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Over the nine years that I’ve been contributing to Ktla-tv in Los Angeles, I’ve been asked the same question over and over again by people who recognized me from the channel: “What is Sam Rubin really like?” The short answer is simple: With Sam, what you saw was what you got. As exuberant, enthusiastic and charming as he was on camera, that’s exactly how he was in person too.

And what a talented professional. After 33 years as the face of entertainment news for Ktla, he had the job down, and you could tell how much he loved doing it. He maintained the same level of gleeful energy from his first daily news hit at 6:15 a.m. to his last at 10:45 a.m. — and when I would see him later in the day at screenings, junkets, premieres and awards shows, he was still going strong. I...

Updated with official cause of death: In a report obtained by Ktla, the Los Angeles Medical Examiner said the station’s former entertainment reporter, Sam Rubin, suffered from “ischemic heart disease due to atherosclerotic coronary artery disease.” His manner of death was listed as “natural.”

Per the station, Rubin, 64, was experiencing stomach pain on the morning of May 10 and got himself to the hospital. The journalist was pronounced dead in the emergency room there just after 11 a.m.

Previously on May 10: Sam Rubin, who was a Los Angeles TV news mainstay as the longtime entertainment reporter for Ktla and regular interviewer on red carpets, died today, the station announced. He was 64.

Rubin’s family confirmed he died of a heart attack, Ktla reported. He was last on the air Thursday morning and showed no outward signs of illness, according to his co-workers. He had called in sick on Friday.

Sam Rubin, a veteran entertainment reporter who spent the bulk of his career with Ktla-tv in Los Angeles, died Friday morning from a heart attack at the age of 64.

His death was first reported in a news story aired by Ktla early Friday afternoon. The television station said the circumstances surrounding his death were not immediately known. Entertainment publication TMZ later revealed it to be a heart attack.

“The Sam that you saw on the air is the Sam that was off the air,” Rubin’s colleague Frank Buckley said on television. “To all of us he shared his mornings with on television, and to those he worked with behind the scenes at Ktla, we will not forget him.”

Rubin started at Ktla in 1991, serving as the lead entertainment correspondent for the Ktla Morning News. He was well-connected in Hollywood, scoring must-have interviews with A-list celebrities from the worlds of film,...

Sam Rubin, the longtime entertainment anchor for Ktla Morning News, has died. He was 64.

Rubin passed away as the result of a heart attack he suffered Friday after appearing on his regular Hollywood news segment that morning, according to our sister site Variety.

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Shortly before 1 pm Pt, Ktla broke into its own newscast to share the news of Rubin’s passing, with anchor...

The four leading candidates for California’s open U.S. Senate seat met again this evening, this time in a one-hour San Francisco debate that produced fewer clashes than their first gathering in January.

Still, with less than a month before the state’s open primary, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-ca) focused a number of his attacks on Steve Garvey, the sole Republican on the stage, particularly over the “issue” of Donald Trump.

“Let me just say this also to Mr. Garvey: The greatest threat that we have to our democracy is Donald Trump,” Schiff said.

Garvey voted for Trump in the last two presidential elections but said that, when it comes to supporting him this year, he “will make that decision when the time comes.” In response to Schiff, Garvey said that the “gravest threat to democracy is deconstruction of the Constitution. Packing the court. Doing away with the filibuster.

The Television Academy Foundation today announced it raised over 436,000 at the 22nd Annual Emmys Golf Classic.

Television stars, sports luminaries, entertainment industry executives, Television Academy leadership and corporate partners competed in the golf tournament at the Riviera Country Club in Pacific Palisades, California, Monday, Oct. 3.

Proceeds from the event benefit the nonprofit’s renowned Internship and College Television Awards programs that provide industry access and career development opportunities for college students nationwide interested in media careers.

Cedric the Entertainer (The Neighborhood) and Andia Winslow (A League of Their Own) co-hosted the event that included stars from television, film and sports: Jonathan Adams (Last Man Standing), Frank Buckley (Ktla), Matt Craven (Lou), Patrick Fabian (Better Call Saul), Derek Fisher (NBA), Jason Her (For All Mankind), Brian Letscher (Scandal), Matt Letscher (The Flash), Willie Gault (NFL), Michael Irby (Mayans M.C.), Chris O’Dowd (Slumberland), Dr. Paul Nassif (Botched), Norm Nixon (NBA), Danielle Nottingham...

Kcet won a leading six awards on Saturday night in a livestream ceremony to bestow the 2022 Los Angeles Area Emmy Awards. ABC7 and NBC4 followed with five wins apiece at the show hosted by Spectrum News 1 journalist Giselle Fernández from the Television Academy Plaza in North Hollywood.

The ceremony honored locally produced programs in the categories of Live and Breaking News Coverage, Crime and Social Issues, Culture and History, the Arts, Human Interest, Sports, and the Environment.

KTLA5 won one of the big awards on the night, for Regularly Scheduled Daily Evening Newscast, for its 11 p.m. newscast. NBC4 won for morning newscast while Kvea’s Noticiero Telemundo 52 won for daytime.

Television Academy chairman and CEO Frank Scherma presented this year’s Governors Award to Ktla’s Gayle Anderson for her “contributions to television broadcasting in the greater Los Angeles area.”

Here’s the full winners list:

Regularly Scheduled...

Local public broadcaster Kcet led all outlets at this year’s Los Angeles Area Emmy Awards, with six total, out of 15 nominations. At the ceremony, held Saturday night at the Television Academy’s headquarters in North Hollywood, ABC-owned Kabc and NBC-owned Knbc tied for second place, with five.

