LOS ANGELES: During NBC’s executive session at the Television Critics Association, NBC Chairman Robert Greenblatt announced a whole slew of news, including renewals, casting for The Wiz, a new comedy executive produced by Tina Fey, and, of course, an update on The Celebrity Apprentice.
- American Ninja Warrior — which has surprisingly impressive ratings — was renewed for Season 5.
- The network extended Jimmy Fallon’s contract for six more years, meaning The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon will run through the fall of 2021.
- Added to The Wiz’s cast are Ne-Yo as Tin Man, Elijah Kelley as Scarecrow, and Common as the Gatekeeper to Oz.
- Rihanna will join the upcoming season of The Voice as a “key advisor” to the coaches.
- NBC ordered two new comedies from notable names. Michael Schur (Parks and Recreation) returns to NBC with the tentatively titled A Good Place. The comedy features another “strong and complicated female character” and is about a woman “wrestling with what it is to be good.”
- The other untitled sitcom is executive produced by Tina Fey and Robert Carlock (30 Rock) and from Tracey Wigfield (also 30 Rock and The Mindy Project), and is a workplace comedy about an “up and coming millennial woman” working at a cable news network with her mother.
- NBC will produce two pilots from the NBC Playground — out of 2100 submissions.
- Heroes Reborn will have a two-hour premiere on September 24, and The Blacklist will now premiere October 1.
- NBC acquired the rights to broadcast the animated movie How the Grinch Stole Christmas for the next two years.
- A new host hasn’t been chosen yet for The Celebrity Apprentice, but the show will take a break this year and return in 2016-17.