In the outside chance there still exists a pocket of backwoods-dwelling clodhoppers who have yet to learn of Jessica Seinfeld's bestselling cookbook Deceptively Delicious, the wife of Bee Movie mogul Jerry Seinfeld appeared on The View today to further outline her methods of veggie-disguising culinary tricksiness.

· Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks are cast in Kevin Smith's Zach and Miri Make a Porno, the story of two platonic friends who try to use the power of hardcore pornography to solve their debt problems. As the actors previously appeared together in The 40 Year Old Virgin, this film represents the kind of re-teaming effort that drives us so wild with delight. [Variety]
· In one of the final Thursday night shoot-outs at the Nielsen Corral before the networks expend all of their first-run-episode ammunition, CBS defeats ABC. [THR]

· Even though the WGA strike might wipe out a significant portion of this so-far underwhelming Fall season, there's still some good news for TV: most shows have produced enough episodes that the Academy may not have to cancel the Emmys, an awards show that rivals the average picket line in thrills-per-minute even in years when it's not hampered by labor strife. [Variety]
· E! further fortifies its lineup of strike-proof programming by picking up a second season of Keeping Up With the Kardashians, a show they can easily spin off into separate series following each member of the Hollywood's bustiest, semifamous family should the need for even more mindless schedule-filler arise. [THR]

In its new issue, Esquire profiles compulsively quotable NBC perfect storm Ben Silverman, who apparently has not been too busy monitoring the foreign airwaves for lowbrow, easily importable reality TV formats he can plug into the holes the writers strike will soon blow in his network's schedule to publicly invite his favorite rivals over for a good, old-fashioned dick-measuring contest. We begin with Silverman's dismissal of network nemeses Kevin "The One Whose Job I Was Begged To Take" Reilly (now of Fox) and Steve "I Gave Him A Huge Hit He Didn't Even Want" McPherson as D-girls, fightin' words if we've ever heard any:

So reenergized was The View's headmistress Barbara Walters by the politically incorrect musings of Damon Wayans on yesterday's broadcast, she's already taken it upon herself to incorporate some of the controversy-courting changes herself:

If only all guests of The View carried on with the candor of a Damon Wayans, whose folksy take on such hot-button topics as Don Imus's return to radio ("When he called them 'nappy-headed hos,' I went, 'Wow. He's right!'"), and the lack of available women possessing the basic, barefoot culinary skills he demands in a partner, energized the typically moribund proceedings.

Breaking! Horny TV doctors show support for striking writers! Says a tipster: "Cast of Grey's Anatomy outside protesting ABC Prospect Studios right now in their blue gowns. Heigl, Dempsey....they're all out there." Actually, we're told Dempsey isn't wearing his scrubs, a wardrobe failure that potentially could hamper a lovestruck picketer's ability to flesh out his or her fantasy of sneaking off with McDreamy for a quickie show of solidarity in the back of a temporarily unused production van.

Another set-disrupting Writers Guild Strike Force has gone on the attack, descending upon a downtown location shoot for ABC's Big Shots in hopes of ruining some takes with the joyful noise of labor strife. A tipster reports from the scene, where it seems that star Christopher Titus has thus far avoided the fate of physically weaker Desperate Housewives hostage Eva Longoria: "I work on 5th and Spring Downtown and strikers were disrupting the filming of some Christopher Titus show. I know this because I walked into Titus' chest. He's tall and tan and seemed to be laughing about the antics. I think the crew was pissed. I overheard 'What benefits they get in the WGA?' Response: 'A lot.'"

Earlier today, we'd expressed a now very naive-seeming wish that WGA members and the Companies they're protesting might find a way to get through the remainder of the strike without further incidents of unnecessary, cause-undermining violence. It is with considerable sadness that we note KTLA's story (video here or here) about a renegade band of Guild picketers, who, upon receiving word of an in-progress Desperate Housewives location shoot earlier today, marched on the set, hoping to disrupt filming.

If it's strike carnage you seek, look no further than today's episode of The View: Stripped of its guild-member producers pumping meaningful dialogue into their earpieces, a Hot Topics segment on the writers strike forced the hosts to explain the labor impasse using their own, barely coherent grasp of the issues. (Particularly immaterial was Joy Behar's "Surveillance Cameras: What's With Them?!" contribution to the ongoing debate.) In moments of total daytime TV chaos like these, we typically rely on Barbara Walters to set this runaway locomotive back on its rails. Oddly enough, however, she remained uncharacteristically quiet during the segment—and, we might add, looking in her old age more and more like Tori Spelling every day.

