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Steamy plot on 'Gossip Girl' draws protest, interest
CW photos
Vanessa (Jessica Szohr), Dan (Penn Badgley) and Olivia (Hillary Duff) stir up trouble on tonight's episode of "Gossip Girl."
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Published: November 9, 2009
Three characters on "Gossip Girl" (Dan, Vanessa and Olivia) are going to share a bed on tonight's episode. And that steamy plot twist has got a conservative group all hot and bothered.
In this case, it's "hot" as outraged. But then the Parents Television Council is often outraged over just about everything on television.
This time the group, spurred by on-air promos for a threesome, has asked affiliates of the CW network to pre-empt the show for fear teenagers will see it and be influenced to go down the path of immorality.
Too late. Chances are fans of "Gossip Girl" have already seen the commercials. Chances are even greater than "GG" fans already know what a threesome is.
And the protest has fueled interest, especially on the Internet where clips from the show are getting a lot of hits.
The CW declined to comment. But my guess is network officials would say "Thanks, PTC."
In a letter to the affiliates, PTC President Tim Winter, called airing the episode, "reckless and irresponsible."
"Will you now be complicit in establishing a precedent and expectation that teenagers should engage in behaviors heretofore associated primarily with adult films?" he asks.
WTOG, Channel 44, The CW affiliate that serves the Tampa-St. Petersburg market plans to show the episode.
CW 44 station manager Laura Caruso said she had received only one complaint as of last week — a local e-mail that appeared to have copied the PTC complaint.
"There are some teens who watch the show but 80 percent of the 'Gossip Girl' audience is over age 18," says Caruso. "The median age of our viewers is 33."
She says the content of "Gossip Girl" has not been objectionable in the past. "The promos are often more exotic than the program itself," she says.
This isn't the first time the PTC got its knickers all bunched up over "Gossip Girl."
Last year, the group complained about commercials that showed a lot of skin and suggested characters were in bed or skinny-dipping.
The CW promotion department cleverly lifted wording from the PTC protest statement and plastered "A Nasty Piece of Work" and "Mind-Blowingly Inappropriate" across the promos.
This storyline continues next week so be warned if you are a concerned parent. But then if you don't want your teens watching "Gossip Girl" take some personal responsibly and change the channel or turn off the TV.
LATE WITH LOPEZ: George Lopez is a funny, likable guy who becomes the first Latino to host a late-night talk show on an English language network. His "Lopez Tonight" debuts at 11 p.m. tonight on family-friendly TBS.
The 48-year-old comic promises a party atmosphere, light banter with guests and spontaneous humor. "It's going to be different every night," Lopez says.
Airing Monday-Thursday, sometimes it will open with a stand-up routine, sometimes with a musical act, sometimes with a guest skit. Guests tonight: Ellen DeGeneres, Eva Longoria-Parker and Kobe Bryant.
Lopez took his act to the White House earlier this year and impressed President Obama, who agreed to do a promo for the show.
Don't underestimate Lopez. His HBO comedy special in August had the network's best stand-up ratings in five years, and Lopez won the Teen Choice Award for favorite comic this year (thanks to reruns of his former ABC sitcom on Nick at Nite).
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