News Brief

OLTL Exit: Tina Won't Be Home for the Holidays
Evans' last air date is Nov. 25, meaning Tina won't be around to share turkey and stuffing with her Llanview kin.

"ABC and ONE LIFE TO LIVE were thrilled to have Andrea Evans reprise the role of Tina Lord after 18 years," executive producer Frank Valentini says in a statement. "Her return was made possible with the understanding that it would be short-term as Ms. Evans' life, family and home are on the West Coast."

INTERVIEW: OLTL's Andrea Evans
“All I can say is that there is some good stuff that will be playing out over the next few weeks, viewers will want to tune in and watch.”

Catherine Hickland Offers Other "Heartbreak Kids" a 30-Day Cure
Catherine Hickland has been through so many failed marriages and painful relationships that she could write a book. And so she did. The actress, who plays ONE LIFE TO LIVE's nutsy heroine Lindsay Rappaport, will hit the market Dec. 30 with her self-empowerment guide, The 30-Day Heartbreak Cure: Getting Over Him and Back Out There One Month From Today (available for pre-order at Amazon.com).

Free dance lessons with Constance Towers
The Falcon Theatre and Arthur Murray Dance Studios of Sherman Oaks team up to help theatre patrons dance like the stars. An hour prior to the Thursday performances of Richard Alfieri's Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks, the second production in the Falcon Theatre's 2008-2009 'Bringin' the FUNNY' All-Comedy subscription season, Arthur Murray Sherman Oaks will be providing free dance lessons in the Falcon Theatre lobby. Theatre-goers will try their feet at some of the dances featured in the show, such as the Waltz, the Foxtrot and, of course, the Cha-Cha.

Lessons will begin at 7pm and end just in time for the dancers to sit back and enjoy the international hit play Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks, starring Constance Towers, star of Broadway and GENERAL HOSPITAL, and Jason Graae (pictured), award-winning musical theatre and TV actor.

FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS: A little comic relief at halftime
"If the first five episodes of the third season of FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS were packed with plot, community politics and working-class realities, this week showed viewers that the drama in the fictional town of Dillon, Texas, is sometimes little more than some freshman hazing, inspirational speeches, drunken silliness and good ol' rock 'n' roll -- the gloriously amateur kind in which teenage love is The End Of The World. But rather than feel mundane, the episode was welcome, painting Dillon as a bit more true, a bit more like the town or city you're probably reading this from -- one that isn't being torn apart day in and day out by debates centered on whether the local high school is spending too much money on athletics."

INTERVIEW: ALL MY CHILDREN's Eden Riegel
"I love working with Tamara [Braun, Reese] so much. The story is intriguing; she didn't tell her mother or her sister that she was in love with a woman, so much so that they had decided to have a child together, which as far as I'm concerned is a bigger commitment than marriage, a decision that needs to be taken even more seriously than getting married. Tamara and I had tried to get together and get to know each other and get used to each other and go over our characters' history, but they were running so early the day we taped our first scenes, they changed our call time to hours earlier and we didn't have time to rehearse, so it was literally like, 'Hi, I'm Eden,' 'Hi, I'm Tamara,' and then it was time to be in love with each other. But we just had an instant connection."

U.K. TV exports surge 23%
The export of U.K. TV shows is surging, with the U.S. responsible for nearly half of the trade, a report revealed Thursday.

Foreign sales of programs and formats was worth £663 million ($1.05 billion) last year, an increase of 23%, according to the annual U.K. Television Exports Survey published by government body U.K. Trade and Investment, and producers org Pact.