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Jennifer Love Hewitt use to work with Kelsey Grammer in the musical version of "A Christmas Carol". Kelsey and his wife, Camille, served as executive producers..... |
![]() Kelsey Grammer |
Kelsey Grammer threw reporters some red
meat while on the panel for his new ABC sitcom "Hank." Grammer knocked Fox entertainment
president Kevin Reilly, suggesting he played politics with his
sitcom "Back to You," and criticized CBS chief Les Moonves over its
handling of "Medium" (which Grammer executive produces).
"I thought we actually were onto something
pretty good," said Grammer regarding "Back to You." "Then Fox hired
-- what's his name? Reilly?" "Kevin Reilly," said "Hank" executive
producer Tucker Cawley. "Hired Reilly, who actually hadn't
bought the show," continued Grammer. "We
had pitched it to him at NBC. So I had bad feelings about that. Then
we had the writers' strike. We sort of like preempted the recession
for ourselves and got in there six months early. There was very
little ... sense of continuity about the show and a sense of
commitment. Because that's just kind of the way they work with
shows. It's their thing. And we were at sea pretty much once 'Idol'
came on. And finally, there was some friction between the guy that
never wanted the show in the first place, who was now running Fox
and our writers, and off we went."
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Regarding "Medium," despite CBS rescuing
the show from NBC's cancellation and bundling the drama with the similar
"Ghost Whisperer" on Fridays fall, Grammer seemed to harbor some ill
will toward Moonves for not being supportive from the outset. CBS Studios produces "Medium," but sister network CBS passed
on the idea. Once the program found success on NBC, Grammer suggested
that Moonves undermined the show's support at the network. "Les Moonves, being the selfless, egoless man that he is,
took the opportunity to claim that NBC was so bad at developing that CBS
had to produce their only hit show that year," Grammer said. "So that
immediately relegated 'Medium' to the bad stepchild situation in which
it has basically flourished. [NBC] would always say, 'Well, we're not
going to put it on the schedule, but we'll plug it in somewhere,' which
is what they did, and the audience found it. And I actually think it's
going to be a great boon to the show to have it scheduled in a regular
place on Friday evenings." Still, sharing the night with
"Ghost Whisperer" struck the actor as a bit ironic.
"I had pitched 'Medium' to Les previously, honestly, and
he wasn't interested -- and then he spent the next four years trying to
make the same show," Grammer said. "When they said in their press
release that 'Medium' could be a nice offspring of 'Ghost Whisperer,' I
thought that was sort of disingenuous and misrepresentative." OK. But it seems like Grammer forgot one thing while griping
about at least one of the network executives. You know that guy, what's his name? Reilly? He's the man at NBC who bought "Medium." |
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Story:
© 2009 The
Hollywood Reporter. All Rights Reserved. Image: Copyright Control. All Rights Reserved. |
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Images: Copyright Control and Dennis Maxim Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Image & Name: ™ ® & © Jennifer Love Hewitt, et al and Love Songs Inc. All Rights Reserved.