Portal:Television

The English actor and comedian Ian Carmichael OBE (1920–2010) performed in many mediums of light entertainment, including theatre, radio, television and film. His career spanned from 1939 until his death in 2010. According to Brian McFarlane, writing for The Encyclopedia of British Film, Carmichael "epitomises the good-natured, undemanding pleasures of '50s British cinema".

Carmichael made his professional stage debut in 1939 while he was studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art; his role was as a robot in the science fiction play R.U.R., which lasted for only a week. His studies were interrupted by the Second World War, and he was commissioned into the Royal Armoured Corps; he also joined an entertainment unit, 30 Corps Theatrical Pool, for which he produced twenty shows. At the end of the war he returned to professional acting, and in 1947 he took a role in She Wanted a Cream Front Door, which ran in the West End for nine months. He continued to perform in the theatre throughout the rest of his career, largely in the United Kingdom, but also in productions in Canada, South Africa and the United States. In 1947 Carmichael made his debut on television in the revue New Faces. He continued to work in television throughout his life and, according to McFarlane, achieved considerable success with P. G. Wodehouse's The World of Wooster in 1966–1967, in which he played Bertie Wooster, and as Lord Peter Wimsey between 1972 and 1975. (Full article...)

Baccano! is a 2007 anime series directed by Takahiro Omori and produced by Brain's Base and Aniplex. The 16 episodes are adapted from the light novels of the same name written by Ryohgo Narita and illustrated by Katsumi Enami. Told in out-of-order sequences, the story spans three consecutive years of Prohibition-era America during which three seemingly unconnected events occur: two bottles of immortality elixir are passed around Manhattan by gangsters believing it is alcohol, a supposed monster massacres members of two gangs attempting to hijack the transcontinental train Flying Pussyfoot, and a missing man is tracked down by his sister and a gang. The first thirteen episodes aired in Japan from July 26, 2007, to November 1, 2007, on WOWOW, a Japanese pay-per-view station, and the final three were released direct-to-DVD. The series made its North American television debut when it started airing on the Funimation Channel after the channel transitioned to HD in September 2010.

Eight DVD compilations were released by Aniplex, each containing two episodes, with the first released on October 24, 2007, and the eighth on May 28, 2008. A Blu-ray boxset was released January 26, 2011. On July 21, 2008, the English adaptation of Baccano! was licensed by Funimation. They released four DVD compilations, each containing four episodes, with the first released on January 27, 2009, and the fourth on June 16, 2009. A complete DVD collection boxset was released December 29, 2009, and re-released on December 28, 2010, as part of a lower-priced Viridian Collection. A limited edition Blu-ray boxset was released May 17, 2011; the Blu-ray set was later rereleased on July 31, 2012. The entire English-dubbed series was streamed through Hulu during October 2009 and English-subtitled episodes although once available for streaming, have been removed as of December 2017. Funimation streams English-subtitled and English-dubbed episodes through their website. In Australia and New Zealand, the series is licensed by Madman Entertainment, who released the series over four DVDs between June 24, 2009, and October 21, 2009. A boxset was released on March 17, 2010. Baccano! is licensed in the United Kingdom by Manga Entertainment and was released in a complete boxset on October 11, 2010. The series is aired in the Philippines, Hong Kong and Southeast Asia on Animax Asia. (Full article...)

The first season of Family Guy aired on Fox from January 31 to May 16, 1999, and consisted of only seven episodes, making it the shortest season to date. The series follows the dysfunctional Griffin family—father Peter, mother Lois, daughter Meg, son Chris, son Stewie and their anthropomorphic dog Brian, all of whom reside in their hometown of Quahog, a fictional city in the U.S. state of Rhode Island. The show features the voices of series creator Seth MacFarlane, Alex Borstein, Seth Green, and Lacey Chabert in the roles of the Griffin family. The executive producers for the first season were David Zuckerman and MacFarlane. It is also the only full season to feature Chabert, before she was replaced by Mila Kunis for the rest of the series' run, starting with the season two episode "Da Boom".

