Media Beat

MLB Network Presents: The Cobra At Twilight provides an intimate, comprehensive look at the Cincinnati native and former MVP Dave Parker who won two World Championships in his 19 big league seasons.

It shows him as the outspoken and confident right fielder for the Pittsburgh Pirates; a Cincinnati Reds clubhouse leader in the 1980s, mentoring Barry Larkin and Eric Davis; a witness in the 1985 federal crackdown on Pittsburgh cocaine dealers; and a giant slowed by Parkinson's disease at age 68 taking 20 pills a day and struggling to walk.

When I asked Cammy Dierking if she knew what she may do after leaving WKRC-TV on Dec. 20, she surprised me with an emphatic “YES!”

She smiled and slid her new business card across the table to me.

Jo Ellen Pellman is going to The Prom on Netflix, and look who's going with her -- Meryl Streep, Nicole Kidman, Kerry Washington, Keegan-Michael Key, Awkwafina and late-night talk host James Corden.

Cincinnati native Dave Parker, who played four of his 19 seasons for the Reds, will be profiled 8 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 12, on the MLB Network in MLB Network Presents: The Cobra At Twilight.

Fox News Channel has promoted Bill Hemmer to take over Shepherd Smith's 3 p.m. time slot, and to lead all breaking news coverage on the Fox News Channel.

George Clooney's Catch-22 on Hulu was nominated for two Golden Globe Awards Monday, while the Mark Ruffalo-Anne Hathaway Dark Waters feature film shot in Cincinnati earlier this year was shut out from the Globes.

Repeating my favorite story about my favorite Christmas TV special from Nov. 30, 2015.

Tonight's A Charlie Brown Christmas remains the best holiday TV special for all the reasons that CBS executives didn’t like it before the 1965 premiere.

The simplicity of the story. The absence of adult voices. Its anti-commercialism message. The terrific jazz sound track by Vince Guaraldi.

And Linus quoting the Bible to tell "the true meaning of Christmas," about the birth of Jesus Christ.

Former WCPO-TV morning anchor Chris Riva will return to local airwaves next week in preparation for  WXIX-TV's early evening news expansion.

Monday, Dec. 9 update: WCPO-TV anchor Ryan Houston is heading to Pittsburgh's WPXI-TV (Channel 11), the NBC affiliate owned by Cox Media Group.

WVXU-FM will repeat its award-winning The Who Concert: 30 Years Later at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 3, the 40th anniversary of the tragedy on the Riverfront Coliseum plaza.

Eleven concertgoers were crushed to death as thousands were awaiting the concert with "festival seating," or unreserved seating. Only a few doors were open for entry that night.

I’ve been making my list and checking it twice… And here it is: My annual Holiday Program Guide.

All the Christmas favorites are here: Charlie Brown, Rudolph, The Grinch, Frosty, White Christmas, A Christmas Carol, A Christmas Melody, A Christmas Story, It’s A Wonderful Life, Polar Express, The Santa Clause and Little Drummer Boy.

Update at 11:45 a.m. Monday, Dec. 2: Perry Schaible decided it's time to use her Northern Kentucky University law degree – and stop working weekends and holidays.

Schaible signed off as WKRC-TV's weekend morning anchor Saturday at WKRC-TV, where she had worked since 2010. She earned a law degree from NKU's Chase College of Law in 2013.

"I’ve really enjoyed my career at Local 12, but I decided it was time to move on at the end of my contract," she told me in an email Sunday.

Anderson Township native Chip Chinery makes a brief appearance on The Conners Tuesday night as a resident of Landford.

Elliott Block loved television. He loved TV technology, loved talking about it, and most of all, he loved providing the Greater Cincinnati area with a variety of TV programming on his low-power WKRP channels.

Block, who died Sunday at age 71, was a national low-power TV pioneer.

Turkeys away! Thanksgiving week means that it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas on TV again.

Here's my first holiday programming list of the season, for Thanksgiving week. My h-u-g-e Holiday Program Guide for shows Dec. 1-25 posts Sunday, Dec. 1.

Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend share their memories of The Who concert tragedy in 1979 in a one-hour WCPO-TV special on Dec. 3 called The Who: The Night That Changed Rock.

Eleven died trying to get into the concert in Riverfront Coliseum, now known as Heritage Bank Arena.

Cincinnati attorney Robert Bilott got a standing ovation on CBS' Late Show With Stephen Colbert Thursday night, hours after he was interviewed on WVXU-FM's Cincinnati Edition.

The two aren't directly related, of course, except for the fact that it's all part of promotion for Dark Waters, the movie starring Mark Ruffalo as Bilott opening Friday, Nov. 22.

Update 1:30 p.m. Tuesday Nov. 12: Late night TV hosts Seth Meyers and Conan O'Brien aired tributes Monday night to Rick Ludwin, their former NBC mentor who died Sunday, Nov. 10, in Los Angeles.

Cincinnati native Dotty Mack, an early 1950s TV star who hosted an ABC TV network show, died in Miami, Fla., early on Monday, Nov. 11, says her nephew, Steve Beckman. She was 90.

Rod Serling's 1955 comedy involving the Cincinnati Reds – broadcast only once on NBC Television – will come to life in a Cincinnati Public Radio studio this weekend.