Rob Owen stories, Page 18
TV Talk: PBS explores ‘Breaking the News,’ plans for America’s 250th
PASADENA, Calif. – PBS’s “Independent Lens” chronicles the 2020 start-up website 19thnews.org, co-founded by Emily Ramshaw, in the film “Breaking the News” (10-11:30 p.m. Feb. 19, WQED-TV). Ramshaw, who is featured heavily in the film, has ties to Pittsburgh and perhaps a genetic nose for news. Her mother, Mary Leonard,...
TV Talk: Best/worst Super Bowl ads; Pittsburgh native Jeff Goldblum appears in 3
Advertisers largely avoided weird, non-sequitur ads in favor of celebrity-starring commercials during Super Bowl LVIII. And often the spots didn’t feature just one star — additional bold-name folks made cameos. Pittsburgh native Jeff Goldblum not only starred in an Apartments.com ad but he also had a cameo in a Homes.com...
TV Talk: WPXI-TV back on DirecTV; Jon Burnett and CTE
A little more than a week after Cox Media Group stations, including Pittsburgh’s WPXI-TV, went dark on DirecTV, the two companies reached a deal. Channel 11 is now back on DirecTV. The retransmission dispute began on Feb. 3 and was resolved just in time for Cox-owned CBS stations in other...
TV Talk at TCA: ‘Percy Jackson’ and its Pa. teen star plot 2nd season; ‘Ghosts’ returnsVideo
PASADENA, Calif. – Last week, Disney+ renewed “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” for a second season that will be based on the novel “Sea of Monsters” and on Saturday, the show’s three young lead actors described how their lives have changed since the show’s premiere. “Mostly it’s been with my...
TV Talk at TCA: ‘Space Race’ profiles Black astronauts; Peak TV peaksVideo
PASADENA, Calif. — “The Space Race: The Untold Story of the First Black Astronauts” (9 p.m. Monday, National Geographic Channel; next day on Hulu, Disney+) profiles NASA legends past and present, including Ed Dwight, who had a successful military career before he was recruited to an Air Force training program...
TV Talk: W.Pa. pups compete in ‘Puppy Bowl XX;’ area native hosts ‘Rescue Bowl’Video
Super Bowl Sunday has gone to the dogs — this time to some dogs with local ties. The annual pet-centric tradition of “Great American Rescue Bowl” (noon-2 p.m. today, Great American Family), hosted by Fox Chapel native Beth Ostrosky Stern, and “Puppy Bowl” (2 p.m. today, Animal Planet, Discovery, TBS,...
TV Talk at TCA: More ‘Dead’ on ABC, AMCVideo
PASADENA, Calif. – The dead live with the return of comedy “Not Dead Yet” on ABC and “The Walking Dead” franchise expanding yet again on AMC. ‘The Walking Dead’ It’s easy to be cynical and suggest AMC has gone to its undead well one, two or three too many times...
TV Talk at TCA: Andie MacDowell sees ‘Groundhog Day’ parallels in Hallmark series; PBS profiles ‘Gospel’Video
PASADENA, Calif. – Actress Andie MacDowell stars in Hallmark Channel’s “The Way Home” (9 p.m. Sunday), a multi-generational family drama in its second season about Kat (Chyler Leigh) and her daughter (Sadie Laflamme-Snow) who can travel between the past and present via a pond on the family’s land. They’re in...
TV Talk at TCA: CBS premieres ‘Tracker;’ BET+ debuts ‘Diarra’Video
PASADENA, Calif. – For his first post-“This is Us” series, actor Justin Hartley goes the procedural route with CBS’s “Tracker,” debuting Sunday after “Super Bowl LVIII” (approximately 10 p.m.; subsequent episodes will air at 9 p.m. Sundays, KDKA-TV). Hartley stars as Colter Shaw, a self-described “rewardist” who tracks down missing...
TV Q&A: Does WPXI have a new sports anchor?Video
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Sunday Tribune-Review. Q: Is Shelby Cassesse a new sports anchor at WPXI or is she just filling in until Alby Oxenreiter returns? — Ryan, via email Rob: Cassesse...
TV Talk at TCA: CBS’s ‘Watson’ will be set in Pittsburgh; Apple TV+ explores ‘New Look’ of post-WWII ParisVideo
PASADENA, Calif. – Last month, CBS announced a straight-to-series order for “Watson,” a medical drama starring Morris Chestnut (“The Resident,” “Rosewood”) as Dr. John Watson, who resumes his career a year after the death of his friend and crime-solving partner, Sherlock Holmes. Sounds like the kind of drama procedural that’s...
TV Talk: WTAE hires news director; ‘Dish’ returns on WPCB
WTAE found a news director to fill the shoes of Jim Parsons, who will retire later this month. Baylor Long, currently news director at sister Hearst station WVTM-TV in Birmingham, Ala., joins Channel 4 on March 4. Long will be a familiar face in the WTAE newsroom: Before his stint...
