All the tube news that’s fit to surf …

– Ed McMahon, TV land’s greatest sidekick as Johnny Carson‘s announcer on The Tonight Show, has died at age 86. The Hollywood veteran had reportedly been battling bone cancer, among other illnesses.

– Yes, it’s true, we sadly haven’t seen the last of Jessica Simpson on reality TV. Simpson will star in The Price of Beauty for VH-1, where she’ll travel around the world and “study the local fashions, dietary fads and beauty regimes and even participate in some of the extreme practices she discovers.”

– Jon and Kate Gosselin confirmed that they’re separating on last night’s Jon & Kate Plus 8 (as if People.com’s confirmation that they’d filed divorce papers earlier in the day didn’t make their announcement moot), and now the speculation is already starting about a possible custody battle.

– Producer/writer Bryan Fuller has left Heroes again, which means there’s little chance of the tired show returning to its first-season glory.

– The View co-host, and Celiac disease book author, Elisabeth Hasselbeck is being sued by another Celiac disease book author, who claims E.H. stole her idea.

– Bravo is launching a new series in which host Andy Cohen will talk about … other Bravo series.

– And tonight in primetime:

– The fourth season premiere of America’s Got Talent (9PM ET, NBC), with newbie host Nick Cannon
– The series premiere of NYC Prep (10PM, Bravo)
– The Real Housewives of New Jersey Watch What Happens Reunion (9PM, Bravo)
– The second season premiere of The Cleaner (10PM, A&E)
– The premiere of the Battle of the Network Stars-ish The Superstars (8PM, ABC)
– Cloris Leachman and Theo Huxtable, a.k.a. Malcolm-Jamal Warner guest star on HawthoRNe (9PM, TNT)
– The finale of Life After People on History Channel (10PM)
– Rescue Me‘s creative resurgence continues on FX (10PM)
– And Ted learns about Phil and Lem’s fight club – make that a medieval fight club, in the Veridian basement – in a hilarious new episode of Better Off Ted (9:30PM, ABC)

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• Filed in TV News
• Tags: America's Got Talent, Andy Cohen, Better Off Ted, Bravo, Bryan Fuller, Cloris Leachman, Ed McMahon, Elisabeth Hasselbeck, Hawthorne, Heroes, Jessica Simpson, Jon and Kate Gosselin divorce, Malcolm-Jamal Warner, Nick Cannon, NYC Prep, Real Housewives of New Jersey reunion, Rescue Me, The Cleaner, The Price of Beauty

HawthoRNe
Stars: 2.5 out of 5

Stars: Jada Pinkett Smith, Michael Vartan and Vanessa Lengies

The Big Idea: Pinkett Smith is Christina Hawthorne (or HawthoRNe, as the annoying capitalization in the show title insists, making me seriously wonder if they named the character that just to be able to use ALL CAPS on the R and the N … but I digress), the compassionate Chief Nursing Officer at Richmond Trinity Hospital who’s raising her teenage daughter by herself since the death of her husband a year earlier. Hawthorne’s more interested in helping people and getting things done than being a stickler for rules, which, of course, leads to many a head-butting with administrators, including her friend and chief of surgery, Tom Wakefield (Michael Vartan).

To Watch or Not to Watch: I would have guessed that I wouldn’t like the show just because I’m not a fan of Pinkett Smith. But she’s always been good at playing tough characters, and does that again here, though she mixes it with a healthy dose of vulnerability and compassion that makes her and her character likable.

There’s also the usual hospital chaos to keep the drama ratcheted up to a respectable level (a friend of Hawthorne and her late husband’s – played by 24‘s D.B. “Wayne Palmer” Woodside – tries to commit suicide by making a wicked swan dive off the hospital roof in the premiere’s opening moments), some quirky characters (including an awkward male nurse who’s trying to fit in as the new guy on staff) and the resident hunk (George Clooney‘s stint on ER taught everyone in TV land that you can’t even think about making a medical drama without one) in Alias vet Vartan, who does have a spark with Pinkett Smith.

The problem: The cast and the set-up are likable enough, but the whole show feels very by-the-book. There’s some mystery surrounding the death of Hawthorne’s husband – we find out in the premiere he died of cancer, but the specific circumstances of his death will be a question the show will milk throughout future episodes – but otherwise, medical drama fans have been here, seen this before.

TV Screener Tidbit: One reason to at least keep Hawthorne on your DVR radar: a string of upcoming guest stars that includes Malcolm-Jamal Warner, Cloris Leachman and Chuck star Sarah Lancaster.

UPDATE: Directly from a Tweet by actor James Morrison, who 24 fans know as the heroic Bill Buchanan, he’ll be a recurring guest star on Hawthorne. Beginning with the June 30 episode, Morrison plays hospital CEO John Morrissey.

HawthoRNe premieres Tuesday, June 16, at 9PM ET on TNT

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• Filed in Review - TV
• Tags: Alias, Chuck, Cloris Leachman, D.B. Woodside, ER, George Clooney, Hawthorne, Jada Pinkett Smith, Malcolm-Jamal Warner, medical drama, Michael Vartan, Sarah Lancaster, Vanessa Lengies