Sonnenfeld quickly set the tone Tuesday by opening with a story about the size of his penis.

He followed up by asking such off-the-cuff questions as "Do you get more sex as an independent producer or an executive, and has sex changed?" (to NBC's Ben Silverman); "Do you agree that Peter Liguori is so handsome, you have to punch him in the face?" (to Fox's Kevin Reilly); "Has Les Moonves ever threatened to kill one of you?" (to CBS' Nina Tassler and the CW's Dawn Ostroff); and, to all of them, "If death was not an option, who would you rather drive in a car with cross country — Les Moonves in a really bad mood or Steve McPherson?"

While Sonnenfeld kept much of the attention on himself with his lighthearted dick jokes and fun, hypothetical questions about potentially fatal road trips with TV's deadliest personalities, at least one panelist managed to make a trade paper's highlights list, as TV Week chooses its top "Oh no you di'int, Mr. Sassy Programming Executive!" moment:

Even by softball HRTS standards, Sonnenfeld seemed mainly interested in his own personal musings — such as asking why his pitch meetings take so long, and how many hours executives spend reading scripts instead of spending time at home.

Actually, that latter question did prompt one exchange that for some was worth the price of admission. Silverman tried to gamely poke fun at his partygoer image by saying that, instead of spending time with his family like the other network executives, he's busy "dating their kids." Reilly leaned over and said, "I have two boys," and the audience hooted.

Now twice-shamed by the barbs of his network rivals in a public forum, an atypically dejected Silverman was later overheard quietly muttering into his BlackBerry, hinting to an NBC underling that he'd be "totally psyched" if when he returned to the office following the panel, everyone "surprised" him with a party where he and his staff would share pieces of a delicious cake depicting him ripping out Kevin Reilly's small intestines with his razor-sharp peacock claws, "you know, just if we have one of those laying around somewhere."

[Photo: Getty Images]

• Sonnenfeld steals show at HRTS panel [THR]
• HRTS Smackdown: Network Chiefs on Best Behavior [TV Week]

Me: Lunchtime, Gower Gulch, the usual walk-thru. I see a small crowd with some tallish guys with really bad hair, so I assume it's a band getting ready for a local club gig. Boy, are they UGLY. Oh, it's the Geico Cavemen! One is in a blue argyle sweater and the other in a white button-down shirt. They only have a small crew and they look like they're going to ambush people, so I walk thru the parking lot over to the Rite Aid.

One of my coworkers walks by and I said, "Did you see the cavemen?" Having her sunglasses and headset on, she walked by and had no idea. I head to Coffee Bean, and see them walking down the sidewalk. I quickly cross the street. Luckily it seems like they are only keeping it "to the Gulch." On my way back, I see a security guard helping himself at craft service ... which is the back of a minivan.

Then J goes out and immediately gets it.
"So, do you like cavemen?"
J: "Yeah, I like cavemen."
GC #1: "Good, cuz cavemen like you!"
Caveman: "So tune in and watch us."
J: I will.
Caveman #2: Just tune in and catch the one ep before it goes off the air!
J: mm-hmm, (walks away, and gets accosted by a clearance person - oh, the irony - and she refuses to sign.) "Aww, come on, it's a new TV show for ABC!" smartly, she still refused.

Just one episode seems like a depressingly pessimistic outlook, even for a show that's already been extensively retooled. We hope that ABC's Steve McPherson will take immediate measures to lift his cavemen's morale, perhaps by unexpectedly showing up to the set with some special frozen treats for his cast, delivered with a promise that he'll give the series at least four episodes to prove itself before succumbing to panic and replacing it with reruns of According to Jim.

• Previously: Defending 'Cavemen' II: The Racial Insensitivity Question [Defamer]

'But I'm the president of ABC'!" exclaims Steve McPherson." [TV Week]

On the comedy side, president Steve McPherson's vaunted "Greenlight 'em all and let God sort 'em out" development strategy has yielded the aforementioned Cavemen, Carpoolers (guys carpooling to work), Sam I Am (Christina Applegate bonked on the head, loses memory, learns she's a bitch), Miss/Guided (guidance counselor goes back to her high school; edgy forward-slash courtesy of Nip/Tuck), and in midseason, Cashmere Mafia (think Sex and the City meets Sex and the City). Also: Did you hear Cavemen is on the schedule? It totally is!

