The “C” in CBS can now officially stand for Chuck as top producer Chuck Lorre will have four series on the network in the fall. I’ve learned that CBS will pick up Lorre’s comedy pilot Mom to series tomorrow, a full week before the network’s upfront presentation. It will be the first pilot from this year’s crop to get a series order. A select few A-list producers get early pickup deadlines from the networks, giving them a window to shop the projects elsewhere if they get a pass. Lorre understandably is in that category with an unusually early deadline for Mom this year even by those standards. Not that there has ever been any doubt that CBS would exercise its option to pick up Mom to series. Written on spec by Lorre, Eddie Gorodetsky and Gemma Baker, Mom has been sailing through the pilot process with a hot script, top-notch cast led by Anna Faris and Allison Janney and great table read and taping that led to a finished pilot that has been well received. The series, produced by Warner Bros TV and Chuck Lorre Prods., centers on a newly sober single mom (Faris) who tries to pull her life together in Napa Valley. It is eyed for the Monday 8:30 PM slot following the final season of How I Met Your Mother – which is exec produced/directed by Pam Fryman, who also helmed the Mom pilot. Despite his tremendous workload, Lorre focused a lot of energy and passion on Mom this season. He will now have the rare distinction of having four series on the schedule in the fall: Mom and the returning Two And A Half Men, The Big Bang Theory and Mike & Molly. The Mom cast also includes Nate Corddry, Blake Garrett Rosenthal, Matt Jones, Spencer Daniels, Sadie Calvano and French Stewart.

With one of the CBS comedy slots going to Mom as expected, attention will shift to the fierce competition for the other berths. If CBS expands in comedy as speculated, given that the network brass seem higher on their comedy development versus drama this season, estimates are that the network could pick up as many as four new comedy series for next season, leaving three slots for the multi-camera Greg Garcia and Friends With Better Lives and single-camera Rob Greenberg and Crazy Ones as well as a potential wild card from several others who are in contention when testing results come in.

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Allison Janney is in talks to join New Line’s Melissa McCarthy comedy “Tammy” opposite Susan Sarandon and Mark Duplass.

Project is on track to begin shooting next month with McCarthy starring and co-directing with spouse Ben Falcone. McCarthy and Falcone are also producing from a script they co-wrote.

Pic follows a women who, after losing her job and learning that her husband has been unfaithful, hits the road with her profane, hard-drinking grandmother (Sarandon).

Janney would play the mother of McCarthy’s character.

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TLC has commissioned the two-hour film Letters To Jackie: Remembering President Kennedy, co-produced by Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker Bill Couturié’s The Couturie Co. and Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Television. Based on the book Letters To Jackie: Condolences from a Grieving Nation by Ellen Fitzpatrick, the film revisits the months following the assassination of President Kennedy, when more than 800,000 US citizens and mourners around the world reached out to the First Lady in support. Letters To Jackie spotlights the strength and unity that emerged during one of the most difficult times in American history. It will premiere in the fall to mark the 50th anniversary of the President’s assassination. Bringing the letters to live are 20 celebrities, including Bérénice Bejo, Demián Bichir, Jessica Chastain, Chris Cooper, Viola Davis, Zooey Deschanel, Kirsten Dunst, Anne Hathaway, Allison Janney, John Krasinski, Melissa Leo, Laura Linney, Frances McDormand, Chloë Grace Moretz, Mark Ruffalo, Octavia Spencer, Hailee Steinfeld, Channing Tatum, Betty White and Michelle Williams. Letters To Jackie is written and directed by Bill Couturié and produced by Anne Sandkuhler and Couturié. Darryl Frank and Justin Falvey exec produce.

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Allison Janney is headed to Showtime’s Masters of Sex.

Showtime Orders ‘Ray Donovan’ and ‘Masters of Sex’ to Series
The actress, who won four Emmys for The West Wing, has booked a five-episode arc on the upcoming drama starring Michael Sheen and Lizzy Caplan, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.
Masters of Sex centers on the real-life pioneers of the science of human sexuality, William Masters (Sheen) and Virginia Johnson (Caplan). The one-hour drama chronicles the unusual lives, romance and pop culture trajectory of Masters and Johnson. Their research touched off the sexual revolution and took them from a mid-western teaching hospital in St. Louis to the cover of Time.

