The networks went hog wild last week, canceling some shows and renewing others. The casualties, and two of the renewals, were fairly noteworthy.
In the itchy-trigger-finger department, “Lateline,” Al Franken’s wacky comedy about the staff of a Washington-based late-night network news show, is dust.
The NBC series had just slipped into “NewsRadio’s” 7:30 p.m. Tuesday spot last week for the beginning of a six-week run. Now the network will air repeats of “Frasier” and “Just Shoot Me” for the remaining five weeks until “NewsRadio’s” return.
Two other midseason series were led to the gallows. ABC’s “Strange World,” the bizarre series about criminal abuses of cloning and other areas of science, is gone after only three episodes. It was supposed to give “NYPD Blue” a breather at 9 p.m. on Tuesdays, but the cop show is back with repeats this Tuesday on WLS-Ch. 7.
Also jettisoned is “The Magnificent Seven,” CBS’ Friday night western that was canceled last year and revived, thanks to a furious e-mail/letter-writing campaign led by a Chicago-area woman. It had been preempted in favor of NCAA basketball playoffs, but now CBS will run episodes of “Kids Say the Darndest Things” and “Candid Camera” between 7 and 9 p.m. this Friday, and insert new segments of “Unsolved Mysteries” beginning April 2.
So much for the losers: The blockbuster renewal was for NBC’s “Law & Order,” which the network reupped for an unprecedented three seasons.
It remains to be seen if all of the current cast members will be around by the end of the show’s run, considering “Law & Order’s” history of shuffling characters in and out like kids at a Saturday morning soccer game.
As part of the renewal, which keeps the cops-and-lawyers show that premiered in 1990 on the air until 2002, NBC has ordered a spinoff — tentatively titled “Sex Crimes” — focusing on the sex crimes division of the New York City Police Department.
The show will be unique in that two weeks after it airs on NBC, it will be rebroadcast on the USA cable network.
Meanwhile, the WB’s “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and “Felicity” will return for another year of neck-biting and man-stalking, respectively.
Big score: There was one other notable renewal: ABC’s “Sports Night,” arguably the best new show of the season, but nevertheless a straggler in the ratings.
Yet, the comedy (8:30 p.m. Tuesdays on WLS-Ch. 7) about an ESPN-like sports news show had even better news. Cast member Robert Guillaume, who suffered a stroke in January, is back at work.
His character, Isaac Jaffee, the chief executive of the fictional “Sports Night” program, will be off-camera recuperating from his own stroke. Guillaume will miss maybe six episodes, and won’t be seen until the end of the season.
Wearing different hats: The prevailing rule of thumb is that actors become producers so they can star in the movies they’re most interested in.
But Mimi Rogers is anything but conventional. The appealing actress is an executive producer of “The Devil’s Arithmetic,” a haunting Showtime movie premiering at 7 p.m. Sunday that is based on a 1988 novel stressing the importance of learning about one’s heritage, and then never forgetting it.
Instead of a prominent role, however, Rogers is in only a handful of scenes, playing the mother of a spoiled Jewish teenager (“Interview with the Vampire’s” Kirsten Dunst) who learns the hard way — or so it seems — about the horrors of the Holocaust.
“It was important to Showtime that I be in the film,” Rogers says. “Certainly, since it was my project, I was happy to be in it. But the focus of my company is just to get good movies made, whether they’re for me to star in or not.”
But Rogers, who co-produced “The Devil’s Arithmetic” with Dustin Hoffman, still has that little acting thing going. She’s currently known to fans of Fox’s “The X-Files” as special FBI agent Diana Fowley.
Rogers says she’s currently set to appear in the hit sci-fi series’ season finale in May. However, “I have no idea what’s going to happen to me, or what I’ll be doing,” she says.
Rogers is equally clueless as to whether her character is really a disciple of the dreaded Cigarette Smoking Man (William B. Davis), as it appeared in a revealing two-part episode in February.
Says Rogers: “I really have no idea if I’m going to turn out to be bad or good, or a little of both.”
TV Planet: Neve Campbell of Fox’s “Party of Five” is going to put all that lip-locking training she got with Denise Richards in the movie “Wild Things” to good use. Scheduled to begin April 28, a three-episode set will see Campbell’s Julia Salinger character getting involved in a lesbian relationship with a visiting writing professor (played by Olivia d’Abo of “The Wonder Years” and “The Single Guy”).
85 days and counting On June 18 comes the most anticipated motion picture event of the season: “South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut.” Sweet.
