Further more, Deadline informed that the project is based off of an original idea by Riggle and is expected to be single camera comedy written by Adam McKay and Chris Henchy.

The show will be set in the bond trader world in the 1980s. Riggle’s character is “a successful, hard-living boss who lives a dark, self-centered, unhealthy life,” said Deadline. It is predicted to be a good fit with McKay and Ferrell, who have a relationship with HBO already, while Wahlberg brought in HBO’s hit show Entourage.

The question of whether or not Riggle can handle his own show still lingers.  Although he has had supporting roles in movies such as, Step Brothers, The Hangover, and 21 Jump Street, Riggle has yet to play a leading man. Does Riggle have what it takes to live up to the challenge?

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Speaking as a consumer, I’ve spent $20 for online, exclusive stand-up comedy specials: Ansari’s Dangerously Delicious, Gaffigan’s Mr. Universe and  C.K.’s Live at the Beacon Theater as well as his newly released Word. That’s the equivalent of one comedian’s regularly priced DVD special.

Normally I would just watch the specials on TV, choosing either to DVR them or to watch them live with commercials. So in effect I have already spent more money because of the availability.

C.K. faced an initial uncertainty due to torrenting and online piracy, saying, “I was told that it would be easier to torrent the way I made it, but I chose to do it this way anyway, because I want it to be easy for people to watch and enjoy this video in any way they want without ‘corporate’ restrictions.” A large majority of the piracy C.K. speaks of takes place in foreign countries. China, Bulgaria and Armenia rank among the worst offenders due to the fact that content is not available or restricted in those places.

Yet piracy has obviously shown no sign of destroying the model. C.K. posted a picture on Twitter when his Paypal broke $1,000,000. And piracy has certainly not slowed online distribution of music or movies. Just last year Netflix surpassed BitTorrent in traffic. Think about it: when’s the last time you popped a CD into your car stereo? This is obviously a natural progression in the digital age. But can it work for all comics?

Kent Alterman, Comedy Central’s head of Original Programming and Production, has been quoted as saying that only “a very rarefied community of comedians” are likely to command an audience to recoup the costs.

What channels like Comedy Central, HBO and Showtime have done for years is provide a platform for comedians to appear on TV. Outside of appearing in five minute bits on late night TV, its the biggest way to break through for comedians. This is how they obtain a following.

C.K. claimed total production and distribution costs were roughly $250,000 of his own personal money. Obviously a comic that made his first appearance on Conan last week won’t have this kind of money. But the strategy for these lesser known comics follows a similar model where they release their material strictly online, cutting out things like video production and physical manufacturing and distribution costs of DVD’s and CDs.

Perhaps the key to understanding this shift to look at the demographics of stand-up comedy. Most consumers are male and a very large amount of them are younger, particularly in the 18-35 range. This age group lives online and has done so most of their lives.

But success does not guarantee repetition. Ansari’s special, after a two month run online, will appear on Comedy Central this Sunday and C.K.’s Live at the Beacon Theater was recently aired on FX.  In his AMA on Reddit.Com C.K. was enthusiastic about online releases but hesitant to fully commit. “As long as it stays a good idea. We’ll see. It’s been really fun to do it and learn about it. I think there’s huge potential. But potential means there might be nothing.”

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Carell’s appearance was mostly about his new summer movie, Seeking a Friend for the End of The World, which co-stars the lovely Keira Knightly. But Ellen’s hit show wouldn’t be so popular if all she did was “talk” with her guests. Insert improv here.

“All right, we’re going to play charades, and it’s things all related to summer,” the host explained. Carell did his part, nailing most of the items acted out by Ellen. But midway through Steve’s routine, his actions became so reminiscent of a sexual act, Ellen was unable throw out any guesses because she was hysterical.

It’s pretty obvious from the video neither star expected their game of charades to get so graphic. “They’re never going to be able to air this,” joked Carell.

Check out the video below. Do you think Ellen’s writers set her up?

For more info about DeGeneres’ show visit her website here. You can view the trailer for Seeking a Friend for the end of the World here, courtesy of YouTube.

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Created by Alan Kirschenbaum and Ajay Sahgal, and produced by Two and a Half Men’s Eric and Kim Tannenbaum, the show will center around two childhood friends in their twenties who relocate from their home town of Bloomington, Indiana to Los Angeles to work at Groupon.

