Entertainment

TV: 'Bernie Mac Show' and 9 others are shown the door

10:32 AM CDT on Friday, May 19, 2006

By ED BARK / The Dallas Morning News

Fox's spring training, otherwise known as the pre-American Idol/ 24 fall season, will begin with six new series in play.

They include 'Til Death, an Everybody Loves Raymond look-alike starring ELR alumnus Brad Garrett.

Also, another new talent competition produced by Idol's Simon Cowell will have a four-week run leading up to Fox's annual rites of fall, Major League Baseball's playoffs and World Series.

The No. 1-rated network with advertiser-coveted 18- to 49-year-olds has a new late-night talk show planned, too. Hosted by newcomer Spike Feresten, it's set to follow Mad TV on Saturday nights.

Fox has renewed four of this season's freshman series: Bones, The War at Home, The Loop and Prison Break, whose second season will be filmed in the Dallas area. Producers of The Loop likely are still partying. The sitcom is to return in January in a superplush slot following Idol's Wednesday performance shows. 24 likewise will be back in January for a sixth season on Monday nights.

The most prominent cancellation is The Bernie Mac Show, which ends a five-season run marked by constant, confusing pinballing around Fox's prime-time lineup.

The O.C. has been spared, but its Thursday 8 p.m. slot will be doubly difficult following ABC's decision to move Grey's Anatomy to a neighborhood already housing CBS' CSI: Crime Scene Investigation .

Duets (unscripted): Established singing stars are paired with celebs from outside the music industry in Mr. Cowell's latest behind-the-camera concoction. They'll compete for their favorite charities while being vulnerable to weekly viewer vote-offs. The four-week show is set for Thursdays and Fridays in September, with time periods to be announced.

'Til Death (comedy): Mr. Garrett and Joely Fisher (Desperate Housewives) play a veteran, battling married couple living next door to newlyweds. Fox describes it as "a show about new marriage vs. old marriage." Sound vaguely familiar?

Happy Hour (comedy): A straight-laced guy moves to Chicago at his wife's insistence and then gets dumped by her. His new mentor is a modern-day Dean Martin schooled in the old-school traditions of the good life. A cast of unknowns beckons.

Vanished (drama): The wife of a prominent Georgia senator goes missing. But who is she, really? Various inquiring minds want to know, and it's possible of course, that a sinister conspiracy lurks. Rebecca Gayheart (Nip/Tuck) is featured as a dogged reporter.

Standoff (drama): Ron Livingston (Sex and the City) and Emily Lehman (Cinderella Man) star as bickering FBI agents who have the hots for each other. Boy, there's a concept we've never seen before.

Justice (drama): What is it with all these one-word titles? Alias alumnus Victor Garber heads a dream team of four lawyers specializing in high-wattage cases.

Viewers at last get a break. There's nothing notable to report.

Say goodnight to That '70s Show, Malcolm in the Middle, The Bernie Mac Show, Free Ride, Arrested Development, Stacked, Killer Instinct, Head Cases, Reunion and Kitchen Confidential.

The Wedding Album, network TV's first prime-time series about a wedding photographer, is due on Fridays in January. Bruno Campos ("The Carver" from Nip/Tuck) shows his acting versatility by playing horndog shutterbug Tony Zutto.

Rob Corddry of The Daily Show will star in The Winner, a comedy about a 43-year-old guy recalling how he "lost his innocence and started to become a man" – at age 32. Fox says it will air sometime in midseason. The co-executive producer is Seth MacFarlane of Family Guy fame.

E-mail ebark@dallasnews.com