TV Talk: WPXI-TV goes dark on DirecTV; Waterston exits ‘Law & Order’
As of Saturday morning, WPXI-TV is no longer available to DirecTV customers, the latest retransmission dispute that impacts local viewers, this time between Channel 11 parent company Cox Media Group and DirecTV. In a statement at WPXI.com, the station says, “DIRECTV has dropped WPXI from its lineup.” In its competing...
TV Talk: Millennial ennui meets ‘Mr. & Mrs. Smith’Video
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers a viewing tip for the coming week. The 2005 film “Mr. & Mrs. Smith” worked well as both a high-concept thriller and as a coming out for the romantic relationship between stars Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, who played married assassins hired...
TV Talk: KDKA adds co-hosts to ‘Talk Pittsburgh’
After rotating through a number of top-of-show hosts in recent months, KDKA-TV has settled on a co-host for Heather Abraham on “Talk Pittsburgh” (3 p.m. weekdays). Beginning Monday, Abraham will be joined by Mikey Hood (“Pittsburgh Today Live”) and Kelly Dzanaj, on-air personality at Star 100.7 FM. Boaz Frankel, who...
TV Talk: FX debuts dull ‘Feud;’ WQED-TV covers Carnegie InternationalVideo
Usually, FX is eager to get TV critics’ opinions on its shows in advance of a premiere, so its marketing team can splash positive notices all over ads in Hollywood trade magazines, burnishing the network’s deserved brand of quality, critically applauded, award-winning entertainment. Most of the time these embargoes, the...
TV Q&A: Why more than 1 color analyst on Penguins games?
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Sunday Tribune-Review. Q: I was sorry that Pens ownership dropped Bob Errey as a color analyst on TV broadcasts. This season has rotated at least three different announcers....
TV Talk: Former Pittsburgher Loren Allred exits ‘AGT: Fantasy League’Video
In Monday’s “AGT: Fantasy League” former Pittsburgher Loren Allred competed in the show’s semi-finals by singing her own spin on “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” She made it into the Top 2 for the night but ultimately did not advance to the show’s finals, ending her competition tenure on “AGT: Fantasy...
TV Talk: McCandless native plays Rustin in Nat Geo’s ‘Genius: MLK/X’Video
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers a viewing tip for the coming week. There’s occasionally weird serendipity in Hollywood casting when it comes to Pittsburgh ties. Netflix’s “Rustin,” a bio-pic about gay civil rights leader Bayard Rustin played by actor Colman Domingo, filmed in Pittsburgh. Now McCandless native...
TV Talk: WPXI-TV hires weekend morning anchor, faces retransmission spat with DirecTV
WPXI-TV hired New Kensington native Jatara McGee to be the station’s new weekend morning anchor beginning in mid-February. Current weekend morning anchor Alyssa Raymond will move to anchor the weekday noon newscast on Channel 11 after Katherine Amenta and Gordon Loesch took on an additional 7 a.m. weekday newscast on...
TV Talk: ‘Masters of the Air’ takes flight with epic WWII storyVideo
After HBO’s Tom Hanks/Steven Spielberg-produced 2001 miniseries “Band of Brothers” and its 2010 follow-up, “The Pacific,” the premium cable network put a third WWII limited series into development in 2013 that would track the air war over Europe, “Masters of the Air.” But on the way to screens, the streaming...
TV Q&A: Why do many TV news personalities return from vacation on a Thursday?
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Sunday Tribune-Review. Q: I have always wondered why so many folks who work for broadcast media return from their vacations on a Thursday or Friday. I’ve seen this...
TV Talk: Former Pittsburgher, ‘Greatest Showman’ singer competes on ‘AGT: Fantasy League’Video
Although she’s becoming known as the true singer of “Never Enough” in 2017’s movie musical hit “The Greatest Showman,” former Pittsburgher Loren Allred said, “Enough!” to a career in the public eye after her first reality show experience on NBC’s “The Voice” in 2012. It took a decade to find...
TV Talk: Pittsburgher Daniel Moore competed on latest ‘Jeopardy!’
Daniel Moore’s return to “Jeopardy!” proved short-lived. Moore, a 33-year-old contract compliance analyst in the office of business diversity in the mayor of Pittsburgh’s office, first competed on the quiz show last summer and won $41,800 over three episodes. He returned this week as part of the show’s “Season 39...
TV Talk: Netflix’s ‘Griselda’ embraces TV characters’ love of bad choicesVideo
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers a viewing tip for the coming week. Netflix’s new series “Griselda,” streaming Thursday and starring Sofia Vergara (“Modern Family,” ex- of Mt. Lebanon native Joe Manganiello), tells a fictionalized account of the real queenpin Griselda Blanco, who led a powerful drug cartel...
