Dana Carvey and Spike Feresten are developing a new half-hour sketch comedy series, in which they will both star as well as writing and executive producing, Variety reports. A pilot has already been picked up by Fox. The show does not yet have a title.
Fox’s Television Critics Association presentation will take place later today (Jan. 11). Check back at EW.com for full coverage of the press tour.
Singer Michael Bublé is planning to wed Argentinian actress Luisana Loreley Lopilato de la Torre, People reports. The couple have been engaged for two months, but this is the first announcement. Lopilato recently starred in Argentinian telenovela Atracción x 4.
A car carrying Lindsay Lohan was involved in a minor accident Saturday night on the 1600 block of N. Cahuenga Blvd. in Hollywood, a rep for the LAPD confirms to EW. The incident, caught on tape, occurred at 12:30 a.m. when paparazzi surrounded the vehicle, driven by an unidentified female, as it attempted to leave — and clipped a paparazzo, who injured his wrist. A police report was filed and there is an ongoing traffic collision investigation, the LAPD rep says. But reports that the driver is a person of interest in a criminal assault with a deadly weapon investigation are “not correct,” according to the police spokeswoman.
The 63-year-old show-woman will undergo knee-replacement surgery in New York next week, reports People. The procedure means Minnelli will miss the Jan. 31 Grammy Awards, where Liza’s at the Palace, the original cast recording of her Tony-nominated Broadway production, is up for best traditional pop vocal album. Get well, hoofer!
The amendment to Michael Jackson’s death certificate declaring that his June 25 passing was due to “acute propofol intoxication” and “intravenous injection by another,” has been published online. EW has confirmed with the L.A. County coroner’s office that the document, which is part of the public record, is genuine. Jackson’s death was officially ruled a homicide last August.
On Friday afternoon, Jane Robison, a spokeswoman for the L.A. district attorney’s office, told EW that recent reports claiming Dr. Conrad Murray, Michael Jackson’s physician, will be indicted on charges of involuntary manslaughter are false. “Nothing has changed,” Robison said. “It’s a bogus report. We don’t have the case.”
A spokeswoman for Dr. Murray also sent EW the following statement: “We have refused to comment on stories involving unnamed sources and will continue to do so. However, we can confirm that we have not received notice of an impaneled grand jury and Dr. Murray has not been invited to testify. J. Michael Flanagan was added to Dr. Conrad Murray’s defense team this past week. His offices are in Glendale, California.” As we previously reported, Flanagan is the attorney who represented Britney Spears in a hit-and-run case. He told the AP he once also successfully defended a nurse who was acquitted in an L.A. trial after being accused of administering propofol to a patient who died.
As earlier reported in the Ausiello Files, Showtime, whose fourth and final season of the bodice-ripper The Tudors will premiere this spring, announced plans for a new historical drama. In his first regular TV series role, Oscar winner Jeremy Irons will play Rodrigo Borgia, the head of a prominent Italian Renaissance family accused of every possible dastardly crime. Neil Jordan (The Crying Game) will direct. The network plans a spring 2011 premiere.
AJ McLean proposed to his girlfriend, Rochelle Deanna Karidis, on stage at a Las Vegas club Friday night, People reports. According to an eye-witness, the Backstreet Boy, who turns 32 today and was celebrating with friends at the Hard Rock Hotel’s Wasted Space, got on stage, asked the DJ to turn off the music, knelt, and popped the question to everyone’s surprise. The club, People notes, was also hosting a party for an adult website taking part in Sin City’s AVN Adult Entertainment Expo convention.
McLean was previously engaged to singer Sarah Martin.
Art Clokey, who created the beloved claymation character Gumby in the 1950s, died in his sleep Friday at his Los Osos, Calif. home, the LA Times reports. Clokey’s son Joseph said his father, 88, had battled a recurring bladder infection. “At his frequent best, Clokey fashioned a canny combination of surrealist and naive art, anticipating both the David Lynch of Eraserhead and the Paul Reubens of Pee-Wee’s Playhouse,” EW’s Ken Tucker wrote in 1994, when the stop-motion Gumby show returned to the air in the form of Nickelodeon reruns. Clips from 1988′s Gumby Adventures can be viewed on Hulu. The character was also immortalized in a film, with toys and other merchandising, and by Eddie Murphy on Saturday Night Live.
Brittany Murphy’s mother and husband tried to resuscitate actress Brittany Murphy while a 911 operator gave instructions, according to People. “My daughter’s passed out!” Sharon Murphy is heard on the Dec. 20 tape. “We’re doing mouth to mouth. Please get here quick! Please hurry!” At one point, Sharon Murphy screams, “Brittany, please come back” and tells the operator that her daughter “was dizzy, she couldn’t walk, she had a cold.”
Murphy, 32, died of an apparent cardiac arrest after she was found in the bathroom of her Hollywood Hills home. Authorities have said no foul play is suspected, and toxicology results are pending
The Disney Channel has confirmed that its hit comedy Hannah Montana starring Miley Cyrus will air its series finale in spring, 2011. Production on the last season begins Jan. 18 but the network has yet to announce when it will schedule the final episodes. Meanwhile, the sitcom’s third season finale will air this March with Miley Stewart (Cyrus) deciding whether to stay in Los Angeles or return to Tennessee – a pivotal story arc that kicks off the final season that’s set to star Ray Liotta and Angus T. Jones (Two and A Half Men).
Hannah Montana continues to deliver at all-time high levels in total viewers. In 2009, the comedy was Disney Channel’s No. 1 series in total viewers and tweens 9-14.
