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With Congress passing a measure to rescind $1.1 billion in previously allocated funds for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, NPR, PBS, and their member stations are bracing for major challenges ahead. This cut effectively eliminates all federal support for public media for the next two years, hitting local stations — especially those in smaller and rural markets — the hardest. Vital programming and educational services that rely heavily on federal dollars are now in jeopardy.

Amid these political and financial headwinds, PBS’ rich history of Emmy-winning programs remains a testament to its unmatched contributions to television. From the beloved Sesame Street to groundbreaking documentary series like Frontline and award-winning dramas such as Downton Abbey, PBS has built a legacy of excellence, earning more than 1,000 Emmys and shaping America’s cultural and educational landscape for decades. Here’s a look at some of PBS’ most celebrated and award-winning programs.

Sesame Street

Sesame Street, the...

Tim Allen returns to the world of sitcoms with Shifting Gears, a new show from creators Mike and Julie Thacker Scully and showrunner Michelle Nader. In the series, a widower and car workshop owner named Matt (Allen) takes in his estranged daughter Riley (Kay Dennings) and her two kids (Maxwell Simkins and Barrett Margolis). The show also features Sean William Scott and Daryl “Chill” Mitchell as workers at Matt’s auto shop.

Allen is, of course, a sitcom legend. The actor and comedian led Home Improvement, a sitcom based on his own stand-up comedy material, from 1991 to 1999. The role even won Allen a Golden Globe award. Allen’s next sitcom, Last Man Standing, ran for even longer, beginning in 2011 and ending in 2021 after 194 episodes. In addition to his TV roles, Allen has starred in truly beloved movies and franchises including Toy Story (Allen recently gave an optimistic Toy Story 5 update) and The Santa Clause.

This Old House practically invented the renovation show genre on television. The inspiration for This Old House led to an unlikely hit in the sitcom Home Improvement. The original hosts of This Old House, Bob Vila, and Norm Abram, inspired the characters of Tim Taylor and Al Borland.

Long before the evolution of television led to the formation of specialty channels like HGTV, audiences had to make do with far fewer options. One of the most popular was PBS, which, in the 1970s, sparked an entirely new television genre in what has now become a staple practically everywhere: renovation shows.

The idea came as a spark of inspiration. One day, Boston television producer Russell Morash drove by a construction site and noticed spectators huddled around a plywood wall, craning their necks to see into the development. Morash figured that if a crowd like that could be drawn to an excavation...

The reason Wilson hid his face on Home Improvement was because Tim Allen wanted to pay homage to a neighbor from his childhood whom he couldn't fully see over a fence. Wilson's mysterious appeal on Home Improvement came from the fact that his face was always obscured, adding to his popularity as a character. Last Man Standing, Tim Allen's more recent sitcom, paid tribute to Home Improvement and Wilson by featuring an episode where Tim Taylor and Mike Baxter discussed their neighbors with hidden faces.

A recurring gag on Home Improvement is that Taylor's friendly neighbor Wilson's face is never shown fully, but here's the real reason why Wilson hid his face. Tim Allen had few acting credits to his name before Home Improvement. It was thanks to the success of Allen's stand-up special Men Are Pigs that ABC became interested in developing a sitcom tailored to him. After turning...

Dabl, a lifestyle-focused multicast network launched last fall by CBS Television Distribution, is expanding via new carriage deals with Comcast Xfinity and Verizon FiOS.

The agreements cover 13 top markets on both platforms (see the full list below), mirroring the places where Dabl (pronounced as “dabble”) already airs on digital spectrum programmed by CBS-owned stations. At the start of this year, CBS said the ad-supported network was cleared in 90% of the country.

In addition to the extra distribution, the network announced four new shows joining its summer lineup: Emeril Live, Instant Gardener, 60 Minute Makeover and Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares. The last of the group comes to Dabl via a deal with ITV Studios.

“We’re excited to announce the extension of Dabl’s footprint to cable subscribers in top markets,” said Steve LoCascio, COO of CBS Television Distribution. “Dabl’s lineup of lifestyle programs in the food, home improvement,...

