Roger and Chaz Ebert looking for other funding for their film reviews show.

http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2011/11/unless_we_find_an_angel.html

I'll repeat some of what I've said here in the past:
Yes, it's good that Roger Ebert put a film review show on television to take up the gap left when The Walt Disney Company guillotined AT THE MOVIES.

But, like the sad season of AT THE MOVIES when Ben Mankiewicz was shackled to shallow Ben (son of Jeffrey) Lyons, Ignatly the Intellect is handcuffed a la 39 STEPS to supersmiling-though-not-dumb Christy Lemire (essentially Richard "careerist" Roeper in drag).

And I don't understand why Roger and Chaz Ebert seem to have a weakness for too-eager-to-be-telegenic cardboard people like Lemire and Roeper.  Perhaps too much deference to TV execs who were likely in preschool when Roger won his Pulitzer Prize.

If the current Ebert show fails to find non-Ebert money to produce and dies a premature death, all one can say is to read Roger's very good autobiography LIFE ITSELF and seek out old clips of SISKEL AND EBERT in its various incarnations to see film criticism on television done right.

[UPDATE 11/11/11: Here's Chaz Ebert thanking viewers of EBERT PRESENTS for their support thus far: http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2011/11/a_personal_message_from_chaz_e.html#more]

Paula Abdul, Ben Lyons and Ben Mankiewicz now on the unemployment line.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/05/ben-lyons-ben-mankiewicz-_n_252150.html
http://www.popeater.com/2009/08/05/ryan-seacrest-paula-abdul-leaving-american-idol/
http://www.popeater.com/2009/08/05/paula-abdul-replacements/

It's safe to say that Lyons will keep his E! job and Mankiewicz may be seen again on TCM, but Abdul will face the kind of Industry sexism which hates tantrums and dysfunctionality from women, but turns a blind eye when it erupts from members of the male gender.

So I'll predict Paula's immediate future on TV will be solely as a salesperson of her jewelry line on QVC.

But here's a more positive assessment of Paula Abdul's past, present and possible future from Richard Rushfield, who used to be on the AMERICAN IDOL beat for the LOS ANGELES TIMES' Calendar section: http://gawker.com/5330632/five-reasons-paula-abdul-quit-american-idol?skyline=true&s=x

[UPDATE 8/6/09: TMZ post says that negotiations could still be going on:http://www.tmz.com/2009/08/06/paula-leaves-a-i-a-hoax/?icid=mainhtmlws-maindl3link3http%3A%2F%2Fwww.tmz.com%2F2009%2F08%2F06%2Fpaula-leaves-a-i-a-hoax%2F And perhaps it's time to bring former President and current crisis envoy Bill Clinton in as an arbitrator.]

Critic Erik Childress on the continuing trainwreck of AT THE MOVIES.

Thanks again to Jeffrey Wells' HOLLYWOOD ELSEWHERE for providing this link to an article by Erik Childress, which, while a bit long, comments on Ben Lyons (the smarmy one) and Ben Mankiewicz's (the smarter one) sitdown with an Associated Press TV scribe to spin AT THE MOVIES as turning the corner and heading towards success: http://www.efilmcritic.com/feature.php?feature=2689

The article also reminds readers of Ben Lyons' Greatest Hits during his critical career for E! and Disney, including his "One of the Greatest Films Ever" blurb about the Will Smith remake of I AM LEGEND.

After having my head explode and my stomach turn from witnessing young Lyons' terminal glibness, I quit watching AT THE MOVIES months ago.

One final comment about the Childress article:
Apparently, Lyons father, hack critic Jeffrey Lyons (who still has a TV show carried by NBC affiliates), once called Roger Ebert a "putz."

The mind boggles when you consider what Ebert has achieved vs. what Lyons and his nonillustrious son don't even try for.