Things are going pretty well for NBC's acclaimed sitcom 30 Rock (although honestly I've found the current fourth season a little disappointing): This week, 30 Rock star Alec Baldwin and onetime 30 Rock guest star Steve Martin were named as the hosts for this year's Academy Awards (airing March 7, 2010), which is a somewhat odd but intriguing pairing. Oscars producers have been trying to shake things up with their hosting choices, and pairing two actors together who aren't known as a team is certainly an unexpected way to go. Martin has hosted solo before, but will his deadpan style mesh with Baldwin's more over-the-top personality? Will they do comedy bits together, or alternate the spotlight? It'll certainly be interesting to watch (and probably give a big boost in visibility to 30 Rock).
The show could probably use the help in Germany, where it debuted as the flagship show on a new cable network with a 0.0 rating, meaning it pulled in fewer than 5,000 viewers. Granted, the show is already available on DVD and online in Germany, and aired on a fledgling channel still struggling to find an audience, but that still isn't good news for potential worldwide success for the show, which does have a lot of U.S.-specific cultural references and humor.
If Germans like James Franco, maybe they'll be pleased that the increasingly odd actor (who just signed on to a two-month stint on daytime soap General Hospital apparently as part of some performance-art project) will be guest-starring on 30 Rock, playing himself, getting into a publicity-generating manufactured romance with Jane Krakowski's Jenna Maroney. Sounds like just the sort of weird project Franco himself would pursue these days.
Photo courtesy of NBC
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