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TV Casting News: Busy Philipps, Chris O'Donnell, Amy Acker

BuzzSugar — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 14:30:16 -0800

As pilot season rolls on in LA, I've got a whole bunch of new TV castings to report. Of course, this week's big news is Brittany Snow getting offered the lead in the Gossip Girl spinoff, but there's much more going on. A few highlights:

The cast for Courteney Cox's ABC comedy Cougar Town has filled out a bunch this week: Busy Philipps will play Cox's friend and coworker in the show, while adorable Aliens in America star Dan Byrd will play Cox's son. Brian Van Holt will play Cox's ex, described simply as "a loser."
Chris O'Donnell is officially on board for the NCIS spinoff. He'll join LL Cool J.
Angel alum Amy Acker has joined the cast of ABC's murder mystery Happy Town, playing the wife of Geoff Stults's character.
David Morse and Michael Nouri will play blue collar and blueblood fathers in ABC's Empire State, about a modern-day Romeo and Juliet-esque couple.
Derek Luke and Kevin Rankin (Herc from Friday Night Lights!) will play a doctor and a paramedic on NBC's Trauma. Jamey Sheridan is among others in talks to join the cast.

Source

Movie Preview: Max Payne

BuzzSugar — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 16:26:09 -0700

The trailer for the video game-turned-movie Max Payne looks dark and spooky, though the story doesn't seem particularly new. According to the plot description, Mark Wahlberg's character, Max Payne, is looking to avenge the deaths of his family members. Mila Kunis costars as an assassin who is also looking to avenge a loved one's death (her sister's). Lots of avenging going on.

Ludacris and Chris O'Donnell also star. Additionally, there is a giant bird.

The dark thriller hits theaters October 17. To check out the new trailer, read more.

TV Tonight: "The Company"

BuzzSugar — Sun, 05 Aug 2007 13:30:25 -0700

Here's the bad news: I didn't love the first installment of TNT's "The Company" the way I expected to. The two-hour segment, which airs tonight, seemed a bit jumbled, covering a lot of ground without a good hook to pull me in. The good news is that there was enough compelling content in the first episode that I'm still planning to check out the other two.

Broadly speaking, "The Company" tells the story of the CIA in the Cold War. More specifically, it focuses on two friends (played by Chris O'Donnell and Alessandro Nivola) who are recruited from Yale into the CIA, a third friend (Rory Cochrane) who ends up working for the KGB, and an American intelligence expert's quest to uncover a KGB spy within the CIA.

The book by Robert Littell on which the series is based weighs in at almost 900 pages, so I suppose it's no surprise that the miniseries (which will air in three two-hour segments) also plows through a lot of material. But what did surprise me was how disorganized the whole thing felt, so to hear more about that and see a video of Chris O'Donnell talking about his role, read more

The screener copy of "The Company" that I received came with a poster-sized chart of who's who, breaking down which characters work for the CIA, which work for the KGB or other intelligence agencies, and which are (or at least appear to be) civilians. And thank goodness; part of the idea of "The Company" is that you don't know who's really working for which agency, but I thought the first two hours contained too many characters with too little context.

Beyond that, "The Company" doesn't seem to have a coherent identity thus far. Is it a story of three college friends who end up working on opposing sides of the Cold War intelligence effort? Or is it a story of one man's lifelong quest to track down the KGB's mole within the CIA? I also had to roll my eyes at the "love story" portion of events; those who fall in love seem to do so in about 10 seconds, and of course all of the main characters' relationships are with people who could jeopardize their jobs and their lives. (One of those women, a ballerina who seems to do nothing but dance 24/7, is particularly grating.)

The first hour certainly had its good points, though. I mentioned I'm a sucker for spy stories, and there's some great code-cracking, phone-tapping and allegiance-switching here. Alfred Molina delivers a strong performance as a CIA agent nicknamed "The Sorcerer" who mentors O'Donnell's character and thrives on the danger of his job. And I hope Cochrane gets more screen time in future installments; his character, a conflicted Russian-born, American-bred spy, has more depth than anyone else so far. Overall, "The Company" looks to be a mixed bag - but fellow fans of spy stories still might find it worth a try.

Source

First Look: "The Company"

BuzzSugar — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 13:33:39 -0700

Sure, on the surface, I'm a pop culture-obsessed, concert-going, movie-watching maven. But behind it all, I'm really just a nerdy, somewhat spy-obsessed gal. So TNT's new miniseries, "The Company," easily earned a spot on my list of reasons to keep the TV on this summer.

The three-night, six-hour exploration of the history of the CIA, which premieres this coming Sunday, Aug. 5, has an excellent pedigree. Based on an acclaimed novel by Robert Littell, the miniseries is directed by Ridley Scott and counts Chris O'Donnell, Michael Keaton and Alfred Molina among its cast. I have high hopes that this miniseries - like "Mad Men" - can be not just a great period drama but a great drama, period. I'll share my thoughts on the first episode later this week, but in the meantime, you can check out
this tense trailer and a sneak peak from the first episode.

Photo courtesy of TNT

What to TiVo: Monday

BuzzSugar — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 23:50:00 -0700

ABC is new with Dancing With the Stars and Castle
CBS is new with How I Met Your Mother, Accidentally on Purpose, Two and a Half Men, The Big Bang Theory, and CSI:Miami
FOX is new with House and Lie to Me
NBC is new with Heroes and Trauma
The CW is new with One Tree Hill and Gossip Girl
A&E is new with Intervention and Hoarders
ABC Family is new with Lincoln Heights and Greek
Bravo is new with The Rachel Zoe Project
TLC is new with Jon & Kate Plus 8
Late-night highlights include Bill Maher on The Jay Leno Show on NBC; Felicity Huffman on the Late Show With David Letterman on CBS; Chris O'Donnell on the Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson on CBS; Courteney Cox and Jessica Capshaw on Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC; and David Duchovny on Late Night With Jimmy Fallon on NBC