The full Fall schedule follows [via THR, new shows in CAPS]

MONDAY
8-9:30 p.m.: "Dancing with the Stars"
9:30-10 p.m.: "SAM I AM"
10-11 p.m.: "The Bachelor"

TUESDAY
8-8:30 p.m.: "CAVEMEN"
8:30-9 p.m.: "CARPOOLERS"
9-10 p.m.: "Dancing With the Stars" (results show)
10-11 p.m.: "Boston Legal"

WEDNESDAY
8-9 p.m.: "PUSHING DAISES"
9-10 p.m.: "PRIVATE PRACTICE"
10-11 p.m.: "DIRTY SEXY MONEY"

THURSDAY
8-9 p.m.: "Ugly Betty"
9-10 p.m.: "Grey's Anatomy"
10-11 p.m.: "BIG SHOTS"

FRIDAY
8-9 p.m.: "Men in Trees"
9-10 p.m.: "WOMEN'S MURDER CLUB"
10-11 p.m.: "20/20"

SATURDAY
8-11 p.m.: "Saturday Night College Football"

SUNDAY
7-8 p.m.: "America's Funniest Home Videos"
8-9 p.m.: "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition"
9-10 p.m.: "Desperate Housewives"
10-11 p.m.: "Brothers & Sisters"

• ABC adds seven dramas, enters 'Private Practice' [THR]
• 'Grey's' spinoff leads ABC schedule [CNN.com]
• Previously: George Lopez Vs. Cavemen [Defamer]

"I get kicked out for a...caveman and shows that I out-performed because I'm not owned by [ABC Television Studios]...So a...Chicano can't be on TV but a...caveman can?" Lopez said.

"And a Chicano with an audience already? You know when you get in this that shows do not last forever, but this was an important show and to go unceremoniously like this hurts. One hundred seventy people lost their jobs." [...]

"TV just became really, really white again," he said.

While Lopez's angry reaction to losing his job is understandable, his knee-jerk dismissal of Cavemen demonstrates that he's probably unaware of the series' noble mandate to deconstruct the absurdity of racial stereotyping through sophisticated allegory. Once he realizes that the hilarious Cro-Magnons aren't his enemy, he'll direct his anger in a more appropriate direction, such as the show about the carpool or the one where Christina Applegate tries to regain her identity after getting bonked on the head.

• TV just got a lot 'whiter,' says a canceled George Lopez [LAT Show Tracker]
• Previously: 'Cavemen' Gets A Pickup [Defamer]

The ABC entertainment prexy played Good Humor man on Wednesday, pushing a cart of ice cream and walking from office to office, passing out scoops to network staffers.

Steve McPherson flew in 12 large tubs from Thomas Sweet, a Princeton, N.J., parlor famed for its homemade ice cream.

"They don't ship — so I had to bribe them," McPherson said. Included in the shipment: cookie dough, coffee, bittersweet and McPherson's favorite: cookies and cream.

ABC staffers "flipped out" at the sight of their network leader marching down the network halls, ice cream scooper in hand, McPherson said.

While the thoughtful gesture was appreciated, many couldn't help but feel vaguely disappointed in the display of gratitude as they consumed their chilly treats; after all, if Ted Harbert can transform his entire headquarters into a Mardi Gras-quality bacchanalia, couldn't McPherson at least roam the hallways offering his underlings some pulls from the tube of his beer-helmet, or set up a tequila body-shot station in a cubicle? No proud broadcast TV staff wants to see its leader outdone by a basic-cable show-off.

• ABC's McPherson scoops out love [Variety]

THR: The pilot "Cavemen" is based on the Geico commercials. Was there a conscious effort to find nontraditional voices?

McPherson: We tried to go some nontraditional ways, but some of the voices are not necessarily nontraditional voices, they just haven't had a chance to stretch their muscles a bit or been kept in a box. I can't say we went looking for "Cavemen." When they came in the door, they pitched and we were very skeptical at first. But when we heard it, we heard it was a sendup of race the way "3rd Rock From the Sun" is an analysis of human nature.

McPherson might be setting the bar a bit high in comparing the project to the socio-allegorical triumph that was 3rd Rock, but it's only because he's confident that the stunts he's planned for the upfronts next month, a "Superficially Evolved People Dance Like This, Cavemen Dance Like This" Party and a curbside demonstration in which some Cro Magnons demonstrate their inability to hail a cab, will instantly have prospective advertisers ready to buy into the show's winning combination of racially charged satire and broad humor.

• Pilots Package: dialogue with Stephen McPherson [THR]

Cuse: "We went to Steve McPherson last season and said, 'Okay, one of our main characters, Michael, is going to kill two of our other main characters.'

Lindelof: "And they were all: 'As long as one of them is Michele Rodriguez.'"

It's a truly special moment when both showrunners and their network boss can so easily find some common creative ground; we imagine hearty laughs and enthusiastic high-fives were exchanged on both sides when McPherson then requested, "Can you make sure it's a clear head-shot—hell, let's make it four clear head-shots—so that everyone will know that she's really not coming back, and that it's not one of those 'the evil island is just mindfucking us with wishful thinking again' things you always do?"

• 'Emergency' Solution [Critical Eye]