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Breakfast w/Greg: Michael Cudlitz on Southland reprieve; Whitney returns to AMAs; Franco on GH

Good morning everyone!

I’m feeling so much better today! Guess my little illness yesterday was not Swine Flu! C’mon, you know you thunk you have it with every sneeze or cough. It’s got us all a but on edge!

Anyway, it’s so great that Southland, canceled inexplicably by NBC before its season premiere, will begin airing on TNT early next year. I love the show and am eager to see the development of  Michael Cudlitz’s gay cop character of John Cooper.

Cudlitz was the most vocal about NBC’s treatment of the show and I’m glad that he popped off a bit because I think he was speaking for the fans and probably also for his castmates who certainly deserved better.

“I really do feel like it’s going to do fantastic, it may even be a bigger hit this time around,” he told Entertainment Weekly’s  Michael Ausiello. “I’m just really happy that the show gets a chance to sink or swim based on what we’ve done creatively, and it’s not some arbitrary business decision.”

In all 13 episides were shot, seven which aired last spring. When they are re-aired on TNT, they will apparently have some additional footage that did not air on NBC.

“It’s my understanding that the actual episodes will have more airtime on TNT, so I believe they will be going back in and [adding] content,” Cudlitz said. “They’ll have the opportunity, and, in my opinion the need, to open up the [initial seven] episodes a little bit.”

If ratings are good, TNT will greenlight production of more episodes of Southland which also stars Ben McKernzie, Regina King and Tom Everett Scott.

SHE’S BACK: Remember the year Whitney Houston won something like eight American Music Awards the year of The Bodyguard soundtrack? If you were too young to remember or still in elementary school, I think I hate you.

So Miss Houston will be making a triumphant to the AMAs later this month – her first appearance in a decade – where she will perform her powerhouse ballad I Didn’t Know My Own Strength and be presented with the American Music Awards International Artist Award.

It’s a brilliant move by the AMAs because it assures them of a real big moment and gives Whitney a chance to build onto her recent comeback which started with the August release of her seventh studio album I Look To You which debuted No. 1. After so many years away, well-chronicled personal problems and her voice not quite what it was, hopefully Whitney will settle into a nice second career where she is happy and healthy.

“We’re honored to have Whitney Houston back on the AMA stage after ten years,” American Music Awards producer Larry Klein said in a statement.  “She has won the most AMA’s of any female artist in history and is without a doubt an international superstar so it’s only fitting we honor her with the “International Artist Award” this year at such an important time in her career.”

In all, Miss Houston has been nominated 37 times and won 21 AMAs in her career.

Other announced performers at the AMAs include Rihanna, Green Day, Shakira, Mary J. Blige, Keith Urban, Lady Gaga, Eminem, Jay-Z, Alicia Keys, Jennifer Lopez, The Black Eyed Peas, Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, Daughtry and Adam Lambert.


FRANCO CHECKS IN: And finally, here is a teaser for James Franco’s upcoming storyline in General Hospital. The Milk star’s storyline kicks off on Nov. 20 and it will be interesting to see him in this format.

We’ve seen plenty of performers act in soaps before they become big movie stars but this is the first time, that I can recall, that a star at the height of their career chose to go that route. (Elizabeth Taylor’s movie career was nearly dormant when she did her guest stint on General Hospital in 1981).

It should be fun!

FILE UNDER: Breakfast w/Greg

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One Remark

  1. Southland was a very good show with the possibility of becoming a great show. I’ll be watching.

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