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'Just Shoot Me' Pulled; Producer Pistol-Hot

After a disastrous ratings performance earlier this week, NBC informed the producers Wednesday that it was immediately pulling the sitcom from the schedule and shelving 13 unaired episodes.

The move drew an outraged response from "Just Shoot Me" executive producer Steve Levitan, who accused NBC entertainment president Jeff Zucker of breaking his word about the show's future and killing it this season through poor scheduling and a lack of promotion.

Levitan said that at the final season taping last month, "Jeff Zucker came and assured our cast, promised our cast, that (NBC) would not pull us and they would be airing these episodes. Now it's clear to me his word meant nothing.

"It's a real slap in the face to the show and the crew for NBC to treat the show the way they've treated it."

Levitan -- whose public criticism echoed David E. Kelley's attacks on ABC earlier this season over a scheduling switch for "The Practice" -- emphasized that he was speaking out because he felt NBC's handling of the show was representative of a larger trend in the business, with network executives growing increasingly enamored of reality shows and impatient with scripted fare.

"If they're going to toss you aside for 'Game Show Moments,' where's the integrity and dignity in this business?" said Levitan, who also is an executive producer of Fox's comedy "Oliver Beene."

Levitan said that after he expressed his anger over the show's removal, Zucker told Levitan's agent, Jay Sures of United Talent Agency, that his client would not be working for NBC again. Sures declined comment.

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O.J. Simpson could become the star of a new reality television show that would be centered on snippets of his appearances at hip-hop concerts.

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"No tyranny has ever really lasted. No government based on violence has endured. Sooner or later, they all fall. We're here to build a new life for ourselves, a home among the stars. Would you build a home on a foundation you knew would not last?"

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Larry Namer, who co-founded E! Entertainment (originally as Movietime Channel), and Blake Mycoskie, a contestant from The Amazing Race, plan to launch Reality Central, a round-the-clock cable network focusing on the genre. Investors include winners of CBS' Amazing Race and Survivor.

Namer disagrees with critics who say the reality genre could be a passing fancy.

"There's a huge base of passionate fans. (And) the main audience is 18-to-34," the young adults sought by advertisers, he says. "They grew up on The Real World on MTV. To them, reality TV is television. It's not a fad for them."

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"A man who won't stand up for his own principles is not really a man at all."

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