June 2008

JoBros fans have less than a month to wait until the worldwide premiere of Disney Channel‘s Camp Rock, a music-filled movie starring Joe, Nick and Kevin Jonas, and a slew of other Disney stars. The film’s premise is a bit Dirty Dancing meets Cinderella, where an arrogant musician (played by Joe Jonas) meets a talented yet unsure young singer named Mitchie (played by Demi Lovato). They struggle to fit in, ultimately learning to believe in themselves and to be who they really want to be. The film airs June 20 on Disney Channel, June 21 on ABC and June 22 […]

For such a politically charged show, Morgan Spurlock does his best to keep his personal feelings a mystery when it comes to 30 Days. The documentary series that takes the axiom of “walk a mile in another man’s shoes” to new lengths — 30 days, to be exact — returns for its long-delayed third season June 3 on FX. This season’s episodes include a gun-control proponent living with a pistol-packing family, a same-sex couple and their adopted children hosting a woman opposed to gay rights, a former NFL player spending time in a wheelchair, and an avid hunter moving in […]

It was a no-brainer that Lifetime‘s series Army Wives would be back for another season. Not simply because it ended on a cliffhanger (networks have been known to leave viewers hanging by yanking shows before storylines are completed if the program’s ratings are low), but because the all-important viewing numbers were more than there. Season 1 was one of last summer’s hit shows, with the season finale becoming Lifetime’s most-watched original series telecast ever. And the cliffhanger should certainly help bring all of those viewers back for more. Last season ended with a bombing at the Hump Bar, a watering […]

Thom Beers believes he has struck another goldmine. The creator/producer of such hits as Deadliest Catch, Ice Road Truckers, Monster Garage and Ax Men — just to name a few — will unearth his latest find when Black Gold premieres June 18 on truTV. Following the adventures of oil drillers, known as “roughnecks,” who put their lives on the line to capture the bubbling crude, the show continues Beers’ fascination with the world’s most dangerous jobs. Whether it’s on the high seas or in the arid badlands of West Texas, Beers says the key is finding the right people to […]

And what if they hadn’t come back from the moon? When Neil Armstrong made his “one giant leap for mankind” in the summer of 1969, the world cheered — little knowing that it was less certain he would ever walk on Earth again. The most telling evidence of how dangerous that original moon landing was is found in a memo from then White House speechwriter William Safire. Titled “In Event of Moon Disaster,” the short speech was prepared so that President Nixon would be ready in case the mission went wrong and the men could not return. It says, in […]

Novelist David Morrell looks not one bit like a pumped-up, anger-fuelled, out-of-control one-man-force of lethal destruction, but he does know a thing or two about that — having created the character John Rambo in his novel First Blood, and in the novelizations of the subsequent films in the popular franchise. I first met Morrell at Chicon V, the 1991 World Science Fiction Convention. We were sitting next to each other at a mass book signing. As we waited for the doors to open, we discussed, among other things, how the incredible shades of gray in his novel First Blood shifted […]

You might think you know Denise Richards, but she would beg to differ. While her film resume includes memorable turns as a sex-crazed femme fatale in Wild Things and a hot-pants-clad nuclear physicist in The World Is Not Enough, she’s more famous lately for her messy divorce from Charlie Sheen. The custody battle over the couple’s two daughters — Sam, 4, and Lola, 2 — has reached epic levels of public nastiness, with the accusations and name-calling from both sides becoming tabloid staples. Most recently, Sheen went to court to try to block Richards from starring in her own reality […]

Go ahead and call Bill Engvall middle of the road. That’s exactly where he’s aiming. He’s ridden his clean-as-a-whistle standup routine to glory as part of the megasuccessful Blue Collar Comedy Tour — where he pals around with fellow down-home funnymen Jeff Foxworthy, Ron White and Larry the Cable Guy — and now stars in his own TBS sitcom The Bill Engvall Show. The show’s second season begins June 12. The Galveston, Texas, born comic is trying to emulate the family-friendly shows he has always loved, the kind of traditional three-camera laughfest that used to dominate the airwaves but people […]

She’s a representative of the Italian fashion industry. The child of screen legends Ingrid Bergman and Roberto Rossellini, she’s been in touch with the glamorous life since birth. So what is Isabella Rossellini doing feigning sex with bugs while dressed up as one? Being hilarious, for starters. Rossellini is the brains behind a new series of Sundance Channel film shorts called Green Porno. The project stemmed from a request made by the network for her to produce something with an “environmental” theme. She chose the freaky ways bugs get freaky. “My love for animals is the one thing that has […]