Mintz-Plasse will star as Evan and Nicolas Braun will co-star as Rob. Together the two will play polar opposite characters; Evan a shut-in and Rob ready to explore the LA party scene with storylines following Evan attempting to get Rob out of his shell. The show will also co-star Outsourced’s Parvesh Cheena.

The already skeptical premise of a show centered on Mintz-Plasse and Braun trying to sell half-off sushi and yoga classes has many critics and bloggers talking. How is a show based off of an internet coupon site going to be entertaining, they ask.

But the actors work well together and given their already notable chemistry in the upcoming comedy feature Get a Job (which Mintz-Plasse and Braun both happen to co-star in) audiences have much to anticipate. Be sure to check out the Friend Me pilot airing on CBS this fall.

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It felt like a theft of precious sitcom seconds were being wasted on him when I just wanted J.D. and Turk to sing about their “Guy Love.” Needless to say, I didn’t like Aziz on my first impression. Then I hear he’s releasing an online special a la Louis C.K. and once again I had my bitter biases creeping up.

But lo and behold, Aziz isn’t just an actor moonlighting as a stand-up comedian.

He’s not one of these guys that relies on his own ethnic and racial background for material. You aren’t going to hear self-deprecating Pakistani jokes from Aziz, mostly because he’s Indian which quite frankly is racist of you to assume they’re the same thing.

Shot at the Warner Theater in Washington D.C., Aziz is a hip hop aficionado, his set replete with stories of R. Kelly, Jay-Z and 50 Cent. One of his great strengths are his stories that bond the audience through experience. Example: “One night I’m texting a girl, she texts me back I text her back” and after about five back and forths, “I say ‘Alright cool, so you wanna get pizza on Tuesday?’ And then I don’t hear anything!”

This may seem lacking in clever wordplay, shock value or biting sarcasm. But it’s something that has happened to every guy and drove him crazy. When you hear Aziz tell stories like this you’re right there empathizing with every petty frustration that it seems laughable how close the two of you are.

My favorite is a comedy moment that absolutely has to be unwritten. There is honestly no way Aziz could tell this without it being true. Things start merrily along with a lunch date with a friend until suddenly 50 Cent appears in his eyesight. The scene is simply this rapper and former Vitamin Water shareholder believes that his grapefruit soda should be purple. As Aziz puts it, “There are parents who aren’t there when their kids learn what a grapefruit is. I am there in rapper 50 Cent’s life.”

Other hits on this hour long special include a Canadian customs lady whose English is “barely better than Animal from the Muppets Babies,” a dramatic interpretation of R. Kelly’s newest song, and the latest updates on Aziz’s chubby cousin Harris.

Just like Louis C.K. and Jim Gaffigan, Aziz is selling his special Dangerously Delicious for $5 on his website azizansari.com. A shortened and censored version will air on Comedy Central May 20 10:00 PM ET. It’s likely a quarter of the show will be slashed for commercials.

This is what I think of Aziz’s comedy. The words, on paper are neither highly cerebral nor playactingly stupid. The stories often involve banal realities rather than outrageous adventures. It’s Aziz’s personality, the same personality I initially despised on Scrubs, that drives his stand-up. Time will tell that Aziz is not a TV actor moonlighting as a comedian. It might be the other way around.

Check out a preview of Dangerously Delicious here:

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“Don’t get Twirter. Anchorman2 teaser w Dictator tom night. Dont know what a teaser is. World is crazy? Having a scotch,” tweeted @RonBurgundy on Monday. And earlier today @RonBurgundy reaffirmed the trailer was in theaters saying, “On Twirtter to say the A2 teaser is in theaters tonight with Dictator. Done. Now having a Cutty Sark & watching McCloud.”

Anchorman was an incredibly successful movie, but the price of the star actors had gone up considerably since its release in 2004. The delay for a sequel was due to Paramounts inability to agree on such a high budget.

“[T]heir numbers machine purely looked at the box office,” director Adam McKay told THR.com last month.”It didn’t project off of DVD sales and TV and cultural influence. It stopped at the box office.”

Some interesting news to note, Anchorman 2 doesn’t even have a script yet, but they’ve some how come out with a teaser. Here’s to somebody bootlegging it tonight and uploading it on to YouTube.

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Despite unfavorable ratings, Season 7 is expected to be the best yet!  According to Greenblatt,  “I know Tina, Alec and the rest will deliver some of their best work [in season seven], we think the world of Tina and hope she will be in the NBC family for years to come.”

