Blonde Charity Mafia has reportedly been whacked from The CW's summer schedule.
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The CW has pulled its The Hills-like docu-reality series from its summer schedule, The Washington Post reported Saturday, adding the reason for the debut delay is so the show can receive more promotion before its premiere.
Instead of premiering on the originally announced date of July 7, The Post reported The CW programming chief Dawn Ostroff is so enamored by Blonde Charity Mafia's six initial half-hour episodes that the network has decided to debut the show during the 2009-2010 programming season.
Blonde Charity Mafia is now likely to premiere as part of The CW's midseason programming schedule, according to The Post.
The CW's most recent decision is only latest programming twist for Blonde Charity Mafia, which was originally ordered by Lifetime last August.
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Lifetime had originally planned to premiere it in November, with the show's episodes reportedly scheduled to air immediately after the network's broadcasts of new sixth-season episodes of Project Runway, which Lifetime thought it had managed to grab from Bravo in a surprise April 2008 deal with the show's The Weinstein Company production company.
However Bravo's NBC Universal parent company immediately sued The Weinstein Company over the deal, resulting in a year-long legal saga that prevented Lifetime from airing Project Runway's sixth season. A settlement was finally announced in April and Lifetime subsequently scheduled Project Runway's sixth-season premiere for August 20.
The delay also forced Lifetime to shuffle some of its programming slate -- resulting in the women's cable network dropping Blonde Charity Mafia, which was subsequently picked up by The CW.
About The Author: Christopher Rocchio