TVSquad

It's always a good thing when an Oscar winner deigns to do TV, and based on her past efforts, I have high hopes for The Tower knowing that Marcia Gay Harden has joined the cast. The Tower, is a new CBS pilot about a group of Chicago reporters. Marcia Gay Harden is going to play Zoe, the millionaire owner of the newspaper, the leader of the pack.

Since winning the 2001 best supporting Oscar for Pollack, which was directed and co-starred her husband Ed Harris, Marcia's gone back and forth between TV and features. She received another Oscar nom for Mystic River in 2004, and last season did a memorable -- and Emmy nominated -- turn as a determined, driven FBI agent on Law & Order: SVU.

In order to create more buzz about its new Monday show K-Ville, Fox decided to put the full pilot online for U.S. citizens to watch. Surely, they hope that TV fans will watch it before its September 17 premiere and blog about it, thus generating a buzz (and creating a free marketing campaign).

K-Ville, a series starring Antony Anderson and Cole Hauser, is a police drama set in New Orleans, two years after Katrina hit the city. The series follows cops who remained active after the devastating event as they try to reclaim and rebuild the city.

Just when I thought it was another field trip.

Rather than load all 200 plus members of the TCA on a plane to New Orleans, Fox decided to have a N.O.-themed party at Les Deux, a trendy restaurant in Hollywood in honor of its new series K-Ville, which has cast Anthony Anderson and Cole Hauser as cops in a post-Katrina Louisiana.

There was only man who could give me the full scoop on this series and what it will mean to New Orleans -- Times Picayune TV columnist Dave Walker

Fox entertainment president Kevin Reilly answered inquiries from TCA members on Sunday about a big name exiting the network -- only the network was NBC and the departure was Reilly's own.

Reilly poked fun at the standard reasons found in press releases that are used to explain a person's leaving a top gig. "No one is ever really fired in Hollywood are they," he rhetorically asked, adding, "You can pick whatever trade euphemism you want [to explain my exit from NBC]. 'I segued.' 'I thought about it over the holidays.' I want to spend more time with my family, which I did for three days.'"

Then, Fox hired him to work with Peter Liguori, the network's entertainment chairman.

Fox really only has a handful of new pilots to premiere next season because it's holding on to mega ratings-getters like American Idol, House, Prison Break, and 24... to name a few. It's replacing last season's stinkers such as Standoff and Justice.

At its upfronts presentation last month, the net announced two new reality shows, three new comedies and five new dramas. Of those, we have seen all the comedies and dramas except a drama called Nashville, which Fox has not yet released for preview.