TVSquad

Rod Lurie is no stranger to writing strong female characters. In film, he wrote and directed The Contender, with Joan Allen as a woman who was being considered for the Vice Presidency of the United States.

Then with Commander in Chief on ABC, he made Geena Davis the President and actually showed her in action -- until the show was canceled.

Lurie's working on another female-driven drama now for Showtime, but this time it's not about politics. Hillary Jones is the name of the show and the character, a police detective working vice in Los Angeles during the week, but moonlighting as a hooker in Nevada during the weekend.

She's not breaking the law, though, because prostitution -- as you and I know from the movies -- is legal there.

CBS is rounding up some A-listers to appear at The Tony Awards this year. Alec Baldwin (30 Rock), Kristin Chenoweth (Pushing Daisies), Glenn Close (Damages), Richard Griffiths, Laura Linney (John Adams), John Lithgow, Liza Minnelli, Mary-Louise Parker (Weeds), Daniel Radcliffe, Brooke Shields (Lipstick Jungle) and Marisa Tomei will be presenters at this year's award show. As previously announced, Whoopi Goldberg of The View, a Tony-winner herself, will be this year's host.

Also, the Tony Award-winning productions The Lion King and Rent will make rare encore performances at this year's gala.

The 62nd Annual Tony Awards will be broadcast live from Radio City Music Hall on Sunday, June 15th from 8:00 to 11:00 p.m. ET (delayed PT) on CBS. Here's my issue with the Tonys. It's long and it's usually a snore. Do you think this effort to spice up the show will pay off? Does it make you want to tune in?

The New York Post has gotten some dirt on big changes for the next season of Weeds. Season four is going to have some major overhauls.

The show is about a suburban housewife played by Mary-Louise Parker who has to sell marijuana in order to make ends meet after her husband unexpectedly passes away. It's known for having the song "Little Boxes" played in the intro.

Except that it won't anymore. Gone will be the intro song and the location of the show will change to a rundown seaside California town near the Mexican border. This should come as no surprise to regular viewers since the fictional community they lived in burned down at the end of season three.

(S03E01) Oh, Weeds, how I've missed you. I've missed your soft-hearted thugs and manchild stoners. I've missed your misguided children and far more misguided parents. Tonight's episode was pitch-perfect, and while we still don't know whether Peter is dead and whether Nancy will live, we know that the world will keep turning with or without the MILF-weed in it.

Today, Showtime announced that Mary-Kate Olsen will be joining the cast of Weeds as a love interest for Nancy Botwin's (Mary Louise Parker) son, Silas. Normally, I don't find cast additions to be that interesting but this one is definitely news-worthy.

For a generation of TV viewers, the names Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen have become synonymous with safe, children's entertainment. I know that my daughters still enjoy an Olsen twins DVD every now and then and I will never forget being the only adult male in the theatre when I took them to see New York Minute. As I watched them grow up over the years, I often wondered if there would ever come a time when they would try and be taken seriously as actresses (the Olsen twins, not my daughters).

Well, it seems that time has come. By joining the cast of Weeds, Mary-Kate has declared that she is ready to be taken seriously and, more importantly, ready to work without her sister. All things being equal, I have always thought the Olsen sisters had what it took to be stars beyond their chldhood. I guess we will find out soon enough.

Welcome to TV Squad Lists (formerly 'The Five'), a feature where each blogger has a chance to list his or her own rundown of things in television that stand out from the rest, both good and bad.

Being newly single, I've been spending a lot of time these days thinking about the perfect woman. More often than not, my thoughts end up drifting into the realm of television and all of the perfect women there. So I decided to compile a list of the ten hottest moms on television. Unfortunately, there were way too many to fit on a top ten list, so I expanded the list to fifteen. This was a tough list to compile and I'm sure many of your favorites are absent, but I doubt that anyone can refute the fifteen below.

Susan Mayer - Desperate Housewives (Teri Hatcher) Hatcher has always been smoking hot but it wasn't until Desperate Housewives that she became a TV mom. The best part of her character is how Susan is continually clumsy, awkward and unsure of herself and still manages to be hot.

The Golden Globes are so much more entertaining than the Emmys. The celebrities are drunker. The nominees are more worthy. Zero production numbers, and the presenter banter is cut down to a precious minimum. In anticipation of the Globes' broadcast on Monday, January 15th, TV Squad will spend the week recapping the nominees and giving you our best guess as to who will be taking home the shiny goodness.

Starting things off is the Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy category.

(S02E12) Weeds went the way of Tarantino last night with an old-school Mexican stand-off by way of Armenia. The slowly crumbling wall between Nancy's home and work life came down with a mighty thud in a finale that left us with a quasi-kidnapped Shane, a busted Silas and a very dead Peter. There are, to quote Shane's genius commencement speech, "motherfucking snakes on the motherfucking plane" that is Agrestic.

Before beginning this review in earnest, let us take a moment to mourn the passing of Peter. No one really cared about Peter. It was never clear if Nancy really did or not, and frankly, it seems like the writers had backed themselves into a corner so they off-ed him. This is all well and good in that it shows us just how far Heylia is willing to go in her wheeling and dealing, but the TV landscape is now without Hal Hartley regular Martin Donovan. Sigh.

Alright, moment over. On with the review.