But the way Fox wants you to think of it is, apparently, as a mid-to-low end strip club that is very welcoming of lady clientele.

The network's "edgy" new redband promo (below) features the whole Fox gang, including the stars of House, Bones, Lie to Me and Fringe out for a night watching women disrobe down to their underwears. It's an interesting piece of positioning; many networks attempt to subliminally communicate that "if you watch our shows we will provide you with low cost sex," but generally they get this message across by working cheerleaders washing cars and high-price brothels into their plot lines and using the flimsiest excuses possible to put models into bikinis. Few just come out and say, Hey, we're a very affordable strip club!

And what about the ladies in the audience? What's in it for them? Well as the promo demonstrates, everyone can have fun watching women take their clothes off. Fringe's Anna Torv almost gets to make out with a stripper! And the Bones cast get to revive their old favorite geek joke reference to the Broken Cowgirl position.

"No shirts. No shoes. No problemo" read the closing credits, and from now on, when I want to party naked, it's going to be straight to Fox for me.

Yes, this Wednesday, when every other channel in the country is playing the president babbling about the Swine Flu Bailout Budget or whatever, you, the educated television viewer, will not have to miss one all-new minute of Lie to Me, a.k.a. "House But He Got to Keep His Accent and He Solves Crimes."

Has a broadcast network ever refused to air a presidential news conference before? Well yes, probably the WB. But god, we dream of a world in which Obama preempted the American Idol results show, forcing them to just fucking tell us who lost, during a commercial break, without K.C. and Lady GaGa and David Cook getting all up in our business.

(Unrelated:

The three networks have evaluated Mr. Obama very similarly: 57% positive comments on ABC, 58% positive on CBS, and 61% positive on NBC. But he fared far better in New York Times stories, where nearly three out of four evaluative comments (73%) by sources and reporters were favorable. And he fared far worse on Fox News, where only one out of eight such comments (13%) were favorable.

What a simplistic way of evaluating media coverage of a public figure! Also, Fox is evil and bad.)

Similar crime procedurals, who ever would have thought? THR's James Hibberd says sparks flew at TCA after the inevitable attempt by the press to compare the two shows:

"Go at it boys," says Tim Roth.

"The difference between the two shows is that our show is based on actual science, while 'Mentalist' is, I think, more of a scam," says actor Brendan Hines. "Our show is based on the most cutting-edge research used by TCA and NSA. What you see on the show is based on real science and techniques that are simple and that people can bring to life." [...]

More superficially, Tim Roth kept his British accent — unlike transplanted Brits such Hugh Laurie.

And quite unlike Australian Simon Baker, whose native accent was tamped down lest a besotted Barbara Walters hurl herself at the TV screen. Still, familiarity has never hurt this genre before, so why should it now? There's room enough for both shows, plus Fox's own reality spin, Moment of Truth—in fact, we eagerly await the upcoming plotlines that find Baker and Roth obsessed with examining the validity of men's stuffed crotches.

• 'Lie to Me' panel: 'The Mentalist' is a 'scam' [THR]

Meanwhile, Tim Roth is hoping the grass — or at least the money — is greener at Fox, where he's aboard Brian Grazer's Lie to Me, about a FBI-recruited scientist "with the innate ability to read whether people are telling the truth":

Net has officially picked up a 13-episode order. Roth stars as Dr. Cal Lightman, a specialist who can read the human face, body and voice and determine, more accurately than any polygraph, whether the person in front of him is lying. [...]

Imagine TV and 20th Century Fox TV are behind the show, which is loosely based on the real-life exploits of psychologist Paul Ekman, who's considered an expert in the science of facial micro-expressions.

Brian Grazer said he's been fascinated by Ekman since reading about his work. Baum, meanwhile, had also been doing his own research about so-called human lie detectors.

That's... it? No chain-smoking, ad-selling prowess or terminally ill meth manufacturing? Where's the show? Still, we're optimists; here's hoping Roth falls on the right side of the crossover spectrum, more Alec Baldwin than Christian Slater, more Martin Sheen than James Woods. And that the door swings back the other way — may Roth, too, someday have the opportunity to reject his tired old terrain of "human lie detecting." Seriously, that shit will never beat James Spader.

• Clooney and 'ER' return? [Reuters]
• Fox Ready to 'Lie' With Tim Roth [Variety]