Day: August 20, 2009

Seth MacFarlane has been actively campaigning for his Family Guy to become the first animated sitcom to win the Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series at the 61st Primetime Emmy Awards on Sept. 20. Since I'm not an Emmy voter, I hadn't been giving it too much thought, leaving it to my friends and colleagues in the online entertainment world to deal with instead (prime example: Gabe at Videogum). But when a friend shared this latest tidbit via Google Reader (thanks for the tip, Eric!), well, I just had to watch. MacFarlane has taken to ribbing his competition by creating a separate YouTube channel called WheresMyEmmy. Today's victim: 30 Rock. OK. So. Yes. He got it right in the end: 30 Rock will probably win. But there's something more disturbing about this, if only I could place it… a) Is it taking on Judah Friedlander by calling him "Hat Guy"? I know and like Judah, but no, that's not it. b) Is it taking on Tracy Morgan? No. They say he's hilarious. c) Is it taking on the promotion of Kenneth's Internet page? No. NBC does push the promos a little too hard sometimes, although said Kenneth page is also nominated for an Emmy. Answers a, b and c are all OK, within reason, because comedians should be able to dish out and receive a little ribbing from each other,...

At the TCA tour this summer, FX's TV programmers spoke highly of two of its comedy pilots but did not announce their additions to the schedule. They rectified that last night, officially ordering 13 episodes of Louis CK's Louie, plus six episodes of The League. Louis CK said on his site that he was "very, very excited" to get going on the 12 eps to follow the pilot. "This show is insanely fun. I'm starring in it, writing, directing and editing it. The show will be shot in New York City, my home," he wrote overnight. It'll be a mix of stand-up and offstage, revolving around his own life as a stand-up comic and single dad with two daughters, with "extended vignettes" as Variety reports depicting scenes from his life. The one vignette that already has been described in the trades — about chaperoning a field trip — already has been a staple of his stand-up act this year. But as he pointed out when he filmed the pilot, "I do some standup on the show and some of it is in narrative film form and some of it gets weird. It's kind of hard to describe. It doesn't follow the pattern of any show I've seen. It's not like Seinfeld or Pulp Comics." We'll all get to see what it is in early 2010. As for The League,...