THIS WEEK IN XENA NEWS.... TWXN 45 11/14/96 Brought to you by Xena: Media Review (XMR): http://www.teleport.com/~gater/IAXS/IAXS.html XMR is a periodic annotated world press review of reports regarding the internationally syndicated television show XENA: Warrior Princess (1995 - ) and the castmembers, Lucy Lawless and Renee O'Connor. For a free e-mail subscription send "subscribe XMR" to ktaborn@lightspeed.net. Excerpts from the following cites will appear in future issues of XMR. EDITOR IS STANDING ON THE TABLE AND DANCING!!! XWP took 1st place in action hours for RETURN OF CALLISTO (#29). It is just as I predicted!!! At the end of the last season I predicted that XWP would take a top honor during a first run episode early in the season. My next prediction is that as the season warms up and gets up to speed, XWP will be turning in 6.x rating regularly (The top rating XWP has ever earned was a 6.1 for the first showing of ATHENS CITY in January 1996. It is also to date the only rating the XWP has earned in the 6's). You just wait and see! Mark my words!!! WHOOSH #3 will be released November 17, 1996. WHOOSH has a complete spoiler-enriched episode guide current through INTIMATE STRANGER, on-line, waiting for you! I am about half way through XMR #19. There is a good chance it will be out before December 1, 1996. Again, thanks to everyone for their patience. And, I almost forgot, I got permission from my family to go stag to the Xena/Hercules Convention in January in Burbank. See you there!!! --Kym [ ] 11-10-96 USA WEEKEND. Friday. Page 02. 1162 words. "Who's News" By Lorrie Lynch COMMENTARY: Q&A mentioning Lucy Lawless as a tall actress. EXCERPT: ...Q. There are so many female stars of the small screen, but I've been wondering: Who are some of the tallest in current shows? Darrin Hill, Highland Park, Mich. Suddenly Susan star Brooke Shields, a former fashion model, and 3rd Rock From the Sun's Kristen Johnston are tops: Both stand 6 feet tall. Lucy Lawless, popular star of the syndicated action show Xena: Warrior Princess (who recently broke her pelvis while preparing a comedy bit with Jay Leno), is just shy of 6 feet. Christine Lahti of Chicago Hope is 5-foot-10. Friends' Lisa Kudrow is 5-foot-7. Three of the four players on Cybill are tall: Cybill Shepherd is 5-foot-9, sidekick Christine Baranski is 5-foot-8, and Alicia Witt (daughter Zoey) is somewhere in between.... [ bo] 11-10-96 THE PROVIDENCE JOURNAL-BULLETIN. Sunday. Page 6T/ 532 words. "Question & Answers" COMMENTARY: After over a month after Ms. Lawless' injury, it is still being reported. EXCERPT: I've heard reports of Lucy Lawless being injured in some kind of accident. What's the story? D.D. The star of the syndicated hit Xena: Warrior Princess was thrown from a horse last month while waiting to enter the Tonight Show sound stage for a comedy stunt. She is working with a physical therapist and her trainer so that she can return to work on her action series which is filmed in New Zealand.... [ ] 11-10-96 THE OBSERVER. Sunday. Page 20. 1941 words. "Pendennis" By Tom Hibbert COMMENTARY: What will be playing in London and the rest of the United Kingdom on Christmas day? HTLJ and XWP in a special double bill. You know you have made it when you are considered THE Christmas show for an entire nation. No doubt, the episodes shown will be the Christmas episodes we have heard so much about. EXCERPT: ...The advent of Hercules Pendennis is a teeny bit troubled about Rupert Murdoch, supreme ruler of the universe if you don't count Ted Turner. Or Tony Blair. I thought he was supposed to be a 'Born Again' Christian. There is little inkling of this in the Sky TV Advent Calendar which has just fallen on to my desk by mistake. Okay, I cheated. I opened all the little windows way ahead of the appropriate time, which is sometimes called the 'festive season'. With mounting excitement I ripped off the door marked 25 December and what did I find there? Three Wise Men? The baby Jesus and his donkeys? Nothing of the sort. What you get is a reminder of what you can see on Sky that day if you are foolish enough to own a decoder and dish. And there's nothing 'Holy' at all. At 3: 05 pm, Hercules teams up with Xena, Warrior Princess, for a special double bill.... [ ] 11-12-96 THE BALTIMORE SUN. Tuesday. Page 1A. 1481 words. "Homework: TV violence; Watching: Maryland's attorney general joins his counterparts in urging that parents rate television programs and report their impressions to broadcasters" By Marego Athans COMMENTARY: Last addressed when the V-Chip was being discussed (and XWP was put through a V-Chip test and found that it wasn't blocked! -- see XMR198, 03-12-96. THE TORONTO STAR, page A1, "TV device a dunce at zapping violence" by Antonia Zerbisias), the violence of XWP hit the news again. This time it was part of a Parent's Diary project in Maryland to educate parents as to what their children were watching on television. EXCERPT: Assignment for parents, from Maryland's top law enforcement officer: Spend a week with Xena the Warrior Princess, the X-Men, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers -- the images that beam from the TV screen to the most impressionable brains in your home. Take a pen and a copy of the newly printed Parent's Diary now on its way to the state's elementary schools, and rate each show for violent content. Then tell the broadcasters what you think. The nationwide campaign to be announced today is called "Tune Out the Violence," launched by state Attorney General J. Joseph Curran Jr. and others who say televised violence fuels violent juvenile crime. Maryland posted the nation's fourth-highest rate of juvenile murders in 1994.... [ ] 11-14-96 THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER. 674 words. "Thu, Nov 14, 1996" COMMENTARY: Notice about what Digital Sound & Picture is currently doing or just finished. Digital Sound & Picture is a contractor for XWP. EXCERPT: ...TechBriefs: Los Angeles audio postprod house Digital Sound & Picture has completed work on David Lynch's ''Lost Highway'' and continues work on TV series ''Xena: Warrior Princess'' and ''Hercules: The Legendary Journeys,'' with upcoming feature film jobs to include ''Washington Square'' and ''Hoods''... COMMENTARY: XWP is currently at 5.5 (no. 13 of all syndicated shows), HTLJ at 5.2 (no. 15), and STAR TREK at 5.0 (no. 16). The shows covering the first half of the November sweeps were RETURN OF CALLISTO (#29) and WARRIOR...PRINCESS...TRAMP (#30). [ ] NOTE: It's official!!! XWP has trounced HTLJ and ST:DS9 during the first half of the November sweeps!!! RETURN OF CALLISTO (#29), 1st release, 10/28/96. Ranked as the 1st action hour with a 5.5 rating. (Second time it has hit 1st spot in 1996; first time for the 2nd season, and first time for a first run episode). The first time XWP hit the number one action hour spot was December 1995 with a rerun of PATH NOT TAKEN (#5) (everyone else was in reruns too!). XWP hit the number place again in August 1996 with a rerun of TIES THAT BIND (#20). Again, XWP was competing against other re-runs. Here it is only FIVE episodes into the season and XWP has taken the number one spot against first runs! Not only is this telling of XWP's growing popularity, but it is also happening during the first week of the November sweeps. The standings for action-hours were as follows: 1. XWP with 5.5 2. HTLJ with 5.2 3. ST:DS9 with 5.0 4. SINBAD/FX with 2.9 5. CAPE with 2.7