TV Bulletin Board (Oct. 27)
10/27/08 15:10
By ED BARK
Live from New York, Saturday Night Live's Amy Poehler and husband Will Arnett had their first child just a few hours before the show went on Saturday night.
Their baby boy, Archie, arrived the night after Poehler had shared the "Weekend Update" desk with Seth Meyers on SNL's last of three live Thursday broadcasts.
"Amy Poehler is not here tonight because she is having a baby," Meyers told a cheering audience on Saturday's show, hosted by Mad Men's Jon Hamm.
The new arrival officially ends Poehler's tenure with SNL. She's become one of the show's all-time standout female cast members after joining SNL in 2001. Now, as planned, Poehler will be on maternity leave with her new son before beginning work at some point next year on a planned new NBC comedy series being developed by the creative team behind The Office.
***NBC also announced a few shuffles in its ratings-starved prime-time lineup.
Beginning on Nov. 5, Law & Order will return earlier than previously announced for a 19th season that was supposed to start in January.
L&O will be on Wednesdays at 9 p.m. (central), with incumbent Lipstick Jungle shifting to Fridays at 8 p.m. following the network's freshman series Crusoe.
The second year series Life will move from Fridays to Wednesdays at 8 p.m., following NBC's first-year Knight Rider series.
The Peacock also announced that Momma's Boys, a reality series co-produced by American Idol host Ryan Seacrest, will premiere on Thursday, Dec. 16th following the season finale of The Biggest Loser.
After that, Momma's Boys will wander over to Mondays at 8 p.m., taking Heroes' slot after that series ends its "current volume," says NBC.
NBC entertainment co-chairmen Ben Silverman and Marc Graboff said the shuffles "will play to the shows' mutual strengths and will help us to reinforce our lineup."
You could almost feel their shoulders sag, even via a printed press release. It's going to be yet another long, marrow-sapping season for the Peacock, whose hottest entertainment show is in late-night. That would be the aforementioned Saturday Night Live, which premiered in 1975.
NBC's prime-time schedule for that fall included just three series that would end up in the 1975-'76 season's Top 30. Namely Sanford and Son (No. 7), Chico and the Man (No. 25) and Police Woman (No. 30).
This season so far is shaping up to be possibly even worse.