Although the series is coming to an end,  the future looks bright for co-star and comedian Tina Fey.   “Tina is gonna have a big career directing films and writing,” said co-star Alec Baldwin. “She’s going to be the next Elaine May. She’ll be great.”

30 Rock came to life in 2006.  The series has won several major awards including an Emmy Award for Outstanding Comedy Series in 2007, 2008, and 2009.

Tell us your thoughts about 30 Rock. Did you expect the series to come to an end?

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DeGeneres will be honored by The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts on Oct. 22 with a lineup of star performers in a tribute show that will be recorded for broadcast at a later date. None of the star performers have been announced yet.

Ellen released a statement where she said receiving the same award as past honorees Bill Cosby, Tina Fey and Will Ferrell makes her wonder, “Why didn’t I get this sooner?”

It was 15 years ago that she broke ground, when on her hit television show, Ellen, she became the first lead character in primetime television to come out as gay. This helped pave the way for many more to follow, including Will and Grace, Glee and Modern Family. DeGeneres has also been the voice of a lead character in Finding Nemo and served as a judge for one season on the hit reality show, American Idol.

Before hitting the big time, the New Orleans native got her start as an emcee at a local comedy club. She won Showtime’s Funniest Person in America in 1982 and in 1986. She’s appeared on The Tonight Show and become the first female comedian called over to Johnny Carson’s desk after her performance.

The Mark Twain prize honors people who have an impact on society as a social commentator and satirist, such as Twain did. Cappy McGarr, an executive producer for the Mark Twain Prize show and a Kennedy Center board member, said DeGeneres has a special style of observational humor in the tradition of Twain and she also makes people laugh across political lines.

“This has nothing to do with any political issue,” McGarr said. “But she’s brilliantly shined a light on society, and that’s what Mark Twain did.”

Do you think Ellen is deserving? Do you feel it is a political statement by The Kennedy Center? Tell us your thoughts in the comments.

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AC: The Steve Harvey Morning Show is broadcast on dozens of stations. What is it like going to work, knowing you’re going to reach that many people?

TM: You know, when you start thinking about it – I’m talking to 8-9 million people – and you start thinking about it, you start to panic. ‘Oh my god I’m talking to 8-9 million people!’ You go in with a relaxed mind. You’re not going in with notes, you’re not going in with index cards. You just gotta go in with your personality. I’m a wild and crazy guy, as long as I go in with that, I’m gonna do the job.

When we first started, I used to go in with all these notes. I’d go in with all this stuff. My backpack full of stuff and I’d jot it down. Steve was like ‘Why’d you bring all that shit? Why do you need all that shit for?’ I was like ‘Well I got this joke it would be really great.’ He was like ‘We don’t need that. You stay funny.’ I had to understand radio is spontaneous. Radio is about what’s happening in the moment. Theater of the mind. So you just gotta go with it.

AC: How did you get on the show?

TM: Steve Harvey is my uncle. I was out working with Luther Vandross ten plus years ago. We were doing concerts over in Europe. I came back home and Luther Vandross said ‘Hey I’m gonna take some down time and we’ll be back up in six months, I’ll write a new album and we’ll be back out on the road doing concerts.’  I decided to go to California. I reached out to this new manager, Rushion McDonald. He said ‘Why don’t you come up and get on the radio, hang out with us and talk smack with Steve like you guys always do? Come tomorrow like 5 or 530.’ I said no problem, we’re doing dinner? He said ‘No no no hang on. I mean 530 in the morning.’ I was like you got to be kidding me.

So I get out there, I go in for about a week and Steve and I are just dropping mad smack on the radio. And it became a hit. It’s this unc’ and nephew thing that just blows up and everyone likes it. They said hey, we want to do this all the time and I said hey, hang on, I work for Luther Vandross. So when Mr. Vandross decides we’re going back out on the road, I gotta go back out on the road. Truth of the matter is Mr. Vandross as you know, he got sick and we never went back out on the road. So actually I was given a job when I didn’t even know I needed a job. So that was the birth of me being on the radio with Steve and here we are ten years later and we’re still going strong.

AC: You’ve done scripted acting and improv on the radio. Which would you say is tougher?

TM: They both have challenges. Scripted you want to be as believable as possible. You want everybody watching you from the audience and say, ‘Wow, what a hell of an actor. He’s really got it down. He’s doing a great job.’ So it’s about your character.

