When you're on on a hit TV show, you get to go places.

In the case of Damian Lewis, who stars in Showtime's “Homeland,” those places include the White House, where Lewis attended a state dinner for British Prime Minister David Cameron in March.

“Obviously, I'm called in to consult on matters of homeland security. So then I drop everything and I go,” joked the actor Monday during the Television Critics Association's summer meetings in Beverly Hills.

“You know, it was as much a shock to me as it was, presumably, to everyone else in this room that I was on that invitation list. I think it was just a serendipity. It was a British state visit to see the president, who happened to have this as his favorite show on TV at the time, and I’m a Brit playing an American part, and I kind of ticked a lot of boxes,” said Lewis, who plays a Marine freed by al-Qaeda after eight years who returns as a war hero, but with some serious baggage.

“But I did ask him and David Cameron, I said, 'When do you guys get to watch TV? Aren’t you supposed to be running the free world together? And because I hear, Mr. President, you really like the show.' And he said, 'Yes, Saturday afternoons, Michelle and the two girls, they go play tennis. I go into the Oval Office. I pretend I’m going to work, and I switch on ‘Homeland.’”

Note: Updated to correct the name of the former head writer of "Cheers," Ken Levine, who was misidentified in an earlier version of this post.

HBO's “Game of Thrones” was named program of the year and Showtime's “Homeland” best new show in the 28^th annual Television Critics Awards at the Beverly Hilton.

“Breaking Bad” star Bryan Cranston hosted the Saturday night event, held in the same ballroom where the Golden Globes are presented each year.

Our show has a bit less glitz, but it's over far sooner, after which everyone heads back to the bar. And since it's not televised, there are no Joan Rivers fashion critiques. The acceptance speeches tend to be a little looser, too.

Other honorees this year included comedian Louis C.K., who won both outstanding comedy series for his FX show, “Louie,” and individual achievement in comedy; AMC's “Breaking Bad,” drama; Claire Danes, individual achievement in drama for her role as a bipolar CIA analyst in “Homeland”; PBS' “Downton Abbey,” for movies, miniseries or specials (apparently we disagree with the Emmys over whether “Downton,” now heading toward its third season, is a series or a miniseries); CBS' “60 Minutes,” news and information; Fox's “So You Think You Can Dance,” reality programming; and ABC Family's “Switched at Birth,” youth programming.

David Letterman, this year's career achievement winner, accepted via video but sent a lookalike to pick up the actual award (after telling a number of stories about his years in Los Angeles that basically boiled down to why he wouldn't be returning anytime soon).

“Cheers,” a once struggling show that its former head writer, Ken Levine, claimed was watched mostly by TV critics in its first season (before going on to a long and immensely successful run), received the TCA's heritage award.

Looks as if Charlie Sheen's going to be busy for a while with “Anger Managment.”

And that he'll be bringing his father to work.

FX Networks president John Landgraf said Saturday that he plans to wait until all 10 episodes of Sheen's new sitcom have played on the network before a decision is made about picking up more, but that if the ratings for what's currently the network's most-watched series hold up, they'll trigger the 90-episode order that was built into the unusual deal that brought the show to FX.

He also said that Martin Sheen (“The West Wing”), who'll guest star as Charlie's character's father in the Aug. 16 episode, would join the cast as a recurring character if (and almost certainly when) the show continues.

Bringing with him a repertoire of impressions he gets to show off in his first appearance.

That, the younger Sheen said, is because his sister, Renee Estevez, is in the show's writers' room, apparently spilling family secrets, like their father's ability to do Brando.

She's also “the archivist for the family photos and movies, so Renee was also able to find a clip of my fifth birthday and put it on the show...It's pretty cool.”

“He likes to rehearse. He's very old school,” Sheen said of his father, who'd also put in appearances on “Spin City” and “Two and Half Men.”

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All's well that ends well.

Word that the contract dispute involving several members of the cast of “Modern Family” came Friday evening just as Steve Levitan, one of the show's creators, was chatting with a few reporters at an ABC party in Beverly Hills.

Another reporter came up and told him the deal was done.

“That is fantastic news,” he said, laughing. “I love that I'm hearing it like this. I'm not surprised, but I'm of course thrilled and I cannot wait to get back onstage Monday morning and start making this show again...and I'm very happy for my friends in the cast, for their success. I really am.”

Even before that, though, Levitan had seemed confident that the salary disagreement would be worked out in plenty of time for the fourth season of the ABC hit.

“Sometimes you just read this stuff and you kind of laugh, because it barely resembles what's actually happening... or it doesn't capture the true tone of what's going on,” Levitan said of the coverage of the situation, which including the filing of a lawsuit by cast members Sofia Vergara, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Eric Stonestreet, Julie Bowen, Ty Burrell and Ed O'Neill.

Asked by a reporter if there were any “big plans for Lily this season” -- the preschooler played by Aubrey Anderson-Emmons -- Levitan quipped, “The day Lily holds out, we're really f---ed.”

Did “Lily” show up for Thursday's table read? I asked.

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Add another “reality” gig to the Palin family account.

Just a few days after Todd Palin (and his wife, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin) met with reporters in Beverly Hills to talk up his participation in NBC's “Stars Earn Stripes,” ABC Friday announced that Bristol Palin, who's currently starring in a Lifetime series, "Bristol Palin: Life's a Tripp," would return to “Dancing With the Stars” for its all-star edition, which premieres Sept. 24.