The series premiere, "Death Has a Shadow", was broadcast directly after Super Bowl XXXIII and was watched by 22.01 million viewers. The rest of the first season would then air between 11 April and 16 May 1999, with all of its episodes airing on Sundays; following the first season, the show left Sunday nights, and would not return to airing on Sundays until 2005. The series received praise from most critics, particularly "I Never Met the Dead Man" and "Brian: Portrait of a Dog", however some critics disliked the themes of the episodes. The Volume One DVD box set, including all seven episodes and the second season, was released in Region 1 on April 15, 2003, Region 2 on November 12, 2001, and Region 4 on October 20, 2003. The series has since been released in syndication. (Full article...)

The Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Younger Actress in a Drama Series was an award presented annually by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) and the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS). It was given annually from 1985 to 2019 to honor a young actress below the age of 25, who had delivered an outstanding performance in a role while working within the daytime drama industry.

At the 12th Daytime Emmy Awards held in 1985, Tracey E. Bregman was the first winner of this award, for her role of Lauren Fenmore on The Young and the Restless. The awards ceremony had not been aired on television for the prior two years, having been criticized for voting integrity. The award was originally called Outstanding Ingenue in a Drama Series, the criteria of the new category were deemed confusing, performers of differing ages were nominated, and critics argued some were of supporting or lead actress standards. Adding to the confusion, the first winner, Bregman, and the Outstanding Supporting Actress winner that year, Beth Maitland, played characters near to the same age. The category was renamed Outstanding Juvenile Female in a Drama Series in 1989, and began using its current title in 1991. The criteria were later altered, requiring that the actress be aged 25 or below. (Full article...)

The Good Place is an American fantasy-comedy television series created by Michael Schur for NBC. The series focuses on Eleanor Shellstrop (Kristen Bell), a recently deceased young woman who wakes up in the afterlife and is sent by Michael (Ted Danson) to "the Good Place", a heaven-like utopia he designed, in reward for her righteous life. However, she quickly realizes that she was sent there by mistake, and she must hide her imperfect behavior, and try to be a better person. William Jackson Harper, Jameela Jamil, and Manny Jacinto co-star as other residents of the Good Place, together with D'Arcy Carden as an artificial being helping the residents. Each episode is listed as "Chapter (xx)" following the opening title sequence.

The series was first announced on August 13, 2015, as a 13-episode untitled comedy based on a pitch by Schur. The first season began airing on September 19, 2016, and concluded on January 19, 2017. On January 30, 2017, NBC renewed the series for a second season of 13 episodes, which premiered on September 20, 2017, with an hour-long premiere. The second season concluded on February 1, 2018. On November 21, 2017, NBC renewed the series for a 13-episode third season, which premiered on September 27, 2018, and concluded on January 24, 2019. On December 4, 2018, the series was renewed for a fourth and final season comprising 14 episodes, which premiered on September 26, 2019. The final episode of the series aired on January 30, 2020. During the course of the series, 53 episodes of The Good Place aired over four seasons. (Full article...)

Kashimashi: Girl Meets Girl (かしまし 〜ガール·ミーツ·ガール〜, Kashimashi ~Gāru Mītsu Gāru~) is a Japanese animated television series. The episodes were directed by Nobuaki Nakanishi, and animated by the Japanese animation studio Studio Hibari. The series was based on the manga version of the same name, and followed the original story from the first two manga volumes closely for the first nine episodes, though with many differences. In episode ten, the anime starts to deviate from the manga and after that, the storyline in the anime has no connection with the manga. The main plot in the anime is the drama that relates from the three female main characters of Hazumu Osaragi, Yasuna Kamiizumi, and Tomari Kurusu, and their romantic struggles in a love triangle. Yasuna and Tomari vie for Hazumu's affections while Hazumu is initially unable to choose between them.

