"I guess all our films have been about people learning they don't need to be what others expect them to be," Ms. McCullah Lutz said. "It just happens. We get to the end of a script, and I say, "Well, we did it again.'"

*****

"I'd been thinking, 'What happens to these women?'" Ms. Faris said by phone from New York. "L.A. is full of beautiful women, and what happens when they start getting older? Do they go into advertising? Do they go back to school? Do they go to IHOP?" In The House Bunny, the exiled cupcake Shelley Darlington (Ms. Faris) is adopted by the sorority women of Zeta Alpha Zeta, who give Shelley a sense of herself in exchange for tutorials on makeup and men.

*****

Caution, they agreed, is the enemy of comedy. "If you watch 10 Things, it's racy by today's standards," Ms. Smith said of the almost-a-decade-old film. "The most limiting thing in our genre is that the comedic window of what you can and can't get away with has gotten smaller and smaller."

Mexican actor and producer Rodolfo de Anda says he has just acquired the rights to the long-forgotten screenplay and plans to start filming next year. Titled Frontera, the film was written before the 1967 novel One Hundred Years of Solitude turned Garcia Marquez into an international literary star known to most of the continent simply as Gabo.

"Nobody knew it existed, and the most surprising thing is that it is a Western. I don't think anybody knew he had written anything like that," De Anda told Mexican newspaper Reforma. De Anda says he first heard of Frontera as a young actor about 40 years ago when he was offered the part of the younger hitman. He assumed the screenplay had been written by Alcoriza, one of the giants of Mexico's cinematic golden age.

"When I finally bought the rights, about a month ago, I discovered the surprise that the story was not in fact by Alcoriza, but by Gabriel Garcia Marquez," De Anda said. He now plans to play the older partner, and is considering pursuing Mexican stars Gael Garcia Bernal or Diego Luna for the role of the upstart.

It's almost a given these days that movie critics are elitist, while moviegoers are populist. When the highest-grossing films get panned by critics, what good are critics? As publishers across the country dump their reviewers, this is not exactly a rhetorical question.

Believe it or not, though, critically acclaimed films generally do better than critically panned films at the box office -- if you measure their performance in the right way.

Etan Cohen ("Tropic Thunder") is writing the script, and Judd Apatow and Jimmy Miller will produce. The comedy is inspired by Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes tales. Though the thrust is different, the Baron Cohen-Ferrell pairing is the second major studio project featuring the supersleuth, as Warner Bros. is prepping the Anthony Peckham-scripted drama "Sherlock Holmes" with director Guy Ritchie.

The Col project reteams Baron Cohen and Ferrell, who played rival racecar drivers in Columbia's 2006 hit comedy "Talladega Nights," which Apatow and Miller also produced.

"Just the idea of Sacha and Will as Sherlock Holmes and Watson makes us laugh," said Col co-prexy Matt Tolmach. "Sacha and Will are two of the funniest and most talented guys on the planet, and having them take on these two iconic characters is frankly hilarious."

When we asked Katherine Heigl why her name is not on the TV academy's list of Emmy contenders, she issued this statement to Gold Derby: "I am truly grateful for the honor that the Academy bestowed upon me last year. I did not feel that I was given the material this season to warrant an Emmy nomination and in an effort to maintain the integrity of the Academy organization, I withdrew my name from contention. In addition, I did not want to potentially take away an opportunity from an actress who was given such materials."

His death was announced by Michele Fabian-Jones, one of Mitton's partners in the children's television production company Pineapple Squared Entertainment, The New York Times said. Mitton, a native of Edinburgh, Scotland, directed or wrote more than 180 episodes of "Thomas the Tank Engine," dating back to 1984. Originally called "Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends," the show's name was later shortened to "Thomas and Friends" for British television.

It made its debut in the United States in 1989 as "Shining Time Station" on PBS. "He was a fanatic about planes and boats and obsessed with comedy shows," Fabian-Jones told the Times. "That's where it all started."

Oh my god. SAG wants more than Directors and Writers? That's a smart tactic I guess. When are people going to understand, most importantly actors - we are at war -- we are facing a major recession -- our country is in dire need of being fixed - our country also has no money because we have given trillions to the Iraq war and we have NOT even started to pay for it -- it is just paid right now by printing more money on presses -- China owns our ass in every way. Why not strike on a business in a down fall. Just like the writer's they made pennies on the four extra months striking -- when you do the real math and they are paying the price for it still -- so many writer's (sic) out of work still!!! I want this business to thrive -- I know the studio heads and they will punish those that defy them. Okay, be an idealist -- but you will never get a better deal then the writer's (sic) or directors -- only the same -- the studio's (sic) will never allow it, don't kid yourself. The working actors don't want a strike - they have said so. Too many non working actors have a say which is crazy -- maybe there are just too many actors?? Gosh I'm even a member of SAG, but I don't feel I've earned the right to vote in this guild.

One hunch, the leaders of these guilds seem to like the limelight they get in the press, it becomes more about the ego in the room rather than something smart. Striking is not smart. Through the history in America, strikes in businesses have only gained the union worker 6% at the max -- so take the emotion out of it and go for the 6%. A path to strike is not smart for the the hundreds of thousands of people in this business. Sanity needs to prevail here -- talk real and talk the same talk as your union brothers -- not more!

"The strike had a number of impacts," said Alan Wurtzel, NBC Universal research chief, "but as with everything it's never very clear or direct or black and white." ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC had nearly 9 percent fewer viewers in April and May so far than during the same period a year ago, according to Nielsen Media Research.

