Pee-Wee on HBO in 2011

HBO has announced that it will shoot a special performance of The Pee-Wee Herman Show on Broadway for airing on the network in 2011. The Pee-Wee Herman Show will end its limited six-week engagement at the Stephen Sondheim Theater on January 2nd; HBO will shoot a performance immediately following the conclusion of the engagement.

HBO aired a special taped from Paul Rubens’ original Pee-Wee stage show in 1981. It was directed by Marty Callner, who will also direct the 2011 special.

Rubens’ revival of his character continues to follow the path of its launch 30 years ago, which began as a stage show that was made into an HBO special. It remains to be seen whether Rubens can also engineer the transition to feature film and TV series that made the character a household word in the 80s.

HBO Renews hit series True Blood for 4th Season

HBO has renewed the hit show TRUE BLOOD for a 12-episode 4th season, it was announced today by Michael Lombardo, president, HBO
programming. Created by Alan Ball, the series will begin production of new episodes next year in Los Angeles, with debut set for summer 2011.

“The new season of TRUE BLOOD is off to a terrific start, as enthusiasm for this unique show continues to build among both subscribers and critics,” noted Lombardo. “We’re looking forward to more chills from Alan Ball and his gifted team next year.” “I am beyond thrilled to be able to continue working with this amazing cast and crew,” says Ball. “This is the most fun I have ever had.”

Mixing romance, suspense, mystery and humor, TRUE BLOOD takes place in the not-too-distant future, when vampires have come out of the coffin, thanks to the invention of mass-produced synthetic blood that means they no longer need humans as a nutritional source. The show follows the romance between waitress Sookie Stackhouse (Anna Paquin), who can hear people’s thoughts, and her boyfriend, 173-year-old vampire Bill Compton (Stephen Moyer), who went missing at the end of season two, and is now the object of a frantic search. Alan Ball created and executive produces the show, which is based on the best-selling Sookie Stackhouse novels by Charlaine Harris.

The 12-episode third season of TRUE BLOOD, which launched June 13, has already inspired critical raves, with Entertainment Weekly calling it “faster, sleeker, more vicious, more fun than it already was,” as well as “summer’s best TV.” USA Today hails the show as “fabulously wild,” while the Washington Post describes it as “electrifying.”

"True Blood" Comics

IDW announced at WonderCon this weekend that it will produce comic series based on the HBO series True Blood in partnership with HBO. True Blood #1, the first issue of a six-issue miniseries, will launch in stores and at San Diego Comic-Con in July.

The story is by True Blood series creator Alan Ball, along with series writers Elisabeth Finch and Kate Barnow, and co-written by David Tischman and Mariah Huehner. Interior art is by David Messina; covers by J. Scott Campbell.

The comic series will be available both in print and digital formats

"Preacher" Defrocked

No Show on HBO

Mark Steven Johnson, the writer of the Preacher TV series for HBO (see “HBO To Do Preacher Series”), told Comics Continuum that the project is dead due to content issues. Johnson told the site “the new head of HBO felt it was just too dark and too violent and too controversial.”

This is the second stillborn attempt to develop Garth Ennis’ Vertigo series Preacher for the screen (large or small). A movie that was in development earlier this decade (see “Preacher to Start Shooting in June”) has also gone nowhere.