Craig’s run of media attention surrounding the release of How To Train Your Dragon and the introduction of sidekick Geoff Petersen has continued to grow. Canada’s MacLean’s magazine comments on Craig’s choice of names for his sidekick.

And Entertainment Weekly‘s Ken Tucker talked to Grant Imahara about the building of the sidekick. Grant tells him that Craig was actively involved in the design and planning.

Craig is winding up his first week of having Geoff Peterson on the show. What have we learned? We know that Geoff has several phrases and gestures at his disposal which can be altered to suit a particular show or guest. We know he can make some guests nervous (Mindy Kaling) and flirt with others (Raquel Welch). And we know he wears his tie loosely, just like Craig. Who knows what week two will bring?

It’s not every day that Michael Clarke Duncan reads an excerpt from Jennifer Love Hewitt’s book. Was it just me or was that really fun?

Video Courtesy: malinky2stoatir

Friday Fact for baseball season: Craig’s 173,263 followers could fill Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles more than three times!

Tonight on the Late Late Show, Craig welcomes actress Busy Phillips, actor Kunal Nayyar and the incomparable Betty White. Said Craig this evening on the Tweetie: Betty White on the show tonight. Take that everybody else on tv.

Programming note: Broadcast of The Late Late Show (and The Late Show with David Letterman before it) will be delayed by 15 minutes tonight due to highlights of the Masters golf tournament.

The Discovery Channel has a new slideshow showing behind the scenes glimpses of Grant Imahara building Geoff Petersen and Geoff’s debut on the Late Late Show. There’s even a picture of the remote control device Craig uses to control Geoff (take that, puppets).

Geoff Petersen has been on the Late Late Show for a few days now and even though he made Mindy Kaling nervous, he seems to be settling in to the routine of the show. Craig tweeted last night: I thought Geoff was pretty good on the show tonight but I’m hoping he’ll soon settle down and be crap & then he’ll fit right in. Don’t forget Craig, that’s Peabody Award-winning crap.

He also tweeted this after last night’s taping (shh!) I read the tweets of @DirkWeems to clear my sinuses. We’ve been keeping an eye on Dirk Weems tweets. While he tweets infrequently, some of them are gems like today’s installment: I’m free! Judge gave 90 hrs community service doing massages @ homeless shelter & told me to look up “Irony.” No way: I’m done w/ hookers.

Tonight’s guests on the show are ghost whispering actress Jennifer Love Hewitt, author Stuart Neville and country singer/songwriter Trace Adkins.

Craig started the show with Geoff last night, with a little green room conversation about confidence. I didn’t know Geraldo Rivera’s mustache was confident but you learn something new every day. It appears that Geoff has adopted Craig’s “loosened necktie” plan as well.

The Late Late Show’s own Rebecca Tucker was flipping through the pages of the Hollywood industry trade paper Variety this morning and spotted a nice ad from CBS congratulating Craig and the show for winning the Peabody Award.

Also from Rebecca, some big numbers from Monday’s #lollipoptheater Tweet-a-thon: the numbers are in:RSA TweetAThon raised $3128, got Lollipop1250 new followers & trended worldwide with a total of 36,774 mentions-AMAZING!

Let us add our congratulations to LipSyncingScot who worked very hard to rally support for weeks leading up to the Tweet-a-thon and all of the RSA members who tweeted up a storm on Monday to raise awareness of the Lollipop Theater. Once again the power of the Robot Skeleton Army is demonstrated. Great work!

For those on the far end of the geek scale, Grant Imahara was interviewed by Robot Magazine, covering some of the details of how Geoff Petersen was constructed. The article is due out in the July-August issue.

Tonight on the Late Late Show, Craig welcomes timeless beauty Raquel Welch, last week’s displaced Anna Torv and comedian Brian Scott McFadden.

Geoff Petersen arrived in style on the Late Late Show, commenting during the monologue and chatting with Craig at the desk. Grant Imahara truly outdid himself putting together the perfect robot skeleton sidekick.

In case you missed the conversation, check it out here:

Video courtesy: Malinky2Stoatir

RSA member ArtemusRex spotted that Geoff Petersen was trending as high as #4 on Twitter last night. Art also drew our attention to two articles talking about Geoff, the first from Wired.com, complete with Grant’s drawings and the second from National Public Radio’s Monkey See page which goes into detail about Geoff’s beginnings.

Craig tweeted today that in true technological fashion, Geoff is already getting upgrades: Robot Skeleton sidekick Geoff Petersen downloading upgrades. Responding well. Already demading a latte

RSA member LANewscast (a certain LA radio newscaster) got an insider look, posing with her husband, Geoff and Grant backstage last night.

Kristen Bell was her delightful self, capping off a great show after the dramatic NCAA men’s basketball championship on Monday night (the women’s championship is tonight).

