Craig Tweets on Critics
With the Television Critics Association meeting in Los Angeles this week, Craig Ferguson couldn’t resist a tweet about them:

All the television critics in LA for a big convention except Tom Shales of the Washington Post. #creepyshutin #tca

However, he was corrected soon afterward and replied:

“@hankstuever: I’m here & I’m the WaPo’s TV critic since ’09 ” Oops. My apologies Hank. #you‘recreepytoothough #tca

Hank Stuever has indeed been the Post’s day-to-day TV critic in recent years, after Tom Shales was promoted to a position as a “style” columnist, covering not only the big events of television but the nation’s culture in general.   The Pulitzer Prize-winning Shales has a reputation for being irritable, irascible and downright cranky, once calling the field of late night shows the “cereal aisle” of television, “overpopulated” with too many similar choices.  For example, he has said he thinks Craig would be the wrong choice to replace David Letterman when Letterman retires:

“Ferguson certainly has a constituency but I don’t think it’s broad enough – OR YOUNG ENOUGH – to keep a network happy at 11:35 p.m., When you consider that even Leno attracts too old audience, Ferguson would be a self-defeating choice.”

However, he has been generally positive about Craig in the past eight years, saying things like:

“Ferguson comes closest of the late-night troops to doing a talk show of the loftiest sort: a genuine televised conversation, not just a string of pat questions, wisecracks by the host and canned comments that guests have already supplied to producers during pre-interviews.”

We’re keeping an eye on the TCA events and will post updates if anything exciting happens.

Comedian Needs Help

Craig also retweeted a request for help for comedian Caleb Medley, who was badly wounded in the Colorado shootings and whose wife just gave birth to a son.

Please help comedian Caleb Medley, seriously injured in Aurora massacre. His wife gave birth today. http://calebmedley.com/help

More Praise for Friday
Denver’s Westword Magazine complimented Craig’s decision to edit the show on Friday, contrasting it to the reactions of Jay Leno and Jimmy Fallon.

Keeping It In the Family
On the anniversary of September 11th a few years ago, Craig decided not to have the usual guests and comedy bits but chose instead to invite his sister, writer and comedienne Lynn Ferguson as a guest. The brother-sister duo kept things funny in this two-part interview:

Video courtesy: rock3rgyrl

Tonight’s Guests
Monday on the Late Late Show, Craig welcomes actor George Hamilton and actress Julie Gonzalo.  Earlier on Monday, Craig tweeted:

George Hamilton on the show tonight. Always a tricky one for the lighting guy. He’s the same color as my desk. #tan

On Tuesday, Craig’s guests are actress Minnie Driver and comedian Colin Mochrie.

Guest Update

More guests have been added to the confirmed schedule through August 3rd, including Selma Blair, Adam Savage, Rashida Jones, Julie Delpy, Edward Norton and Malin Ã…kerman.  Originally scheduled to appear this Wednesday, comedian Brian Scolaro‘s stand-up set was used to help fill time in last Friday’s show when the monologue was dropped due to events in Colorado.  We are being told that a new guest will be added to Wednesday’s show along with the already scheduled Matthew McConaughey and we will update the listings as soon as that guest is confirmed.  In another change, actress Joanne Froggatt and singer Joss Stone had been scheduled to appear this Friday along with actor Vince Vaughn but the most current schedule shows Vaughn as the lone guest.  Froggatt and Stone will be re-scheduled for a future date.  As always, you can see the latest listings on our Guests page.

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