While some shows, like Heroes, have tried to merge product placement and plot on the web, Desperate Housewives creator Marc Cherry and his crew are now bringing the trend into primetime.

The writer and others on ABC's payroll will help produce eight commercials for Sprint in which "Housewives" characters grapple with mystery, murder and general soap opera drama. Of course, none of the mainstay Housewives will appear in the commodity-driven mini-series. Rather, the actors in the commercials will appear as "background extras" on the actual show, which could be an ultimately embarrassing move for everyone involved.

NBC and Jay Leno, whose new show premieres tonight, are taking a slightly dated approach:

And an easy way to plug an advertiser in an era when TV commercials are at the mercy of the DVR. Leno describes himself as "advertiser friendly," and NBC has already struck a deal with McDonald's, whose Monopoly-based promotion will find Leno announcing the chain's ad featuring NBC stars. Visitors to McDonald's will be steered by placards to Leno's program.
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Today's challenging economy could well rewrite the old ad playbook, says Brian Steinberg, TV editor at Advertising Age magazine. "We'll see how much he can weave into his show. Because when the ads are part of the program, you're less likely to hit the fast-forward button," he says.

Could this be the wave of television's future? Ads are the program and the programs are the ad? Even if it works, it seems to us viewers have grown up a bit — just a bit — since television's early years and will be turned off by such obvious attempts to buy their business. Or that's our hope, at least, for the increasingly blurry lines between advertising and entertainment must be preserved at all costs.

IS Alaska's Gov. Sarah Palin headed to "Desperate Housewives"? Series creator Marc Cherry is "very hot to trot to have her appear on the season-five finale," Hollywood p.r. man Hal Lifson, who's not involved with the show, told us. "Marc is highly enamored of Sarah and sees her as the ultimate guest star [playing] a similar version of herself. The idea has gone over surprisingly well with execs at Disney, who see it as a blockbuster based on Sarah's huge ratings on 'Saturday Night Live.' " Cherry declined to comment. An ABC rep said, "There's no truth to it."

And who is this "Hollywood p.r. man Hal Lifson, who's not involved with the show"? Well, as near as we can tell from his website, he represents exactly three things: a Palm Springs hotel, singer Doc Kupka, and a husband-and-wife pair of runners. Naturally, this qualifies him to dish inside dirt on Desperate Housewives. Oh, and coincidentally, all three of Lifson's clients boast New York Post press clippings (here, here, and here)! Wonder how that happened. Next time it is a slow news day, readers, we shall ask our friends to make up wild rumors about struggling Georgia senator Saxby Chambliss and Gossip Girl, then print them as fact. This, then, is our J-school legacy to you.

[Photo Credit: AP]

• WISTERIA BOUND? [Page Six]

Talk about childishness: Today's session started off stupidly with a heated argument over chairs — yeah, that's right, chairs...Today, when AMPTP's Nick Counter showed up at the WGA's bargaining venue trailing twice as many people as writers' negotiator David Young had planned, the guild didn't have enough seating.

Young complained that Counter had given him a specific head count, and Counter shot back that he'd warned well in advance that he was going to bring his whole committee with him and called Young a liar (even though another witness vouched for Young's recounting of events...) "The chair thing was totally middle school. David Young totally stood up to him," one insider told me.

But Young wouldn't let the producers' side sit down, or bring chairs in from other rooms, or even go downstairs to a bigger conference room that had seating for everyone. For awhile there was an impasse, and then a Paramount labor exec stepped into the fray and started yelling at guild members, "What are you trying to prove here?" Finally, several negotiating committee members, the best known of whom was Desperate Housewives hyphenate Marc Cherry, went out and fetched chairs for the extra AMPTP'ers. "It was getting THAT uncomfortable that Marc Cherry got off his ass and went chair hunting. Says a lot," one WGA wag opined.

The Great Chair Dispute of 2007 will undoubtedly go down as a potent symbol of just how puerile things have become between the warring factions. Still, sometimes it takes Man at his most dishonorable for the righteous to shine brightest; we therefore salute Marc Cherry for courageously crossing partisan lines to end the negotiation-stalling stalemate, which he accomplished with the help of another, homonymically named participant who was more than willing to pitch in for the cause.

• Tricks & Treats At WGA Strike Talks Today (...And, Yes, I Know All About The Chairs) [deadlinehollywooddaily.com]

GLAAD is honored to collaborate with Desperate Housewives Creator and Executive Producer Marc Cherry to support GLAAD's new Youth Empowerment Media Program. Marc will host a fundraising event at his beautiful home in Toluca Lake, Calif. The evening will feature special entertainment, a full top-shelf bar, buffet dinner and champagne dessert. With the cast of Desperate Housewives slated to attend — as well as some special appearances by celebrity guests and the series' supporting actors— this promises to be an exciting and meaningful evening!

Ah, to be a fruit fly on the wall of Cherry's Toluca Lake manse that evening, where fortunate attendees can rub against the muscular shoulders of Hollywood's PowerGays&trade, ask Teri Hatcher if she's going to finish that last third of her eclaire, or simply wonder out loud why Eva Longoria never bothered to show up. Best of all is the knowledge that your contribution—earmarked for GLAAD's Youth Empowerment Media Program—will help reverse low self-esteem among gay youth, nicely setting the stage for them to spend the rest of their lives making up for it by becoming Hollywood's next generation of abusive and power-hungry tastemaking elite.

• An Evening with the Desperate Housewives [GLAAD.com via Towleroad]