The televised series aired on the TV Tokyo Japanese television network between January 11, 2006, and March 29, 2006, comprising twelve main episodes. Four pieces of theme music were used in the anime, one opening theme, two ending themes, and one insert song used in episode twelve. The opening theme is "Koisuru Kokoro" (恋するココロ, lit. "The Heart in Love") by Eufonius, the main ending theme is "Michishirube" (みちしるべ, lit. "Route Marker") by Yūmao, the second ending theme only used in the twelfth episode is "Kimi no Tame ni Dekiru Koto" (キミのためにできること, lit. "Something I Can Do For You"), also by Yūmao, and the insert song is "Hanbun" (半分, lit. "Half") by Yukari Tamura. The episodes were released on seven DVD compilations released between April 26, 2006, and October 27, 2006, each containing two episodes. The seventh DVD also contained an original video animation episode "A Girl Falls in Love with a Girl" (少女は少女に恋をした, Shōjo wa Shōjo ni Koi o Shita). The staff that produced the television series also produced the OVA. This episode is set four months after the events of the anime series during the Christmas season. (Full article...)

The NBC superhero serial drama series Heroes follows the lives of people around the globe who possess various superhuman powers as they struggle to cope with their everyday lives and prevent foreseen disasters from occurring. The series premiered on American and Canadian television on September 25, 2006. The first season, which finished 21st of 142 American primetime television programs in Nielsen ratings, was released on DVD and HD DVD on August 28, 2007. The second season ranked 21st of 220 in the ratings, and was released on DVD and Blu-ray Disc on August 26, 2008, with the Blu-ray release of the first season. The third season aired in two blocks generally without reruns; it premiered on September 22, 2008, on NBC in the United States and on Global in Canada, with a one-hour clip-show and two regular episodes. The fourth season aired from September 21, 2009, to February 8, 2010. Although cast members had stated and speculated that there would be a fifth season, NBC announced on May 14, 2010, that the show was officially cancelled, but that the network was looking at plans to tie up some loose ends in either a miniseries or TV movie.

Within the seasons of Heroes are "volumes", which focus on shorter story arcs. The first season comprises a single volume of 23 episodes called Genesis, which is also the title of the pilot episode. The second season was designed to contain three volumes called Generations, Exodus, and Villains, but Exodus was scrapped due to viewer criticism and the 2007–08 Writers Guild of America strike. Villains was carried over to the show's third season, leaving the second season with only 11 episodes, 13 fewer than were originally ordered by NBC. The third season included 25 episodes, 13 episodes comprising Villains and 12 episodes in a volume titled Fugitives. The fourth season consisted of a fifth volume of 18 episodes titled Redemption. The final scene of the last episode began a sixth volume entitled Brave New World, which became the title of the first episode of Heroes Reborn. (Full article...)

Arrested Development is an American television satirical sitcom that originally aired on the Fox network from November 2, 2003, to February 10, 2006. Created by Mitchell Hurwitz, the show centers on the Bluth family, a formerly wealthy, habitually dysfunctional family, and is presented in a continuous format, incorporating hand-held camera work, narration, archival photos, and historical footage. The series stars Jason Bateman, Portia de Rossi, Will Arnett, Michael Cera, Alia Shawkat, Tony Hale, David Cross, Jeffrey Tambor, and Jessica Walter. Ron Howard serves as an executive producer on the show, as well as its narrator.

The first season consists of 22 episodes, which premiered on November 2, 2003, and concluded on June 6, 2004. Fox picked up a full 22-episode second season, which premiered on November 7, 2004, but its production order was later cut down to 18 episodes. The second season concluded on April 17, 2005. The show's third season premiered on September 19, 2005, and was also originally slated for 22 episodes, but the production order was later cut down to 13. The final four episodes of the series' original run were shown in a two-hour block on February 10, 2006, against NBC's coverage of the 2006 Winter Olympics opening ceremony. A total of 53 episodes of Arrested Development were produced over its original three seasons. (Full article...)

The Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series is an award presented annually by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) and Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS). It is given to honor an actress who has delivered an outstanding performance in a supporting role while working within the daytime drama industry.

At the 6th Daytime Emmy Awards held in 1979, Suzanne Rogers was the first winner of this award, for her role as Maggie Horton on Days of Our Lives. The awards ceremony was not aired on television in 1983 and 1984, having been criticized for voting integrity. Following the introduction of a new category in 1985, Outstanding Younger Actress in a Drama Series, one criterion for this category was altered, requiring all actresses to be aged 26 or above. (Full article...)

