Fox Places Summer Bet on The Casino

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Mark Burnett's The Casino is the first show Fox has assigned a firm summer launch date. It will premiere in American Idol's time slot on Tuesday, June 8, at 8 p.m., right after the megahit variety show crowns the third American Idol.

The Casino, an unscripted drama, follows dotcom millionaires Tim Poster and Tom Breitling as they take over the Golden Nugget Hotel and Casino in downtown Las Vegas and try to restore it to its former glory.

In other Fox scheduling news, the network is going to give critically-acclaimed Arrested Development a shot behind American Idol on Wednesday, March 17 at 8:30 p.m. Fox executives love the show and critics named it this year's best, but viewers so far haven't been agreeing.

Fox also has scheduled Playing It Straight, a reality dating show, on Friday at 8 p.m., leading into new drama Wonderfalls. Both shows launch on Friday, March 12.

Paige Albiniak
Paige Albiniak

Contributing editor Paige Albiniak has been covering the business of television for more than 25 years. She is a longtime contributor to Next TV, Broadcasting + Cable and Multichannel News. She concurrently serves as editorial director for The Global Entertainment Marketing Academy of Arts & Sciences (G.E.M.A.). She has written for such publications as TVNewsCheck, The New York Post, Variety, CBS Watch and more. Albiniak was B+C’s Los Angeles bureau chief from September 2002 to 2004, and an associate editor covering Congress and lobbying for the magazine in Washington, D.C., from January 1997 - September 2002.