Yet viewership declines are sadly typical for the big networks. Take the same period a year earlier, and the drop was more than 5 percent over 2006. People didn't watch less TV while the strike was on, they just watched cable more, said Steve Sternberg, an analyst for Magna Global. Shows with ongoing stories seemed to lose the most momentum from the strike; ABC's "Grey's Anatomy" on May 1 had its smallest audience since moving to Thursday night. Decisions by NBC to keep "Heroes" for next fall and Fox to delay "24" until next season may prove prescient, unless people forget about the characters altogether.

Comedies were hurt least by the strike. CBS was so buoyed by the performance of their Monday night comedies that the network is considering adding comedies on another night. CBS' rack of procedural dramas had done relatively well, at least until a week ago: "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation" had its second least-watched episode for a Thursday original, and "CSI: Miami" hit a series low for an original.

"There's no question that it could have been a lot worse," said David Poltrack, CBS' top researcher. CBS' strategy was to make as many new episodes of existing shows as possible until the season ends later this month so people got back in the habit of watching again. The explosive growth of digital video recorders, now available in 25 million homes, means more people are setting their own schedules.

Spring has sprung leaks in big-network lineups. Ratings shortfalls for some top series have sparked Hollywood hand-wringing on the eve of next week's fall schedule announcements. Such shows as ER, CSI: Miami, My Name Is Earl, The Simpsons and Supernatural hit all-time lows in recent weeks, and others -- including Grey's Anatomy and Cold Case -- are down sharply from last spring.

Some observers blame the writers' strike, which forced a three-month gap in most scripted series and led viewers to stray. Most series have trickled back but without the usual marketing fanfare. "I'm not convinced people realized their shows were back," says ABC prime-time research chief Larry Hyams. "It's not like there was a premiere week" that lured them.

Strike-hobbled scripted series weren't the only ones to lose ground. American Idol, Survivor and Deal or No Deal did, too, part of the typical ratings erosion as series age. "There has been significant slippage compared to normal series averages," says ad buyer John Rash of Campbell-Mithun in Minneapolis. "What's difficult to discern is if this is a post-strike media malaise that will be corrected" next fall.

But it's not as if viewers abandoned TV. Nielsen data show overall viewership is flat or up slightly from last spring. Instead, more people are watching cable. And more of them are recording shows on DVRs, now in 24% of homes, up from 16% last spring. More than 2 million Grey's viewers — 10% of its total audience — now watch the show one to seven days after it airs.

A memorial service will be held at 6 p.m. Friday, May 9 at the Writers Guild Theater, 151 S. Doheny Dr., Beverly Hills. Over a career of more than half a century, Jacobs wrote episodes for TV shows including "Maude," "Petticoat Junction" and "I Dream of Jeannie." His feature film credits include Elvis Presley starrer "It Happened at the World's Fair," co-written with Si Rose, and the George Burns hit sequel, "Oh, God! Book II," co-written with Josh Greenfeld, Hal Goldman, Fred S. Fox and Melissa Miller.

Born in Kingston, NY, Jacobs attended Syracuse U. where he edited the campus humor magazine. After graduation he became a Broadway press agent, with clients including Bob Hope. He after serving in WWII, he began writing Fred Allen and Jack Paar. Among other series he worked on were "F-Troop," "The Jeffersons," "My Three Sons," "Here's Lucy," "Chico and the Man," "Diff'rent Strokes," "Family Affair," "Bachelor Father," "The Andy Griffith Show" and "The Love Boat," many of which he co-wrote with frequent writing partners Fred S. Fox and Ed James.

He was also in demand penning monologues for several comedy legends including Bob Hope, George Burns, Lucille Ball, Red Skelton, Danny Thomas, Ed Wynn and Johnny Carson.

"Like so many people I've loved the story of The Hulk since I was a kid, so it was thrilling when Marvel asked me to write and help produce an altogether new screen incarnation, as well as play Bruce Banner. I grew up reading Marvel Comics and always loved the mythic dimension and contemporary themes in the stories, and I�m proud of the script I wrote. In every phase of production, including the editing, working with Louis Leterrier has been wonderful...I've never had a better partner, and the collaboration with all the rest of the creative team has been terrific. Every good movie gets forged through collaboration, and different ideas among people who are all committed and respect the validity of each other's opinions is the heart of filmmaking.

Regrettably, our healthy process, which is and should be a private matter, was misrepresented publicly as a 'dispute,' seized on by people looking for a good story, and has been distorted to such a degree that it risks distracting from the film itself, which Marvel, Universal and I refuse to let happen. It has always been my firm conviction that films should speak for themselves and that knowing too much about how they are made diminishes the magic of watching them.

All of us believe The Incredible Hulk will excite old fans and create new ones and be a huge hit...our focus has always been to deliver the Hulk that people have been waiting for and keep the worldwide love affair with the big green guy going strong."

Mr. Norton and Marvel, which has the right of final approval on the film, have sparred in recent weeks over trims, among other issues, said studio executives involved, who asked to remain anonymous as they were not authorized to speak publicly. Mr. Norton -- who was hired to rewrite the script along with playing the lead -- has made it clear he won't cooperate with publicity plans if he's not happy with the final product, these people said.

A spokeswoman for Mr. Norton said he had no comment. Mr. Maisel brushed off the friction as par for the course. "When you get to this point in the process, there are always lots of passionate discussions," he said. "Edward is very passionate. He is as passionate about the Hulk as we are." (For those unaccustomed to Hollywood speak, "very passionate" roughly translates to a seven on the "he’s a difficult person" scale.)

*****

Even Stan Lee, a creator of the Hulk and Iron Man characters, seems underenthused about the prospects of his green baby. "My prediction is that it will be more popular than the last one," he said. His Iron Man prediction? "Enormous hit," he said.