The third season of 30 Rock, an American television comedy series, consists of 22 episodes and began airing on October 30, 2008, on the NBC network in the United States. The season was produced by Broadway Video, Little Stranger, and NBC Universal; the executive producers were series creator Tina Fey, Lorne Michaels, Marci Klein, David Miner, and Robert Carlock.

In this season, Liz focuses heavily on her personal life, trying to adopt a child and find a new romantic partner. Meanwhile, Jack Donaghy pursues a new relationship, Jenna Maroney undertakes a new Janis Joplin-based film project, and Tracy Jordan enjoys the success of his video game developed at the end of the previous season. (Full article...)

The first season of the fantasy drama television series Game of Thrones premiered on HBO on April 17, 2011, in the U.S. and concluded on June 19, 2011. It consists of ten episodes, each of approximately 55 minutes. The series is based on A Game of Thrones, the first novel in the A Song of Ice and Fire series by George R. R. Martin, adapted for television by David Benioff and D. B. Weiss. HBO had ordered a television pilot in November 2008; filming began the following year. However, it did not receive a season order and was later reworked with some roles recast. In March 2010, HBO ordered the first season, which began filming in July 2010, primarily in Belfast, Northern Ireland, with additional filming in Malta.

The story takes place in a fantasy world, primarily upon the continent Westeros, with one storyline occurring on another continent to the east, Essos. Like the novel, the season initially focuses on the family of nobleman Eddard "Ned" Stark, the Warden of the North, who is asked to become the King's Hand (chief advisor) to his longtime friend, King Robert Baratheon. Ned seeks to find out who murdered his predecessor, Jon Arryn. He uncovers dark secrets about the powerful Lannister family, which includes Robert's queen, Cersei, that his predecessor died trying to expose. This leads, after Robert's death, to Ned's arrest for treason. Ned's eldest son, Robb, begins a rebellion against the Lannisters. Ned is killed at the order of Cersei's tyrannical teenage son, King Joffrey Baratheon. Meanwhile, in Essos, the exiled Viserys Targaryen, son of the former king, forces his sister Daenerys to marry a Dothraki warlord in exchange for an army to pursue his claim to the Iron Throne. The season ends with Viserys dead and Daenerys becoming the Mother of Dragons. (Full article...)

The second season of Seinfeld, an American television series created by Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David, began airing on January 23, 1991, on NBC.

Because of the commencement of the first Gulf War, the second season's premiere was postponed one week. The season comprised 12 episodes, and concluded its initial airing on June 26, 1991. It introduced a number of characters who played significant roles in later episodes, such as Jerry's Uncle Leo and Jerry's neighbor Newman. (Full article...)

Adventure Time is an American animated television media franchise created by Pendleton Ward for Cartoon Network. The first series, Adventure Time (2010–2018), follows the adventures of Finn (voiced by Jeremy Shada), a human boy, and his best friend and adoptive brother Jake (John DiMaggio), a dog with magical powers to change shape and grow and shrink at will. Finn and Jake live in the post-apocalyptic Land of Ooo. Throughout the series, they interact with the show's other main characters: Princess Bubblegum (Hynden Walch), the sovereign of the Candy Kingdom and a sentient piece of gum; the Ice King (Tom Kenny), a demented but largely misunderstood ice wizard; Marceline the Vampire Queen (Olivia Olson), a thousand-year-old vampire and rock music enthusiast; Lumpy Space Princess (Pendleton Ward), a melodramatic and immature princess made out of "irradiated stardust"; BMO (Niki Yang), a sentient video game console-shaped robot that lives with Finn and Jake; and Flame Princess (Jessica DiCicco), a flame elemental and ruler of the Fire Kingdom. The pilot first aired in 2007 on Nicktoons Network, where it was later re-aired on the incubator series Random! Cartoons. The pilot was eventually uploaded onto the internet and became a cult hit on YouTube. After Nickelodeon declined to turn the short into a full-fledged show, Cartoon Network purchased the rights, and Adventure Time launched as a series on April 5, 2010. The series concluded its eight-year and ten-season run on September 3, 2018. The series was followed by two spinoffs: Adventure Time: Distant Lands (2020–21) and Adventure Time: Fionna and Cake (2023–).