Janney will play Margaret Scully, the wife of university provost Barton Scully (Beau Bridges). Caitlin Fitzgerald, as Masters’ wife; Nicholas D’Agosto; and Teddy Sears co-star in the drama, with Bridges and Margo Martindale also appearing.

Masters of Sex will premiere Sunday, Sept. 29 at 10 p.m. on Showtime.

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A reading of the screenplay of David Mamet’s Glengarry Glenn Ross, the Pulitzer Prize-winning play about sharks in a real-estate office, will be presented Feb. 21 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

Part of Jason Reitman’s “Live Read” series, which features readings of iconic movie scripts, the evening will begin at 7:30 PM.

An all-female cast will star in the reading of the Mamet work, which was penned for an all-male company.

The company, according to EW.com, will feature Robin Wright as Ricky Roma, Catherine O’Hara as Shelley Levene, Maria Bello as Dave Moss, Allison Janney as George Aaronow and Mae Whitman as John Williamson.

“We toyed with the idea of doing a gender swap on a film like ‘Top Gun,’ but instead decided on a full reverse from men to women,” Reitman told EW.com. “’Glengarry’ was [critic] Elvis [Mitchell's] idea. It’s the perfect candidate as there is no reason this script needs to be read by men outside of our own social stereotypes.”

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Allison Janney was always on the move as a child. The “West Wing” actress played sports and enjoyed figure skating, so staying active was easy. But over the years, exercise took a back seat to Janney’s evolving career.
“I think when ‘West Wing’ ended, I just went into a slump,” she recently said.
We all did, Ms. Janney.
Thankfully the popular government drama is back, available for streaming on Netflix due to a new deal with Warner Bros. that sent fans to the couch in rerun ecstasy. And Janney has returned to her active lifestyle, dropping 20 pounds by focusing on her diet and daily hikes with her dogs.
Janney’s had more than one high-profile role since “The West Wing” ended: She played the dog-obsessed mom in “Juno,” a Southern socialite in “The Help” and Matthew Perry’s crazy boss on “Mr. Sunshine.” But Janney said White House press secretary C.J. Cregg will always be one of her favorite characters.
“I feel proud,” she said. “I feel like I can die happy; I did something good. Not that I’m planning on dying anytime soon.”

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he American Heart Association’s Go Red For Women is asking America to go RED in celebration of the 10th National Wear Red Day on February 1, 2013. For 10 years, women have been fighting heart disease – the No. 1 killer of women – both individually and together as part of the Go Red For Women movement. To date, more than 627,000 women’s lives have been saved, but the fight is far from over. Women need the right information, education and care, in order to treat, prevent, and even end heart disease.

“An estimated 43 million women in the U.S. are affected by heart disease, yet only one in five women believe heart disease is her greatest health threat,” said Dr. Jennifer Mieres, Professor of Cardiology and Senior Vice President of Community and Public Health at North Shore – LIJ Health System. “That’s why it’s so important to understand your personal risk factors and often-overlooked common symptoms, and to share that information with the women you love.”

“I was shocked to learn that heart disease is more deadly than all forms of cancer combined,” said Go Red For Women supporter Allison Janney. “My mother’s quadruple bypass surgery was an eye-opening experience. I’m now making heart healthy changes to reduce my own risk, and have joined with Go Red For Women to educate other women about what they can do. Together, women have the power to save our own lives.”

Read more: http://broadwayworld.com/article/Allison-Janney-Judy-Kaye-and-More-Join-American-Heart-Associations-Go-Red-For-Women-20130130#ixzz2JWmwHkbA

The “West Wing” actress joins previously cast Anna Faris in the CBS pilot, which centers on a newly sober single mom who tries to pull her life together in Napa Valley.

The West Wing’s Allison Janney has joined the CBS mutlicamera entry, which centers on a newly sober single mom who tries to pull her life together in Napa Valley. Anna Faris has been tapped to play the single mother, with Janney now on board as her mother, Bonnie.

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Has that ever been an issue as far as interacting with other actors who are way shorter than you?
No, I mean, sometimes people love to take advantage of that. Aaron Sorkin wrote one of the funniest lines for me and Kristin Chenoweth [on The West Wing]. We were in a scene together, doing a walk-and-talk. I think at first they made me have my shoes on and took Kristin’s off, and I look down at her and I said, “I can’t believe we’re even in the same species.” So people like to take advantage of it for comedic reasons. Anyone who hires me is very aware of my height and doesn’t have a problem with it.

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