This is the sixth year in a row that Kcet won the most, having landed nine last year.

In the key newscast categories, Ktla won the regularly scheduled daily evening newscast (7 p.n. to 12 a.m.), while Knbc’s “Today In LA” was tops for morning newscast and Kvea’s “Noticiero Telemundo 52 A Las 6Pm” was tops for daytime newscast (11 a.m. to 7 p.m.).

Local cable news upstart Spectrum News 1 had landed the most nominations, with 23 nods. Eligibility for this year’s L.A. Area Emmy Awards was between Jan. 1 and Dec. 31, 2021. The Los Angeles Area Emmy Awards honor...

Public broadcaster Kcet, and its stable of locally produced Southern California-centric programming, leads all local TV stations for this year’s Los Angeles Area Emmy Awards, scoring 20 nods overall, the Television Academy announced Monday.

Kcet pulled ahead of Univision-owned Kmex (which it tied with last year), which came in second with 15 nominations. After that was Telemundo’s Kvea, with 13, and then newcomer Spectrum News 1, with 12.

Spectrum News 1 was launched in late 2018 by Spectrum Cable, and earned three nominations last year despite launching midway through this year’s eligibility period. This was the first full eligiblity year for the local cable news channel.

Among traditional English-language commercial broadcast stations, Nexstar’s Ktla was first with seven nominations.

Kcet’s sister station Koce “PBS SoCal” earned an additional six nominations, giving the PBS SoCal Media Group a combined 26.

The Television Academy also revealed Kcet had already won an Emmy in the independent programming category.

The PBS SoCal special “Variety Studio: Actors on Actors” is among the nominees for the 67th annual Los Angeles Area Emmy Awards.

The interview special that features pairings of prominent actors discussing their craft is a contender in the entertainment programming category. “Actors on Actors,” a co-production between Variety and PBS SoCal, will vie against Ktla’s “Live From the Oscars” and Kcbs/Kcal’s “Lexus: Music Uncovered” series.

In the competitive investigative reporting category, Fox’s Kttv is up against Kcbs and Univision’s Kmex, which has two nominations. Hard news reporting noms went to Kcbs/Kcal’s David Goldstein and Catherine Gelera; Kvea’s Azucena Gomez; Kmex’s Antonio Valverde; and separate noms for Knbc’s Robert Kovacik and Tony Shin.

In the competition for the three regularly scheduled newscast categories, there are no nominations; all stations that submit entries are contenders. The morning and daily newscast races this year are among Kttv,...

Ricky Gervais has branded his critics "humourless" after he was blasted by officials at a Down Syndrome charity for persistently posting a derogatory word associated with the condition on his Twitter.com page.

The Office star regularly uses the word "mong" - a British term often used to refer to sufferers of Down Syndrome - in posts on his page of the microblogging site.

He was forced to defend his use of the term in a joke about Susan Boyle last year, but charity chiefs are annoyed about his continued use of the phrase.

Mencap's Mark Gale tells Britain's The Sun, "It's very disappointing. Such language can perpetuate discriminatory attitudes", and Frank Buckley, from Down Syndrome Education International, adds, "Most would consider it as offensive as comparable terms of abuse referring to racial background or sexual orientation."

Gervais is adamant he means no harm by using the word, insisting it has changed meaning to a more "urban" saying.

He explains, "I have never used the word Mongol. I have used 'mong', but never to mean Down Syndrome and never would.

"The meaning of words change over time - 'gay' for example. The modern use of the word 'mong' means dopey or ignorant - it's in slang and urban dictionaries."

And he returned to his Twitter.com page to blast his critics for their "ill-informed" comments and thank his fans for their support.

Gervais writes, "The humourless PC brigade have been out in force trying to influence the vote with ill informed negative comments... thanks for the support as others wilfully misunderstand to justify their point."

And when one follower asked Gervais how he will get out of "this hole", he replied, "What hole? it's only a hole if you let it be one."...

Been positioning himself behind the scene for sometime, "Beverly Hills, 90210" star Jason Priestley will pop up at the next episode of ABC's "Scoundrels". The actor is playing Heather's "love of her life" who eventually creates trouble for her because he's a married actor.

Also in the episode, called "That's the Way the Memory Goes", Wolf finds out that a family member betrayed him and causes a prison riot and Cheryl is confused by the sexual energy between and Mack and herself during a kerfuffle. "Scoundrels" airs August 8 at 9/8c followed by "The Gates" at 10/9c.

In the sci-fi thriller episode "Digging the Dirt", Frank Buckley, Nick and Dylan set out to dig up a secret on him that is equally damning when finding themselves blackmailed. Sarah throws a pool party for the neighborhood women, but social politics threaten to spoil it.

At Gates Academy, neither Brett nor Charlie is willing...

Last night on The Gates, Nick had to cope with learning that vampires do exist! For someone who seems to be very straight edge and "normal" - Nick really didn't have the type of reaction that I expected from him! I seemed to be yearning for him to lose his mind or at the very least get a little spooked.

I think that is the biggest problem with Vampire shows/movies these days. There's no reaction upon hearing that the undead do exist. Whatever happened to the scared/shocked reactions like Christian Slater a la Interview with the Vampire? Now, when he realized that Brad Pitt was a vampire - he kinda bugged out for a second. That's the type of reaction I was looking for!

In any case, Nick not only handled this absurd new quite well, but he showed us a darker side to his gleaming good cop persona.