and direct the semi-autobiographical pilot, with Oscar(R) nominee Michael London (Sideways), and Emmy(R) nominees Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky (The Office, Bad Teacher) executive producing. Set in Boston, SMILF will take a raw look at a single, 20-something whose desires for relationships, sex, and a career collide with the realities of young, single motherhood. The pilot will be produced by ABC Signature as a co-production with Showtime.

Antenna TV, Tribune Broadcasting's multicast network, is pleased to announce a new affiliate home for the network in Knoxville when Gray Television Group, Inc's WVLT-TV launches Antenna TV on Monday, September 5, 2016 on its multicast channel MyVLT on channel 8.2. Antenna TV, which airs in 128 TV markets across the U.S. reaching 86% of TV households, features a lineup of classic favorites such as: Johnny Carson, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, All in the Family, Barney Miller, The Burns and Allen Show, Bewitched, Dear John, Dennis the Menace, Doogie Howser MD, Evening Shade, Family Ties, Gidget, Good Times, Green Acres, Hazel, I Dream of Jeannie, Jack Benny, The Jeffersons, Leave it to Beaver, Maude, McHale's Navy, Mr. Belvedere. Mister Ed, The Monkees, Mork and Mindy, My Mother the Car, Newhart, One Day at a Time, The Partridge Family, Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Sanford and Son, Small Wonder, Three's Company and Webster.