Dabl, an ad-supported, multi-platform lifestyle network launched last September by CBS Television Distribution, is now cleared in 90% of the U.S., the company said Tuesday.

In delivering the status report on the fledgling operation on Day 1 of Natpe, Ctd also said Dabl (as in “dabble”) has acquired more than 400 hours of programming from ITV Studios and all3media. The block includes some titles featuring British chef Gordon Ramsay.

While Dabl is a multicast network airing on the digital spectrum of television stations (including the CBS portfolio), it also recently added cable distribution with Altice USA. The multicast space in general has surged in value in recent years, growing from a fringe realm that was created by the transition to HD TV a generation ago into a more robust business throwing off hundreds of millions in revenue.

“We are thrilled with the growth we have seen in Dabl in just four months,...

Miami born Bob Vila worked his way into the homes of millions as the hard-working host and blue-collar sex symbol on the long-running home renovation television show 'This Old House.'   Bob Vila tooled around on the PBS program alongside master carpenter Norm Abram starting back in 1979 but Vila demoed his involvement a decade later after an endorsement disagreement ... the show was then contracted out to Steve Thomas ... who continue to build the show after that.

Need to catch up? Check out the previous Outlander recap here.

Both Brianna and Roger make the leap through time in this week’s Outlander, thank goodness. It’s been fun watching Jamie and Claire channel Bob Vila and all, but I’m ready for the Frasers and Rog all to be in one place (and century) so that the joyful reunions, tearful misunderstandings and 18th-century game of telephone* can get underway!

On a related note, this week’s episode brings back two characters we haven’t seen in a while: Frank and Laoghaire. For the first time, particularly in Laoghaire’s case,...

By Bob Vila's beard! Are you at a loss for what to get your favorite Thor: Ragnarok fan this coming holiday? You are? Well, then you might be interested to know that ThinkGeek has got a mighty good deal going on right now for Marvel's Thor Hammer Tool Set. That's right, now you too can replace those nasty floorboards, tighten up your loose cabinet…...

Home and Green Living can be viewed for free on FilmOn. The channel is great for those who like do-it-yourself projects, gardening, and those who like home improvement. The channel features popular television series like “Real Green” and Bob Vila-presented television programs. “Real Green” shows its viewers how to live much more in-sync with the natural world and create a smaller carbon footprint while saving some money. Here’s more about “Real Green”: “Real Green” is a nationally-syndicated weekly television series featuring practical advice for living a greener, more sustainable life. We’ll show how you can help save the environment while saving yourself some money as well. We’ll hear from experts, [ Read More ]

The post Watch Home and Green Living for Free on FilmOn appeared first on Shockya.com.

June 17: Actor Peter Lupus (TV's "Mission: Impossible") is 80. Singer Barry Manilow is 69. Comedian Joe Piscopo is 61. Actor Mark Linn-Baker ("Perfect Strangers") is 58. Director Bobby Farrelly ("There's Something About Mary") is 54. Actor Thomas Haden Church ("Sideways," "Wings," "Ned and Stacy") is 51. Actor Greg Kinnear is 49. Actress Kami Cotler ("The Waltons") is 47. Actor Jason Patric is 46. Singer Kevin Thornton of Color Me Badd is 43. Actor-comedian Will Forte ("Saturday Night Live") is 42. Actor-rapper Herculeez of Herculeez and Big Tyme is 29.

June 18: Musician Paul McCartney is 70. Movie critic Roger Ebert is 70. Actress Constance McCashin ("Knots Landing") is 65. Actress Linda Thorson ("The Avengers") is 65. Keyboardist John Evans of The Box Tops is 64. Actress Isabella Rossellini is 60. Actress Carol Kane is 60. Actor Brian Benben ("Private Practice") is 56. Actress Andrea Evans ("The Bold and the Beautiful") is 55. Singer Alison Moyet is 51. Keyboardist Dizzy Reed (Guns N' Roses) is 49. Country singer-guitarist Tim Hunt (Yankee Grey) is...