Each Adventure Time episode is about eleven minutes in length; pairs of episodes are often telecast in order to fill a half-hour program time slot. For the first five seasons, the show aired on Monday nights. However, starting with the early sixth-season episode "Breezy", the show began to shift both its timeslot and its day of airing. Upon its debut, Adventure Time was a ratings success for Cartoon Network, with its highest-rated episodes scoring over 3 million viewers. The show received universal acclaim from critics and has developed a strong following among teenagers and adults, many of whom are attracted due to the series' animation, stories, and characters. Adventure Time has won three Annie Awards, eight Primetime Emmy Awards, two British Academy Children's Awards, a Motion Picture Sound Editors Award, a Pixel Award, a Peabody Award, and a Kerrang! Award. The series has also been nominated for three Critics' Choice Television Awards, two Annecy Festival Awards, a TCA Award, and a Sundance Film Festival Award, among others. Domestically, several compilation DVDs containing a random assortment of episodes have been released; additionally, all the seasons have been released in North America on DVD and seasons one to six were released on Blu-ray. All seasons were released on Blu-ray in Australia only. A North American box set containing the entire series was also released on DVD on April 30, 2019. During its run, Adventure Time was a co-production between Frederator Studios and Cartoon Network Studios. (Full article...)

John Le Mesurier (born John Elton Le Mesurier Halliley; 5 April 1912 – 15 November 1983) was an English actor who performed in many mediums of light entertainment, including film, radio and theatre. Le Mesurier's career spanned from 1934 until his death in 1983. He is best remembered for his role as Sergeant Arthur Wilson in the BBC situation comedy Dad's Army, between 1968 and 1977.

Le Mesurier made his professional stage debut in September 1934 in Dangerous Corner at the Palladium Theatre in Edinburgh under his birth name, and appeared on television for the first time four years later as Seigneur de Miolans in the BBC Television broadcast of "The Marvellous History of St Bernard". The broadcast was adapted from a 15th-century manuscript by Henri Ghéon. After wartime service as a captain in the Royal Tank Regiment, Le Mesurier returned to acting and made his radio debut on the BBC Home Service in a March 1947 broadcast of Escape or Die. He continued working in television roles throughout his career, but it was his portrayal in the BBC television play Traitor, of a character loosely based on Kim Philby, which earned him the British Academy Television Award for Best Actor in 1972. (Full article...)

The Simpsons is an American animated sitcom that includes six main voice actors and numerous regular cast and recurring guest stars. The principal cast consists of Dan Castellaneta, Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, Yeardley Smith, Hank Azaria and Harry Shearer. Pamela Hayden, Tress MacNeille, Maggie Roswell, Chris Edgerly, Eric Lopez, Alex Désert, Kevin Michael Richardson, Jenny Yokobori, Kimberly D. Brooks, Dawnn Lewis, Tony Rodriguez, Melanie Minichino, Jonathan Lipow, and Grey DeLisle have appeared as supporting cast members, along with former supporting cast members Russi Taylor, Karl Wiedergott, Marcia Mitzman Gaven, Doris Grau, Susan Blu, Jo Ann Harris, and Christopher Collins. Repeat guest cast members include Marcia Wallace, Phil Hartman, Jon Lovitz, Joe Mantegna, Frank Welker, Kelsey Grammer and Albert Brooks. With the exception of "Old Money", episode credits list only the voice actors, and not the characters they voice.

Both Fox and the production crew wanted to keep their identities secret during the early seasons and closed most of the recording sessions while refusing to publish photos of the recording artists. The network eventually revealed which roles each actor performed in the episode "Old Money", because the producers said the voice actors should receive credit for their work. Every main cast member has won an Emmy for Outstanding Voice-Over Performance. Shearer was the last cast member to win, receiving his award in 2014 for the episode "Four Regrettings and a Funeral." Castellaneta and Azaria have won four, while Kavner, Cartwright, Smith, Shearer, Wallace, Grammer, and guest star Jackie Mason have each won one. (Full article...)