Producer David E. Kelley's Emmy-winning legal series "The Practice," a mainstay of ABC's Sunday night schedule, is moving to Monday nights starting Jan. 27, the third-placed network announced Wednesday.
And Kelley, speaking on behalf of his production company, is not happy about this. In a statement released to the Associated Press, he said, "We are very concerned about this move. We are hoping that ABC will do everything in its power to support the show, which has garnered critical acclaim since its inception and has continually won its timeslot."
The 10 p.m. Sunday timeslot now occupied by "The Practice" will soon be the home of "Dragnet," a new version of the iconic '50s cop show starring Ed O'Neill ("Married ... With Children").
"The Practice," starring Dylan McDermott, will air Mondays at 9, while "Miracles," a drama about investigators of supernatural phenomena with a religious bent, will run at 10 p.m., The New York Times reports.
ABC Entertainment chairman Lloyd Braun tells the paper that his network shifted the schedule in order to shore up its Monday lineup from 9 to 11 p.m., when ABC carried "Monday Night Football" in the first half of the season.
The Times notes that the scheduling will end up pitting "The Practice" against a new reality series on FOX, "Joe Millionaire," whose premise pits young women against each other for the affection of a man they think is a millionaire but is really a low-paid construction worker.
ABC considers "Joe" a shameless imitation of its own hugely successful "Bachelor" series, The Times reports, but the network is hoping for the last laugh, given that the "The Practice" is owned by the studio arm of FOX, 20th Century Fox Television.
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