Say what you like: The girl's dancing as fast as she can.

Also returning: Kirstie Alley, Pamela Anderson, Helio Castroneves, Joey Fatone, Shawn Johnson, Drew Lachey, Gilles Marini, Kelly Monaco, Apolo Anton Ohno, Melissa Rycroft and Emmitt Smith.

One final contestant will be chosen by fans, but alas, Cloris Leachman isn't in contention.

Instead viewers will get to choose from among Sabrina Bryan, Carson Kressley and Kyle Massey. The trio will kick off their get-out-the-vote campaigns on ABC's “Good Morning America” on Monday. Or you can start stuffing the ballot box immediately by clicking here.

Partners will be announced Aug. 13, but exec producer Conrad Green points out that they can't all have their original partners.

"This is almost our version of 'The Avengers.' These are the superheroes of their particular seasons," he said.

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What's on Katie Couric's bucket list?

“I would like to go out with George Clooney, if you can arrange that,” the news anchor-turned-daytime talk show host told a reporter Thursday during a press conference for “Katie,” the syndicated show she's launching Sept. 10.

“I would like to jump out of an airplane,” she added, not specifying whether this should happen before or after her date with Clooney. “I have no desire to bungee jump.”

Ball's in your court, George.

“I'm not going anywhere! I'm staying right here!” joked Robin Roberts Thursday when a reporter asked how ABC's “Good Morning America” would be handling her absence from the show while she undergoes her upcoming bone-marrow transplant.

In a satellite interview that included her “GMA” co-workers, Roberts, who announced in June that she'd been diagnosed with myelodysplastic syndrome, a blood disorder that sometimes leads to leukemia, told reporters at the Television Critics Association's summer meetings that she expects the transplant to occur toward the end of the summer, “most likely the end of August, early September.”

“It's fascinating/slash/scary how you have to prepare for something like this,” remarked Roberts, who looked as lively as she usually does on air but confessed that she does “go through moments of fatigue” and that this was a day when she was feeling the effects of the treatments she's undergoing to prepare for the transplant.

The show's recent string of ratings victories against its once-indomitable NBC rival “Today” “have been pretty good medicine,” said Roberts, whose bone marrow is to be supplied by her sister, Sally Ann Roberts, a news anchor in New Orleans.

While she's gone, Roberts said, ABC News' Diane Sawyer, Barbara Walters and Katie Couric may all spend some time filling in for her.

South Jersey's Kelly Ripa may be in the mix as well.

“The women of 'The View'” have offered to pitch in, too, said “GMA” executive producer Tom Cibrowski.

Let's hope it won't come to that.

You never know who you'll meet poolside at the Beverly Hilton, the hotel where Whitney Houston died, John Edwards met his mistress and where TV critics congregate for a couple of weeks in the summer.

We're used to seeing stars -- it's why we come here, after all -- but we're not used to seeing Sarah Palin.

The former governor of Alaska was easily the biggest draw Tuesday evening at an NBC cocktail party to promote several of its new shows, including “Stars Earn Stripes,” the “reality” competition in which her husband, Todd, will appear starting Aug. 13.

Bigger than ex-“Friends” star Matthew Perry, who has a new sitcom, “Go On.”

Bigger even than Crystal, the monkey who's getting most of the buzz for another new NBC comedy, “Animal Practice.”

Wearing a dark olive wrap dress, killer heels and a fashionable pair of shades, Palin looked perfectly at home, cheerfully posing for pictures and chatting with reporters a few feet from her husband.

Though he's appeared in both TLC's “Sarah Palin's Alaska” and his daughter's Lifetime series, “Bristol Palin: Life's a Tripp,” Todd, I suggested to the former vice presidential candidate, had never struck me as being as comfortable with the cameras as the rest of the Palins.

“He's very humble and calm, cool and collected, but jumped at this chance to participate in such a worthy cause,” Palin said of her husband's role as a contestant in the show.

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I'm out in L.A. at the moment, reporting on the coming TV season.

But when I heard Tuesday afternoon that Sherman Hemsley had died, I wished I'd had the opportunity to speak more often to the man who'll always be George Jefferson to me.

Here's what I wrote about him, though, in a story for the Daily News in 1996, when Hemsley was appearing in a UPN series called “Goode Behavior”:

If Sherman Hemsley had been able to sew a fine seam, TV might never have been the same.

The actor enrolled in South Philadelphia's Bok Vocational-Technical School in the mid-'50s to learn to be a tailor, but "then I saw how hard it was to do those little stitches and I changed" to retail sales, "which I hated," finally ending up in restaurant training ("because you could eat the food you cooked").

"But I always knew I wanted to be an actor," Hemsley, 58, concluded in a phone interview last week.

The actor who successfully carried a bantam rooster of a character called George Jefferson from an occasional appearance on CBS' "All in the Family" to a 10-year run on "The Jeffersons" will launch his fourth sitcom, "Goode Behavior," at 9 p.m. Monday on UPN.

In the show, Hemsley plays a charming con man and ex-convict, Willie Goode, who comes to live with his stuffed shirt of a son, a university professor, played by Dorien Wilson ("Dream On").