What's happening on the West Coast, where TV critics have once again invaded an unsuspecting hotel -- this time it's the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, and are grilling actors, producers and the occasional network honcho:
"This should not be your go-to place if you have just been diagnosed with cancer...as to how to proceed," Darlene Hunt, creator of Showtime's "The Big C," which stars Laura Linney as a woman whose immediate response to a terminal cancer diagnosis is to kick out her husband (Oliver Platt), start work on a swimming pool and to burn a coach she'd never much liked.
"The Big C," like AMC's "Breaking Bad," faces a built-in problem, having given its main character what amounts to a death sentence in a medium where success is often measured by the length of a run.
How they're solving it, according to producers, is that every season will encompass a season -- starting with summer -- giving Linney's character 18 months to live if the show lasts six seasons.
"The thing about melanoma...there's a truth, generally, as to how long you will live," but there's also a lot of research under way, so they have some flexibility, said executive producer Jenny Bicks.
"We started the show and then this enormous research came out about a treatment for melanoma," added Linney. "So we don't know how long she has."
But "if it comes time that she goes, she goes," said Bicks.
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