In today's opening paragraph I feel compelled to share this bit of wisdom with all of our readers: don't ever attempt to renovate a house without ample professional help. Never. Just don't do it. For the past three weeks I, the least handy person you may never meet, have been tasked with doing things that only Bob Vila and a few select others could be reasonably prepared for. It's an all-consuming, seemingly neverending process that leaves you as the only movie blogger in the history of the civilized world who hasn't yet seen The Avengers. Trust me, it's a lonely place... All warnings aside, in store for you in this week's Top 5 is the first poster for the Anchorman sequel, Anchorman: The Legend Continues, pleasant news regarding the Blade Runner sequel, interviews with Cameron Diaz, Anna Kendrick and more for the rom-com What to Expect When You're Expecting, the first...

Good eeeeeeeeevening, boys and ghouls. Last night FX premiered Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk's new thriller American Horror Story, and I think I speak for everyone who watched when I ask, "What the faaaaaaaaalchuk was that?!"

Each week I will be recapping the madness that goes on inside and near the Harmon house, partly in an attempt to make some sense of it myself. But rest assured, dear readers - I am a lifelong horror nut with an advanced degree in Batsh*tology, so if anyone is qualified to give you a tour of this cursed piece of real estate, I'd like to think it's me.

Shall we get this party started?

Just a minute in, and it's already batty as hell...

We kick things off in 1978 with a few sweeping shots of the front of a gorgeous but disused Victorian mansion accompanied by some ominous and familiar strings (if I'm not mistaken,...

Filed under: TV News

If you miss Bob Vila's home improvement shows ... well, this may not help much. Nevertheless, Robert Van Winkle, better known by his former stage name, Vanilla Ice, is set to teach you the tricks of the trade in a new home improvement show he's hosting for Diy Network, as reported by The Boombox.

 

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By Ben Collins

David Simon has become famous for creating the type of television that make viewers want to breath inside his detail-heavy landscapes — even if those settings (like his gritty but all-to-real Baltimore streets in "Homicide: Life on the Street" and "The Wire") tend to get bloody and gruesome pretty frequently.

Simon's new show "Treme" (named after the New Orleans neighborhood where most of the action takes place) debuted on HBO with an 80-minute premiere on Sunday night (April 11), and its dedication to those inviting hues is no different. It's about a post-Katrina New Orleans (a title card at the top of the show reads "Three Months After"), and there are full five minute blocks of footage that show characters wading through wrecked houses and their own belongings, now unrecognizable by all the flood damage. But the there's something about it all that makes you want to be there regardless,...

Until the recent economic collapse hit and home values plummeted, “flipping” fixed-up houses had grown from a small movement of handy folks with foresight into a cottage industry. “How-to” guides and home-improvement shows proliferated to the point where it seemed like every other high-numbered cable channel featured it’s own Bob Vila or Norm Abrams. Now, banks are trying to offload foreclosed mortgages by any available means and houses that would have been prime flip fodder have instead become a prime source of copper piping for the locals junkies to steal. This bear market needs a new hero, a Tim Taylor for the current real estate environment. We don’t need some run-of-the-mill home improvement expert with no personality hammerin’ nails or fixing the sink. We need Jimmy Pace: he’s got safety goggles, an empty tool belt and he doesn’t actually know how to fix anything. The bane...

After averaging a 0.8 household rating, CBS Television Distribution has cancelled the home improvement syndicated series Bob Vila. This ends a 28-year run for host and renovation expert Bob Vila.

Vila started hosting PBS' This Old House series in 1979 after winning the "Heritage House of 1978" award from Better Homes and Gardens. House instructed home viewers on how to perform a variety of home renovations. Vila left the series in 1989, reportedly because of his involvement in outside endorsements of building equipment. Soonafter, Vila became a spokesman for Sears and began hosting Bob Vila's Home Again in syndication. That series was renamed as simply Bob Vila in 2005.

Bob Vila has been declining in the ratings for many years, due in part to having to compete with earlier incarnations of Vila's shows. There has been a huge growth in home-improvement shows and cable channels like Hgtv and the Diy Network in the past several years.