Tuning In to TV

Hasselbeck returns

Elisabeth Hasselbeck will be back on “The View” on Oct. 19, Associated Press reports.

Miss Hasselbeck has been off the daytime talk show since Aug. 7 - two days before she gave birth to her third child, Isaiah Timothy. She’s married to Tim Hasselbeck, a former quarterback for the Washington Redskins and four other NFL teams.

Since then, her only contact with viewers was last Thursday, when she phoned “The View” for an on-air chat with fellow co-hosts Barbara Walters, Whoopi Goldberg, Joy Behar and Sherri Shepherd.

During Miss Hasselbeck’s maternity leave, numerous guests have filled in. Upcoming subs include “The Hills” star Heidi Montag, former “View” co-host Lisa Ling, “Ugly Betty” star Ana Ortiz, TV reality star Khloe Kardashian and “Big Bang Theory” star Kaley Cuoco.

Matt is back

Showtime network says “Friends” alum Matt LeBlanc is returning to TV in a new comedy.

According to Associated Press, Mr. LeBlanc will star in “Episodes,” a single-camera series about a husband-and-wife producing team whose witty hit comedy on British TV is turned into a dumbed-down American sitcom starring Mr. LeBlanc, who plays himself.

“Episodes” is a sendup of the TV world and Mr. LeBlanc’s image as a sitcom veteran. The show will be a co-production of Showtime, and the BBC and will begin shooting a six-episode season in London and Hollywood in winter. It is scheduled to air next year on Showtime and BBC Two.

Mr. LeBlanc played Joey Tribbiani on “Friends” for a decade. He followed that NBC hit in 2004 with a sitcom based on the same character, “Joey.” It flopped.

Leno TiVo’ed less

Time-shifted viewing of NBC’s “The Jay Leno Show” among TiVo users is below the network’s year-ago levels for 10 p.m. programming. But it eats more into the network’s 11 p.m. viewership, including “The Tonight Show With Conan O’Brien,” DVR pioneer TiVo Inc. tells the Hollywood Reporter.

After the show had been on the air two weeks, an average 46 percent of its TiVo subscriber audience opted to record it and watch it later, TiVo found. That compares to an average of 7 percent of time-shifted viewing of NBC programs in the 10 p.m. slot last season. This also has resulted in less time shifting for NBC thus far this season at 10 p.m. when compared with other broadcast networks, TiVo said.

However, the TiVo Stop||Watch ratings service also found that nearly 20 percent of time-shifted viewing of the Leno show occurred within one hour of the start of the program, up from 13 percent last season.

“Depending on whom you ask, NBC’s glass is either half full or half empty,” said Todd Juenger, vice president and general manager of TiVo Audience Research & Measurement.

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