Daily Marauder

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“True Blood,” HBO‘s vampire-centric series, attracted 1.8 million viewers to last Sunday night‘s second episode, a 24% increase over its debut Sept. 7. That news apparently was all it took for HBO to pick up the show for a second season, which is expected to begin next summer. Variety (9/17)

The bad news on Wall Street has led to some good news for financial-news networks such as CNBC. With shows such as “Mad Money” and “Fast Money” poring over the latest market mayhem, CNBC attracted about 488,000 viewers Monday and 523,000 Tuesday, according to Nielsen figures. The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) (9/18)

ABC Family‘s season three debut of Lincoln Heights Tuesday at 8p delivered 646,000 A18-49 viewers; 472,000 W18-49 viewers; 653,000 Females 12-34; as well as 1.7 million total viewers. (Cynopsis 9/18)

Following the presidential election in November, someone else will have to portray Sen. Hillary Clinton on NBC‘s Saturday Night Live as Amy Poehler will be leaving to go on maternity leave after the birth of her first child and she will be preparing for her new primetime series on NBC, the anticipated spinoff of The Office. (Cynopsis 9/18)

Fine Living Network signed a multi-year syndication deal with NBC Universal Domestic Television Distribution involving NBC’s The Biggest Loser and Bravo’s former Queer Eye series. The agreement allows Fine Living to repurpose current episodes of Biggest Loser, airing them on Saturdays and Sundays at 9p starting this weekend. Fine Living also got the exclusive cable rights to The Biggest Loser: Couples when it premieres next year. (Cynopsis 9/18)

VH1 Classic will debut a new series, VH1 Classic All Time Top 10 on October 10 at 10p. This new weekly series will be hosted by Mark Goodman and will zoom in on a specific artist or music type such as Madonna, Van Halen, Def Leppard, metal music and more. Additionally, the network will air the eight-episode series VH1 Classic One-Hit Wonders hosted by Carrie Keagan starting December 1 through December 4. (Cynopsis 9/18)

FOX is developing a law-themed 60m dramedy and approved a put pilot order based on the fairy tale and classic Disney movie “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” according to THR. (Cynopsis 9/18)

After the spinoff of Time Warner Cable, about 25% of Time Warner’s total revenue picture will come from advertising sales, according to Time Warner CEO Jeffrey Bewkes. And the lion’s share of that, he said, will come from the strong performance of the Turner cable networks: “Ad growth at these nets has been very, very strong.” The Hollywood Reporter (9/17) , Home Media Magazine (9/17)

Comcast Chief Financial Officer Michael Angelakis said Wednesday that he was “very concerned about ripple effects” of the current Wall Street meltdown. But, he added, his company’s business model will help the country’s top cable provider ride out the storm: “We have a business model that has real resiliency. We have a defensive, resilient business that can take some body blows [from a weak economy]. We have a pretty rock-solid business.” The Hollywood Reporter (9/17) , OneTRAK (9/17)

Cablevision CEO James Dolan said that his company would be looking to tweak the distribution model of its recently acquired Sundance Channel. He wants to see the network, currently in about 30 million households, appear on more digital-basic tiers, rather than premium levels for which customers have to pay an additional fee. MediaPost Communications (9/17)