Lauren Conrad may no longer be on "The Hills," but this onetime reality star is determined to keep playing the fame game. Her new novel, "L.A. Candy," inspired by her own experiences, has been on the New York Times children's chapter books bestseller list for 14 weeks. Today Variety reports that Marty Bowen and Wyck Godfrey -- the team behind the "Twilight" film franchise -- are bringing this book to the big screen.

This success must be sweeter for Conrad after the failure of "L.A. Candy" to get any good reviews from the mainstream press. Entertainment Weekly called it, "a dismal portent of the future of pop culture, disguised as escapist fiction aimed at young-adult LC fans who might like a book-shaped object as a keepsake now that Conrad has left her popular show." And New York said, "Since LC's clothing lines were uninspired at best, in a way 'LA Candy's' cheerful mediocrity is its biggest success."

The New York Daily News neatly summarized the plot: "Conrad, who seems to have been ably assisted by a collaborator, tells the story of Jane Roberts, a young beauty most notable for her sweet nature and innocence. She moves to L.A. with her best friend from kindergarten, the gorgeous, smart-mouthed Scarlett. It takes only a couple of nights on the town before they're swept up by a producer making a new reality show."

While his onetime co-star Patricia Heaton basks in the warm reviews for "The Middle," Kelsey Grammer got the cold shoulder from TV critics for his new sitcom, "Hank." Grammer plays the title character, a corporate exec who loses his job and is forced to move to his wife's small hometown to raise their two children.

"Hank" was faulted by many reviewers for clumsily reworking the "Frasier" formula. "Frasier" is certainly a tough act to follow as Grammer learned two years ago when his workplace comedy with Heaton -- "Back to You" -- failed on Fox.

After all, "Frasier" sits atop the Emmy record book as the scripted show with the most awards at 37, including a record five in a row as best comedy series. During the 11-year run of "Frasier," Grammer won four of his 10 bids for lead actor in a comedy series (1994, 1995, 1998, 2004). But based on the reviews for "Hank," Grammer will be hard-pressed to contend again this year.

Matthew Gilbert of the Boston Globe called "'Hank' a junky sitcom that isn’t old school so much as mold school." As he explains, "Look, I loved Frasier Crane. He was a great character: pompous, ridiculous, fussy, and ultimately - aww - a good guy. For such a snoot-head, he was surprisingly beloved by audiences. But by the end of the 11-season life of 'Frasier,' during which syndicated reruns had been wallpapered all over local channels, I was ready to say goodbye to him for good. But apparently Grammer was not, and once again he has brought back the character, this time named Hank Pryor, for more huffing and puffing."

Hank Stuever of the Washington Post said, "'Hank' is less of a sitcom than a show about sitcom assembly. It belongs in a diagram about sitcoms. Grammer comes to it with that 'Frasier'-like star entitlement, the certainty that success for so many years as that character should translate into success as any character who is sorta like that character."

For Tom Maurstad of the Dallas Morning News, "the main attraction here is Grammer, and there's no one better at playing fussy and oblivious arrogance. But the show has an exceedingly prefabricated feel, a quality highlighted by the incessant laugh track, which serves only to underline how not very funny the jokes are and how fake and forced everything else seems." 

Matt LeBlanc has been little seen since his ill-conceived "Friends" spinoff "Joey" crashed and burned three years ago. While that show sputtered out after two seasons on NBC, it's failure should not take away from the enormous success LeBlanc enjoyed with "Friends." And no doubt he hopes to recapture some of that magic with his newly announced series "Episodes,"  a co-production between Showtime and the BBC set to air next year.

This showcase for LeBlanc is being shepherded by two sitcom veterans -- "Friends" co-creator David Crane and "Mad About You" producer Jeffrey Klarik. The single-camera comedy will follow the misadventures of an English couple whose urbane Britcom is dumbed down for American audiences with the casting of LeBlanc, who will play an exaggerated version of himself. As he said in today's news release: "I am so glad I got the part, seeing someone else play Matt LeBlanc would have been devastating." 

Playing the dimwitted but kindhearted Joey Tribiani on "Friends" for 10 years served LeBlanc well. He contended for lead actor in a comedy series at the Emmy Awards in each of the last three years of "Friends." He faced strong competition, losing first in 2002 to Ray Romano (his only win for "Everybody Loves Raymond") then to Tony Shalhoub (the first of three wins to date for "Monk") and finally to Kelsey Grammer (the last of his four wins for "Frasier").

Patricia Heaton returns to the type of role that won her two Emmy Awards during the nine-year run of "Everybody Loves Raymond" -- a sassy suburban mom -- in the new ABC sitcom "The Middle." And TV reviewers are heaping loads of praise on her for this new twist on an old format.