I’m still a character so to speak on the radio show. But I’m coming from a different aspect. They both have their challenges. In this one I’m the loose cannon on the show. I’m the Barney Fife. I’m the trifling nephew who can’t do anything right. I gotta sell all of that. I gotta make you think I’m really that damn stupid. But I’m not. I’m the guy that has Shakespeare bouncing around in his head.

(In fact, during this interview, Miles rattled off not only a Shakespearean monologue, but also some lines from one of his biggest influences, Sidney Poitier.)

AC: Who are some of your biggest influences in comedy and acting?

TM: I think every comedian has Richard Pryor on their list. I like Bill Cosby. I like his cleanness. I like how he decided he wasn’t going to be a person that would use profanity and still deliver his message. Redd Foxx was just straight up triple-x, man. You look at Don Rickles. Don Rickles is funny. Lucille Ball — funny. It don’t get no better. Lucille Ball and Carol Burnett, oh my God. What are we talkin’ about? We’re talkin’ funny.

This will probably blow you away. Donald Sutherland I think is an awesome actor. He does not get the credit he deserves. Don Cheadle I think is a great actor. You ask anybody else they say they like Denzel, but I go way deeper. My greatest, to me, is Sidney Poitier. If you ask Denzel that ought to be his greatest too.

AC: You put out a CD last year called “Just My Thoughts” which featured your stand-up act. Are you looking to do more of that?

TM: Stand-up to me is fun to do. It’s not the ultimate goal. My background is theater. The ultimate goal is always film and television. If I could do 3 or 4 films a year, that would be one of my ultimate goals. I get phone calls because of who they hear on the radio. I get phone calls to do movies because of that. You get phone calls because of the popularity most of the time not ‘Oh shit he can really act.’ It doesn’t come out until someone gives me a role and says ‘Oh god, he nailed it.’ Yeah asshole, he’s a damn actor, he’s not just some dumb guy on the radio. If they’re calling because of the dumb guy on the radio, that must mean I’m really doing my job on the radio.

AC: Is your radio dynamic with Steve Harvey more of a working relationship or a personal bond?

TM: It’s more of a working relationship. I think the most important thing he taught me was there’s no show without business. You have to have the business side. You have to know what you’re doing on the business side. That’s one of the most important parts I needed to know. I made some decision where I say ‘Oh god I shouldn’t have done that.’ And then he’ll come to me and say ‘Ok here’s what you did wrong.’ You get more sharp in knowing how to handle business. And that’s really what’s gonna make you more successful in the beginning. You can have all the talent in the world, but if you don’t have this business thing down man, you’re gonna lose.

AC: Speaking of business, what do you have in the works for 2012?

TM: I got this special my manager is pushing me on. I do a lot of different characters. We put together this thing called ‘I Got People Inside My Head.’ It’s a special that would be me for about 30 minutes and I would be introducing my characters. So the same way that you see Eddie Murphy doing the Klumps and he’s in full makeup, the makeup is like that. Here’s a guy doing three or four people, but it’s all him.

I’m really excited about this prank phone call CD. It’s called ‘Church Folk Gotta Laugh Too.’ What I did this time is I created a theme and I pulled out all prank phone calls that I’ve done that have not been on any CD’s that are church related.

AC: Would you say the prank phone calls are your favorite part of the Steve Harvey Morning Show?

TM: These people are blown away by the prank phone calls. They love them. I wouldn’t say it’s my favorite part. It’s what I’m known by radio wise. I’m known for so much, but I’m a guy who does these characters. More importantly it’s one of the killer spots on the radio. It’s one of our benchmarks so to speak that everybody likes it. The pranks are head over heels, they are the best things in the world.

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During his latest hosting gig, Ferrell brought back one of his greatest impressions ever…former president George W. Bush. The return was a surprise appearance in the cold open, which saw Joe Biden as an angry teenager, upset at the president for stealing the spotlight on the gay marriage issue. Fred Armisen returned as Obama, as he tried to soothe the pain of the vice president, played by Jason Sudeikis.

Obama gives Biden gruff for talking to his imaginary friend “George,” but settles him down and leaves him with $20 for pizza, as he takes off for a black tie event with Elton John and Lady Gaga. After Obama leaves, Biden is joined by his real friend, Bush himself. They share a moment of not being taken seriously by their respective bosses (Dick Cheney in the case of Bush).

Check out the clip below and tell us what you think of Ferrell’s return to SNL. Is former president George W. Bush the best impression Ferrell ever did?

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