Around the Tubes: 10/11/13

I have gotten a plethora of cool press releases have been flooding my inbox recently that you may find interesting. This post will include blurbs on Austin City Limits, Gold Fever, HBO documentaries, American Blackout, Held Hostage, Homeward Bound, casting news, Cold Justice, Hillary Barleaux, and King of the Nerds.


- French band Phoenix make their Austin City Limits (ACL) debut in an epic, career-spanning full-hour episode that showcases their impeccably crafted rock. The brand new episode, part of ACL's just-launched Season 39, premieres October 12th. ACL airs weekly on PBS stations nationwide (check local listings for times) and full episodes are made available online at acltv.com immediately following the initial broadcast.

- The mini-series Gold Fever makes its television premiere on the Discovery Channel tonight at 9:00. The year is 1848: not long after the Revolutionary War. The country is still very young and dirt poor, a nation of farmers. And then, suddenly gold is discovered in California, and the new American dream is born. Over the course of a few years, Americans would discover the modern equivalent of $25 billion dollars — money that would give a jolt to the economy and make America the most powerful nation on Earth: the government could build an army and businesses had the capital they needed to create huge industrial empires unlike anything America (or the world) had ever seen.

- This Monday, HBO will be premiering a trio of new short documentaries. Directed by Oscar-winner Cynthia Wade, Mondays at Racine (9:00) tells the uplifting story of sisters Cynthia and Rachel who own a beauty salon in Long Island, New York, which they open free of charge to cancer patients once a month on Mondays. Redemption (9:40) follows a cast of characters from the five boroughs of NYC as they scrape together a living – five cents at a time. Emmy-winning filmmakers Jon Alpert and Matthew O’Neill followed several men and women over the course of a year. Open Heart (10:20) is the story of eight Rwandan children who embark on a life-saving journey to receive open-heart surgery in Africa’s only free, state-of-the-art cardiac hospital, the Salam Center in Sudan.

- On Sunday, October 27, at 9 p.m. ET/PT, the lights will go out. American Blackout, National Geographic Channel’s two-hour, edge-of-your-seat movie event imagines the story of a national power failure in the United States caused by a cyberattack — told in real time, over 10 days, by those who kept filming on cameras and phones. You’ll learn what it means to be absolutely powerless. Check out the trailer here.

- Held Hostage, a new one-hour documentary special on PBS, details for the first time the real and full story behind the al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorist attack in Algeria on the In Amenas gas facility, which was jointly operated by Algerian and European energy companies, including BP. The program, premiering Tuesday, October 22, 2013, at 9:00 p.m. ET on PBS (check local listings), raises unanswered questions about the attack: How did a convoy of terrorists travel undetected hundreds of miles and gain control of one of Algeria’s most important and valuable gas facilities? Ultimately, who is responsible for the safety of the facility’s workers?

- On, Sunday, November 10th, 2013, Veterans Day weekend, Alan Alda and Joe Mantegna will host Homeward Bound, a live four-hour national telethon to support American veterans suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). Presented by Haven from the Storm and broadcast by the Military Channel (Discovery Communications) the telethon will be broadcast from the historic American Legion Hall #43 in Hollywood from 7:00-11:00 PM (ET), with phone banks manned by veterans, celebrities, and dignitaries. Multiple Emmy-winner Gary Smith is executive producer, Lee Miller is producer and Gail Purse is co-producer/talent executive.

- In casting news, AnnaLynne McCord (90210, Nip/Tuck) is set for a multiple-episode guest-starring role on TNT's hit series Dallas as Heather, a 20-something ranch hand with a troubled ex-husband and a 5-year-old son. RJ Mitte (Breaking Bad) will have a recurring role in the upcoming season of Switched at Birth as Campbell, a pre-med college student paralyzed by a snowboarding accident who works in the free clinic with Daphne. Jennie Garth will join her former co-star, Tori Spelling, in the ABC Family pilot Mystery Girls. And Jeri Ryan (Star Trek: Voyager, Body of Proof) is set to join Syfy’s newest original scripted series Helix for a multi-episode arc as the beautiful and charismatic Constance Sutton, the Chief Operating Officer of Ilaria Corporation, owner of Arctic Biosystems, the research facility where the series takes place.

- In renewal news, TNT has booked a second season of its gripping, real-life crime series Cold Justice. The network has ordered 10 new episodes of the powerful docu-drama which is planned for early 2014.

- Brooklyn based singer-songwriter Hillary Barleaux releases first single “Promise to Never” off her upcoming self-titled debut album. Take a listen below:



- King of the Nerds does not return until January, but TBS recently announce one contestant, and it is the one you voted as The People’s Nerd. Meet Josh Wittenkeller below: