Live From New York, it's... Rose Nylund!

For the more than 400,000 of you (and counting!) who have joined the Facebook charge to get Betty White as host of Saturday Night Live, I present this Golden Girls clip from 17 years ago, during the show's seventh and final season.

As Rose lies in the hospital, under sedation after suffering a heart attack, she has some surprising words for her daughter Kiersten at about the 1 minute mark. Take note, Lorne Michaels -- because there are at least half a million people out there who hope to hear them again soon.

BREAKING NEWS... CW announces 5 early renewals

Breaking News: The CW has taken the somewhat unusual step of announcing early pickups for five of its series. And hmmm... I notice that Melrose Place and Smallville aren't mentioned...

THE CW ANNOUNCES EARLY PICKUPS FOR FIVE SERIES

Freshman Hit “The Vampire Diaries,” “Gossip Girl,” “90210,” “Supernatural” and “America’s Next Top Model” To Return Next Season

February 16, 2010 (Burbank, California) € The CW Network has given early pickups to five series for next season, including four signature dramas and the reality hit AMERICA’S NEXT TOP MODEL. All five shows will return in Fall 2010.

The series receiving early renewals include this season’s breakout hit THE VAMPIRE DIARIES, The CW’s most-watched show (4.6 million viewers) and the network’s number one show among adults 18-34 (2.5/8). THE VAMPIRE DIARIES premiere generated the largest audience in network history for a series debut (5.7 million total viewers). THE VAMPIRE DIARIES has improved The CW’s performance Thursday at 8:00 p.m. by 114% among women 18-34 this season. The network also renewed fan favorite SUPERNATURAL, which will enter its sixth season next year. SUPERNATURAL has one of the most loyal audiences of any show on television and does heroic work in a perennially tough time period. It has improved over last season among women and adults 18-34 (29% and 8%, respectively) this season, a remarkable accomplishment for a fifth-year show.

Also given early pickups for next season are The CW’s Monday night sensation GOSSIP GIRL, which is The CW’s number one show among its target demographic of women 18-34, and Tuesday’s trend-setting drama, 90210, which sees some of TV’s largest percent increases from DVR playback, nearly doubling its women 18-34 live-only ratings once live+7 data is included. Wednesday anchor AMERICA’S NEXT TOP MODEL will also be back for cycles 15 and 16 with superstar Tyra Banks and new groups of aspiring models. TOP MODEL continues to rank second in the competitive Wednesday 8:00 p.m. hour among young women 18-34 (3.4/10.)

A Very Brady Friday

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of meeting two TV icons in the same day. Coincidentally, they come from the same TV family. And it was only fitting that I would meet Jan Brady (Eve Plumb) and her TV mom Carol (Florence Henderson) on a Friday, the day on which The Brady Bunch aired on ABC from 1969-74.

Eve had stopped by the Sirius XM studios, appearing on the 2nd hour of the Frank DeCaro Show on OutQ to promote the February 18 opening of a New York gallery exhibit of her paintings.

Then, that night, Frank and I headed downtown to Joe's Pub, to catch Florence Henderson in her two-night show, "All The Lives of Me... A Musical Journey." In her very intimate and personal performance, Henderson talks about life not only as Carol Brady, but as a Broadway musical star, and even as a young girl, growing up as the 10th and youngest child of a poor Kentucky family.

In fact, in that section, Henderson talked about how as a very young girl, she was often forced by her mother to literally sing for the large clan's supper, to earn groceries from the local store. With that, she did some funny "crowd work" as she worked her way through the room, passing a cowboy hat for donations as she repeatedly sang "You Are My Sunshine."

It turns out, of course, that Henderson donates the proceeds from whenever she does this bit -- which she then personally matches -- to a local charity -- in this case, Broadway Cares / Equity Fights AIDS. The star has a personal connection to the cause, as her Brady co-star Robert Reed died of the disease in the early '90s.

And so coming up soon, she and her TV daughter Eve will appear together on stage, when Florence hosts Broadway Backwards 5, a one-night only lineup where performers will sing musical numbers originally written for the opposite gender. The show, where the two Brady ladies will be doing a duet, will be on February 22 at the Vivian Beaumont Theater at New York's Lincoln Center. Because after all, giving back is a very Brady thing to do.