Some sad news was sent our way by RSA member chatmaker, who noted that actor Corin Redgrave, brother of actors Vanessa and Lynn Redgrave as well as father of actress Jemma Redgrave who appeared in Craig’s movie I’ll Be There, passed away at age 70. Our thoughts are with Jemma and her family.

Tonight on the Late Late Show, Craig welcomes actress Mindy Kaling and legendary comic Dom Irrera.

Tonight is the night! After weeks of anticipation and cheeky previews, Geoff Petersen the robot skeleton sidekick makes his official debut on the Late Late Show tonight! He will be accompanied by his Mythbusters creator, Grant Imahara and might even sit alongside one of Craig’s favorite guests, actress Kristen Bell. The massive Robot Skeleton Army is all atwitter… on Twitter and elsewhere.

Craig himself tweeted: Tonight the robot sidekick Geoff Petersen makes his debut. This ends the domination of TV by partially organic life forms. #lollipoptheater

Later he added: Geoff Petersen the robot sidekick has a metal mohawk & the bluest eyes I’ve ever seen.

Grant tweeted from the set: Watching rehearsals and witnessing the comic genius that is @CraigyFerg… #lollipoptheater

As did producer Michael Naidus: Geoff Peterson roams the stage …. be afraid. #LollipopTheater

The other big event of the day is the Lollipop Theater tweet-a-thon, where RSA members (including Craig, Michael and Grant as seen above) are including the #lollipoptheater hashtag to their tweets, getting it to trend and draw attention to a great charity supported by Craig Ferguson himself and profiled here on the RSA News (see our archive for more information). It has appeared in the top ten trending topics in the US and Canada during the day. Congratulations to LipSyncingScot and friends for a great idea to raise awareness.

There are a couple of smaller news stories going on today, including a space shuttle launch and some sort of basketball game but RSA members will be focused on the Late Late Show tonight!

Even if it’s April Fool’s Day, there is a celebratory mood in the air. Craig tweeted: I received a chocolate cake from @jimmyfallon because I won the Peabody. He is a god among men. Late night wars my ass. I tried the @jimmyfallon chocolate cake on the interns. They seem fine.

Meanwhile, accolades continue to pour in about the Peabody Award presented to the Late Late Show. The awards ceremony will be on Craig’s birthday, May 17th. Ken Tucker of Entertainment Weekly summed up the feelings of many in his column yesterday. And Tucker added more today, including a brief interview with Craig.

Grant Imahara says he has finished working on the software for Geoff Petersen, just a few days ahead of the sidekick’s debut on the LLS: Good morning! Amazing that I am awake, considering I finished robot skeleton Geoff’s software around midnight yesterday…

More good news for Craig! Thanks to RSA member DJPheonyx for passing along this link: The Late Late Show had higher ratings than Late Night with Jimmy Fallon during the first quarter of 2010, which is the first time that has happened. CBS made the announcement this morning here.

It seems, roboskelly faithful, that what appeared to be a looming war with Stan Lee’s POW! Brigade has settled into a quiet and uneasy peace. Stan wrapped up the saga last night on Twitter: Many Brigadiers have begged me to reconsider launching a massive attack against the Skeleton Army of CraigyFerg. This is my reply—Despite the awesome might of our 50,000 combat-ready Brigadiers, your Generalissimo believes in tempering power with mercy. I shall order my personal adjutant to draw up a binding Non-Aggression Pact for submission to the savage forces of CraigyFerg. If the document I present is signed by the leader of CraigyFerg and if our own High Command approves, there may yet be– Peace In OurTime Our Non-Aggression Pact has been dispatched to the enemy! Whate’er his response, we stand at the ready! Tis in the lap of the gods! Obviously overwhelmed by the notion of facing 50,000 brave Brigadiers in battle, the Robot Skeleton army requests a cease fire! The crisis hath passed. The skeletal army of CraigyFerg hath left the field of battle. From sea to shining sea the people rejoice! War hath been averted! But ne’er relax thy vigilance! And know ye this– thy Generalissimo is proud of his brave Brigadiers! Excelsior

There’s a touch of the poet in Stan… in a Prince Valiant sort of way.

Craig mentioned last night that Anna Torv has been rescheduled for next Friday, April 9.

On tonight’s Late Late Show, a contrast of epic proportions: Craig’s guests are the inimitable, hilarious and frantic Robin Williams, followed by moral philosopher Jonathan Dancy who came to Craig’s attention in a conversation with Dancy’s daughter-in-law, actress Claire Daines… about 35 seconds into the clip.

Video courtesy: malinky2stoatir

Not only will we get comedy but a discussion of moral particularism. It should be an interesting night. Friday’s guests are John Corbett and Joss Stone.

Note: RSA_News will be taking a break for the Easter holiday weekend… no blog posts are planned for Friday, Saturday or Sunday unless something big happens. Then on Monday, the big day arrives with guests Kristen Bell, Grant Imahara and Geoff Petersen. Until then, enjoy your holiday.