Two years ago, Heaton and time-slot mate Kelsey Grammer ("Hank") teamed up as battling exes in "Back to You." That Fox workplace comedy failed to find favor with either critics or the public. Now with "The Middle," Heaton is back where she belongs -- in a domestic situation comedy.

And she could well find herself back on the red carpet. For her performance on "Everybody Loves Raymond," she was nominated for the lead actress in a comedy series Emmy  seven years in a row (1999-2005). She won the award in 2000 and 2001. While she was snubbed by the Golden Globes for the entire run of the show, those Emmy-winning years for her marked the only two times Ray Romano landed a Globe bid.

Reviewing "The Middle,"  Alessandra Stanley of the New York Times said, "Ms. Heaton is less acerbic than she was on 'Everybody Loves Raymond,' but just as comical playing an overwhelmed Midwesterner who works at Orson’s only surviving car dealership. Frankie touches up her roots with a brown felt-tip pen and throws fast-food bags on the dining room table with the words, 'I cooked.' Though the troubled economy is only glancingly mentioned in the show, it colors the landscape, and that makes Frankie’s ill-founded optimism all the more amusing."

For Robert Bianco of USA Today, "ABC may be on to something with 'The Middle,' a perfectly timed, down-to-earth comedy that calls to mind 'Roseanne' and 'Home Improvement' (with a little of Fox's 'Malcolm in the Middle' thrown in)." And David Zurawik of the Baltimore Sun enthused, "This family will make you smile a lot, especially Frankie's stressed-out, manic attempts to keep this house of nutsiness almost functioning. Heaton is an outstanding comic performer who really deserved all those Emmys in the 'Raymond' days."

Hugh Jackman and Daniel Craig opened last night in "A Steady Rain" on Broadway to excellent reviews. While Keith Huff's play about two Chicago cops revisiting their troubled lives received mixed notices, these two movie stars were welcomed to the rialto by most of the theater critics. And with the playing field looking relatively sparse in the months to come, one or both of these actors could well be be in contention at the Tony Awards next spring.

Five years ago, Hugh Jackman swept the theater awards for his show-stopping turn as singer-songwriter Peter Allen in the tuner "The Boy from Oz." While "A Steady Rain" marks Jackman's legit debut, Daniel Craig carved out a career on the London stage in straight plays like "Angels in America" long before he came to fame as James Bond. The powers behind that fabled film franchise are producing the upcoming film version of "A Steady Rain," which could bring even more kudos to Craig and Jackman.

Elysa Gardner of USA Today praised their performances, noting that the characters are "regular Joes who are challenged — as cops, as friends, as human beings — by a confluence of devastating developments. They require a more subtle physical and emotional fluency — the kind that enabled Craig and Jackman to carve three-dimensional men out of sexy action figures, and has served both stars in a wide variety of stage and screen roles. To those familiar with that dexterity, their unfussy virtuosity here will be less a revelation than an affirmation, but no less affecting as such."

Ben Brantley of the New York Times was more modest in his praise: "Mr. Jackman often seems to be presenting his character more than inhabiting it. He is an incorrigibly likable entertainer, naturally at home M.C.-ing the Oscars or starring in musicals. Here his polished charm and clean, expansive gestures keep us from ever recoiling from Denny, no matter how destructively he behaves. Mr. Craig creates a more complete portrait as Joey, who emerges as a constant worrier, born with a sense of guilt and a fear of offending. Playing small, drawing in on himself as if hoping to become invisible, Mr. Craig’s Joey still registers large and lucid. And it’s amusing to watch him and Mr. Jackman as carefully contrasted, yin-and-yang studies in body language."

However, Peter Marks of the Washington Post thought "that the stars' surface ruggedness is the evening's only magnetic facet. A 90-minute 'duologue' in which the actors recount an absurdly calamity-filled few weeks in the lives of two maverick crime fighters."

First Kate Gosselin dumped husband Jon in real life. Now she is doing the same in reel life as their hit TLC show "Jon & Kate Plus 8" is revamped to "Kate Plus 8" starting Nov. 2. In a statement, TLC President Eileen O'Neill explained, "Given the recent changes in the family dynamics, it only makes sense for us to refresh and recalibrate the program to keep pace with the family. The family has evolved and we are attempting to evolve with it; we feel that Kate's journey really resonates with our viewers."

