Monday, May 04, 2009

THE CLEVELAND SHOW GETS RENEWED


According to several reports, Fox is so in love with the upcoming "Family Guy" spinoff "Cleveland," it's ordered a second season.

The new 13-episode pickup brings the total order for the show to 35 episodes -- and that's months before the series has even premiered.

The animated comedy, centered on the Cleveland Brown character from "Family Guy," was originally targeted for a debut this spring. But in November, the network decided to push the launch to fall 2009 to give the creative team more time for development and production. At the same time, Fox showed its confidence in the project by picking up another nine episodes, bringing the total order to a full season of 22 episodes.

The new 13-episode pickup is on top of that and is targeted for fall 2010. The move was made to keep the 20th TV-produced animated series in continuous production and avoid shutting down and losing talent and crew. Because of the long lead time in animation, the pickup also ensures that Fox will have fresh episodes for fall 2010.

"Cleveland" hails from co-creators/exec producers by Seth MacFarlane, Rich Appel and Mike Henry, who voices the title character.

The show's voice cast also includes MacFarlane, Sanaa Lathan and Nia Long, as well as Arianna Huffington in a recurring role.