Vanessa Williams Introduces You to the Stars of Classic TV

For the past 5 years, I've been working with a fabulous organization within the Television Academy in Los Angeles, the Archive of American Television. The Archive is an unprecedented catalog of revealing, behind-the-scenes interviews with over 600 television industry greats -- from stars to producers, executives and other creative talent.

Now, those interviews are available to be viewed online, at the Archive's home page, EmmyTVLegends.org. Check out my chats with Jayne Meadows, The Cosby Show's Phylicia Rashad, Cagney & Lacey Star Tyne Daly, Get Smart's beautiful Agent 99, Barbara Feldon, and so many others conducted by preeminent TV experts and journalists.

Below, in a newly produced video promoting the Archive, the incredible star of Ugly Betty, Vanessa Williams, will introduce you to the Archive's resources. "What the Academy Foundation has done with EmmyTVLegends.org is amazing," she enthused in a press announcement of the video. "I am proud to help spread the word about this incredible resources for TV fans worldwide."

And an incredible resource it is, too, full of little-known anecdotes, unique perspectives, and eyewitness accounts from the top names in TV, past and present. The interviews can be watched in their entirety, or browsed by person, show, topic or profession. Check them out! You just might come across a gem, such as when Golden Girl Rue McClanahan slipped, at my request, into Blanche Devereaux's voice to talk about her "many, many men." Priceless!

That's Not What Your Girlfriend Says!

The greatest thing about this past weekend: the debut of the new Snickers commercial starring the 88-years-young Betty White. I won't give it away, but there's a surprise appearance at the end by another elder TV veteran that's equally hysterical.

With commercials like these, it almost makes it worth watching whatever sports thingy -- something with Roman numerals -- during which this aired yesterday. Almost. (Thank God for YouTube!)

Greetings from Manhatan

Okay, so here's what we know about the membrane universe(s) on Fringe:

1) It's 2010

2) Obama is president

3) On 9/11, terrorists attacked the Pentagon and the White House (but not the Twin Towers in New York)

4) Some office worker guy -- who now has 4 legs and a head growing out of his stomach -- was married, whereas he's not in our reality. (How many does he have of other body parts? If that guy were still alive, well let's just say I know of one lucky girl!)

5) Somewhere, in some other reality, Peter Bishop disappeared as a young boy (to replace our dearly departed young Peter Bishop here.)

And oh yeah --

6) New York City is referred to as "Manhatan," spelled with only one "t."

That was, for me (a copy editor and a Virgo to boot), the most jarring part of this past Thursday's episode, "Jacksonville": the realization that either

a) somewhere in the last nearly 400 years of history, someone aiming to name this invaluable island came up with a different bastardization of the name "Mannahatta," given by the local Lenape native tribe

or

b) somewhere in the last season on creator JJ Abrams' staff, someone made a giant spelling mistake in the floating, 3-D location name chyrons for which Fringe has become famous.

Normally, I'm a cynic. But having witnessed for two seasons now how clever Fringe and its writers can be, I'm leaning heavily toward b). Let's just hope "Manhatan" doesn't decide to send us any more of its edifices in exchange for one of our own. I like my limbs just where they are, thank you.

Forget the Saints and the Colts -- I'm for Team Betty!

I've always said that, even now at age 88, Betty White is still an energetic force of nature who can do anything. And that includes taking to the field for a game of touch (hopefully just touch!) football. Check out this sneak peek of her hilarious Super Bowl ads for Snickers, debuting this weekend during the game:

Ricky Gervais on The Office?

At the HBO presentation for Ricky Gervais' new self-titled animated show at the TV Critics' Association conference, Gervais revealed that there have preliminary talks about him making some kind of appearance this season on the American version of The Office.

Speaking of that show, which Gervais of course originated back in the UK, he says that it would be a "huge mistake" for him to go back and revisit that series in its original British form, but that maybe there's a slight glimmer of hope that he might someday return to making more of HBO's Extras, which he says he believes still has "a little bit of legs to it."

The Ricky Gervais Show -- an animated version of his hugely popular series of radio podcasts debuts on HBO on February 19 at 9PM. And of course, catch Gervais as the host of The Golden Globe Awards this Sunday night, January 17 at 7PM Eastern on NBC.

Eric, Julia, and Marriage Equality

I couldn't believe when I came across this video on YouTube, with two of my favorite TV stars of all time. Please -- back in 2004, I would not rest until I got the assignment to write a book about Eric McCormack, and now have threatened the lives of my fellow editors at CBS Watch! magazine if any of them attempts to sidle up to Julia Louis-Dreyfus before I do.

Now, to see them both together, not only being their funny and gorgeous selves (yes, I'd go both ways for them) but advocating for marriage equality? I'll admit it -- I think I just messed myself a little.

Happy Town vs Twin Peaks

At today's TCA, critics who have seen clips of ABC's upcoming series Happy Town began the session by comparing the show, set in a seemingly idyllic Minnesota town bedeviled by the serial killer "The Magic Man," to another ABC classic, the early '90s show Twin Peaks.

According to executive producer Scott Rosenberg, some similarities may be intentional, since exec producer Josh Appelbaum and others on the show are huge fans of the show; Rosenberg, he admits, was not. "So if you think it's too much like Twin Peaks, blame them. If you think it's not enough like Twin Peaks, blame me."

Rosenberg says he's actually more a Stephen King fan -- "Salem's Lot was a huge book in my childhood like Twin Peaks was to them," he explained. "So it's like a stem cell smush of Salem's Lot and Twin Peaks. No one did better that small town thing like [King did] with Castle Rock."

Appelbaum and Rosenberg were also the creators of two other failed series, Life on Mars and October Road, "which for some reason you people hated more than anything. We were treated like Michael Vick," Rosenberg joked. But as even he admitted, in that series, "there wasn't a lot of incident. It was just a small town world. But we loved that world, the small town and the sense of community. So we thought, 'Let's do October Road, but where shit happens.' That should be our tag line actually. 'October Road, where shit happens.'"

That shit, the producers went on to explain, won't include Peaks' predilection for weird midgets and supernatural phenomena. As Appelbaum explains, "Twin Peaks was very much set in a world that was wholly bizarre. Happy Town is much more the real world. there are dark corners to all of that. there are certainly surreal moments that pop up, but it's very grounded in the real world."

The producers reveal that they created Happy Town -- set in the fictional town of Haplin, MN but filmed in Port Hope, Ontario -- upon realizing that "there isn't a scary show on TV that doesn't fall into 2 categories. There's 'forensic porn,' which is bodies and women being abused, or vampires. And we realized, 'What about doing a show that's scary but very earthbound and grounded in reality?'"

Lauren German's character's Henley is our entry point into Haplin, and seems from the clips to be soon in jeopardy due to the Magic Man, whose terror reign had seemingly ended years before but has now begun anew. "There are a ton of entry points into the show," Appelbaum explained. If you're into romance, or crime, the show will hook you in.

And unlike with Twin Peaks, he promises that the core Magic Man mystery will have a satisfying conclusion, within the show's first season. "'[Who Killed] Laura Palmer extended into the second season, but we will answer the question of who is the Magic Man in the final moments of the first season. It's all about playing fair with the audience." And unlike say a show like CBS' Harper's Island -- of which Appelbaum says he was a fan -- Happy Town is prepared for a season 2 even beyond that revelation. "That doesn't mean that the rest of the ensemble will [learn the killer's identity.] It's a shocking revelation, and will turn the show on its head in a big way. It will have cataclysmic repercussions for the town."

Also on the panel: series stars Geoff Stults, Amy Acker, Steven Weber and Sam Neill, who revealed how, even as the cast filmed in the frigid Canadian outdoors last March, the show's producers kept a tight hold on all the show's secrets. "None of us knew whether we were bad guys or good guys so we had to keep things ambivalent." And as far as the identity of The Magic Man, that was kept "on total lockdown."

We won't learn the identity of the Magic Man anytime soon, either; ABC has not yet scheduled the debut of the show's 8 episodes.