Whether this revised version of reality resonates with Emmy voters is another matter. Last summer, "Jon & Kate Plus 8" failed to make the final cut for best reality program at the Emmy Awards. On the surface that snub seemed a surprise as it was the top-rated show in the category, drawing more than 10 million viewers to the fifth-season premiere in May. However, popular-ballot voters opted for "Antiques Roadshow," "Dirty Jobs," "Dog Whisperer," "Intervention," "Mythbusters" and two-time past champ "My Life on the D-List" in that race. The gritty "Intervention" ended up winning the Emmy Award.

The Emmy fate of "Jon & Kate Plus 8" underscored something we already knew about Emmy voters — they're snobs. Consider this: "Frasier" -- the TV series that's won the most Emmys ever with 37 --  is about two snooty brothers, Frasier and Niles Crane, obsessed with wine, women and song. Sure, voters love series about dysfunctional families such as the Cranes, but "Jon & Kate Plus 8" crossed the line, offending academy members exactly at the wrong time.

So it sounds like Whitney Houston did the smart thing by releasing "I Look to You" on Aug. 31 -- the absolute last day of eligibility for the 2009 Grammys. While Houston has won six Grammys, her most recent win was a decade ago. La Streisand has eight competitive Grammy Awards on her crowded mantle, though her last win was way back in 1986 for "The Broadway Album," another return to her musical roots. Though Mariah Carey has racked up 34 Grammy nominations (among female artists, second only to Aretha Franklin), she has managed only five wins. And none of those victories came in the top categories of album, record and song of the year.

Carey made headlines this year when her first single off the album -- "Obsessed" – took on Eminem, among others. Now she is earning praise for the entire package. Greg Kot of the Chicago Tribune said, "She plays it low-key and ends up with her best album since the '90s heyday." For James Reed of the Boston Globe, this disc "presents her as more of an emotive vocalist and not just a singer with an impressive range. Make that Mariah Carey, song stylist." And said Mesfin Fekadu of the AP, "this is an exceptional album that is about love -- being in it, out of it, over it and trying to reach it. While the subjects are tried and true, they are never tired, thanks to Carey's approach, which mixes a good dose of humor and wit with her multi-octave voice."

More than half of respondents to our poll do not believe Roman Polanski deserved to win the Oscar for directing "The Pianist" in 2002. So that suggests that they don't think "The Pianist" is his best movie.

OK, so let's back up and ask you: What is Roman Polanski's greatest film? Perhaps that answer is the movie that really merited his Oscar gold.

Besides winning the Academy Award for helming "The Pianist," Roman Polanski was nominated for directing "Tess" (he lost to Robert Redford's "Ordinary People") and "Chinatown" (Francis Ford Coppola beat him for his direction of "The Godfather, Part II") and writing the script to "Rosemary's Baby" (he lost to James Goldman's "The Lion in Winter"). 

There was something weird about Roman Polanski winning an Oscar for best director of 2002 for "The Pianist." His movie didn't win best picture. "Chicago" did. Usually, those awards go together.

Do you think Polanski really prevailed just because the academy wanted to use the occasion to formally forgive him for his 1977 sex scandal? If they were so inclined to do so, the timing was perfect. Just as final ballots were mailed to academy members, Polanski's rape victim appeared on TV shows to announce she'd forgiven him and she gave Oscar voters permission to cast their ballots for him.

Writing in the L.A. Times, Samantha Geimer said, "I believe that Mr. Polanski and his film should be honored according to the quality of the work. What he does for a living and how good he is at it have nothing to do with me or what he did to me. I don't think it would be fair to take past events into consideration."

Often Oscar voters dole out awards as hugs rather than as honest declarations of movie greatness. Katharine Hepburn didn't deserve to win best lead actress of 1967 for "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" — in which she had an unremarkable supporting role — but academy members wanted to console Spencer Tracy's de facto widow soon after his death. Elizabeth Taylor got a golden statuette for best tracheotomy of 1960 and because Hollywood finally forgave her for swiping Eddie Fisher from Debbie Reynolds. Taylor won her statuette for "Butterfield 8," which she hated so much that she denounced it with profanity that can't be published here.

Nicole Kidman didn't deserve to win an Oscar for one big hambone scene in a plastic nose in "The Hours," a film so awful that it was blasted (correctly) as the worst of 2002 by Time, New York Daily News and Newsday. But she won best actress for a terrible supporting role because Hollywood wanted to give a comforting embrace to the recently cast-off wife of the town's box-office king.

Also vote in our poll: What do you think is Roman Polanski's greatest film?

Photo: Francesca Ruggieri / European Pressphoto Agency

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Sorry, but this blog's reportage of showbiz awards drama is being temporarily halted due to serious drama in my personal life: I'm moving into a new apartment. 'Nuf said, eh? I'll try to get back to blogging as soon as possible.