BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. -- In addition to his judge/executive producer duties on "So You Think You Can Dance," Nigel Lythgoe is also an executive producer on the Fox monster hit "American Idol." He praised the "Dance" contestants, saying, "There isn't a Sanjaya here," but noted that mistakes were made on "Idol" last season. "I think Sanjaya helped the last season very well when we were sort of going down and everyone's going, 'Oh, the talent's not as good this year.' Sanjaya came through for us."
Lythgoe said "Idol" spent too much time on the "Idol" mentors and not enough time on the competitors.
"We didn't know them as much as we knew the Kelly Picklers from the season before," he said. "So this season, we've really gone out of our way to focus on the competitors' thoughts, their feelings, their emotions, so that we're all attached to them a little more than if they were just dance competitors, and I think that's affected us all."
While Lythgoe said the next round of "Idol" will look to "increase the emotional hooks for the audience," he doesn't want to do it at the expense of the talent.
"I think there is enough talent with enough great stories to warrant the fact that we are basing it on talent," he said.
Nick Ut, Associated PressAmy Sherman-Palladino -- Won't reveal her "Gilmore Girls" ending.
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'Gilmore' gossip
At Fox's press tour to promote her new midseason sitcom, "The Return of Jezebel James," "Gilmore Girls" creator Amy Sherman-Palladino finally revealed the final line of dialogue from Lorelai (Lauren Graham) to Rory (Alexis Bledel) that she would have ended the series with if she had gotten to write it: "You're adopted."
She's kidding.
"Just sell the entire series out," she said, laughing.
Sherman-Palladino, who departed the show after its penultimate season, refused to reveal the actual last line of dialogue she had in mind, just in case there's ever a reunion movie. She said she did not watch the finale that aired on The CW in May.
"I just got very drunk that night and sat in the corner ... and it was very quiet," Sherman-Palladino said. "I couldn't watch it because it wasn't going to be my ending. It wasn't going to be what I have had in my head forever, and I was going to do something crazy, homicidal, suicidal, something with an 'idal' in it."
'Kill Point' ratings
Spike TV's "The Kill Point" premiered with 2.1 million viewers nationwide Sunday night, a good number for Spike TV, boosting the network's ratings 111 percent in the time period compared with a year ago.
"Kill Point" didn't score as high as last summer's premiere of the now-canceled "Blade" (it had 2.5 million viewers), but the "Kill Point" ratings were pretty stable throughout the two hours, which generally indicates viewers are more likely to return. "Blade" shed viewers consistently and drew more female viewers, not Spike's target. Sixty percent of the "Kill Point" audience was male.
'Back to You' credit
KDKA-TV news anchor Ken Rice e-mailed after reading Monday's column on Fox's Pittsburgh-set newsroom comedy "Back to You." In that piece, the show's executive producer, a longtime friend of Rice's, credited Rice with the title.
"I cannot take credit for the title," Rice wrote in an e-mail. "I was merely the conduit."
Rice was brainstorming for title ideas with former KDKA managing editor Stu Samuels, who is the one who actually came up with the title "Back to You."
Channel surfing
CBS has canceled reality show "Pirate Master," effective immediately. The remaining five episodes will stream online at CBS.com, posting every Tuesday. ... HBO has renewed its deserving drama "Big Love" for a third season. ... A prime-time "Sesame Street" special featuring the Muppets and guest stars Ben Stiller, Jamie Foxx, Jennifer Hudson and Tony Sirico ("The Sopranos") is in the works for Christmas. ... The second annual briefing by the Fred Rogers Center at Saint Vincent College will air on PCN (Comcast channel 48 in Pittsburgh) at 8:30 p.m. Friday. The topic of the June briefing was "Early Learning Leadership: Challenges and Opportunities for Applications of Technology and Media-based Content," with WQED's Chris Moore as moderator and panelists including Milton Chen of the George Lucas Educational Foundation.
First Published: July 24, 2007, 10:00 p.m.