· Hollywood Out of Ideas, Can't Blame the Writers For the Current Idea Shortage Edition: Jennifer Connelly—an actress we'd pay $14 dollars to watch knitting a sweater or making peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches—will join monosyllabic, paparazzi-punishing superstar Keanu Reeves in Fox's remake of the 1951 sci-fi classic The Day the Earth Stood Still. [Variety]
· Big Love polygamist Jeanne Tripplehorn is on board for HBO's movie version of Grey Gardens, playing Jackie O opposite Jessica Lange and Drew Barrymore's Big and Little Edies, respectively. THR]
· ABC's Cashmere Mafia might be the first primetime victim of the strike, as the network yanks the new series from its schedule before its originally planned November 27 debut. But good news for those craving Sex and the City-inspired entertainment: NBC hasn't yet abandoned nearly identical project Lipstick Jungle. [Variety]

In the current contract, writers only get paid when viewers actually buy the content online, like from iTunes, for example. Problem is, the broadcast networks aren't exactly enamored with the online-retail model. Just ask NBC CEO Jeff Zucker. The broadcast business has always been ad-supported, which is why NBC and News Corp are comfortable with Hulu and the Disney-ABC Television Group signed a deal with AOL Video. And naturally, writers want a cut of the ad dollars, too.

· In other strike-related news, post-production houses prepare for the hit they'd take during a work stoppage, while indie film companies could see "the labor mess as a potential silver lining." [Variety, Variety]
· IggyGate provided The Ellen DeGeneres Show with a nice ratings boost, leading producers to plan a monthly stunt in which Ellen generously gives away one of her recently rescued pets to a young audience member, only to suffer an emotional breakdown as the gift is immediately ripped from the arms of the bawling child by adoption agency shock troops. [THR]

Congratulations are in order for ABC, the network deemed marginally less lily-white than its borderline-albino broadcast rivals in a television diversity report just released by Multi-Ethnic Media Coalition. Behind the leadership of televisionary Steve McPherson—an executive unafraid to crack some skulls when his shows begin to lag behind their diversity benchmarks—and hits like Ugly Betty, ABC easily triumphed over competition that was either satisfied to maintain the Caucasian status quo or backslide further into the alabaster void:

· Universal and New Line join the list of those who strenuously object to the WGA's strike rules, warning writers in their employ that complying with their union's demands to validate the scripts they're trying to turn in before tomorrow's deadline will put them in breach of contract. [Variety]
· Writers and studio executives alike have caught Script-Flipping Fever! Unfortunately, any camaraderie the two sides may now feel as they rush to finish shootable screenplays together could be slightly undermined if they're forced to start trying to kill each other on Thursday morning. [THR]
· Warner Bros. wants to deepen its already very fulfilling relationship with model/host/producer/investigative reporter Tyra Banks, signing her to a multiyear deal in which Banks' production company will do everything for the Warner corporate family short of emptying their trash cans at the end of the day. [Variety]

Call it a curse, call it a lack of fulfilling leisure activities in Hawaii, call it the stress of never getting to speak any of your lines in English—the cast of Lost has claimed yet another DUI:

I can't conceive of what it's going to be like next week without the sight of Mark Cuban kicking up his heels on ABC's Dancing with the Stars. I was so disconsolate that Gawker Media videographer Richard Blakeley cooked up this montage to cheer me up. Let me tell you, Microsoft should be investing $240 million in this guy.

Kicked off of ABC's Dancing with the Stars, Mark Cuban reveals that he's lost 30 pounds in the course of preparing for and performing on the show. That points to his future career: fatblogging, like his good buddy Jason Calacanis, the wantrepreneur who's turned himself into the Richard Simmmons of the Internet.

Alas, Mark Cuban. You soft-shoed your way into my heart — but not America's. Cuban has been booted off Dancing with the Stars. His crime? Letting his nerd flag fly, in high-waisted pants and black-framed glasses. Here's a recap of his brief dancing career:

Give billionaire Internet entrepreneur Mark Cuban this much: At least he didn't faint during last night's Dancing with the Stars on ABC. It wasn't his best performance, but I'm betting he'll be safe during tonight's results show: The hypernerdy glasses he donned during an "I Dream of Jeannie"-inspired number played to his core audience of Valleywag readers.