‘Clone Wars’ unfold

The Television Critics Assn. Press Tour, the semiannual gathering of television journalists from around the country, continues at the Beverly Hilton. We offer these dispatches.

With the “Star Wars” franchise coming to the small screen this fall, television critics got a sneak peek Friday morning at an entire episode of “Star Wars: The Clone Wars,” though they were asked not to reveal too many details.

The animated episode will air on Cartoon Network and TNT at an undetermined date this fall, along with 21 others in a series that further broadens the reach of the formidable and lucrative “Star Wars” story.

The television series will come out after the Aug. 10 premiere of an animated movie of the same name. Both will fill in gaps between “Episode II: Attack of the Clones” and “Episode III: Revenge of the Sith,” with stories of Anakin, Padme Amidala, Count Dooku and other second-trilogy characters.

The episode screened Friday was built around Jedi master Yoda and introduced a new villain, the gothic Ventress, an apprentice of Count Dooku. The series’ supervising director, David Filoni, described her as “a bit sensuous” and “serpent-like.”

Asked whether this series would appeal to children who haven’t grown up watching the “Star Wars” films, Filoni replied: “Every time I go to Toys R Us, I see kids picking up light sabers and imagining they’re in a galaxy far, far away. I hope those fans will watch and enjoy this. And maybe listen to Yoda.”

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Denise Martin

3 HBO alumni to produce pilots

HBO has ordered series pilots from “Sex and the City” star Sarah Jessica Parker, “The Sopranos” executive producer Terence Winter and “The Wire” creator David Simon.

The proposed series fit well with HBO’s programming strategy after the exit of longtime network architect Chris Albrecht. The plan seems to be to greenlight a greater number of shows than in the past, without fundamentally changing the notion of what an HBO series should be.

“We’ve had to be a little more proactive” in pursuing projects, Michael Lombardo, president of the network’s programming group, told reporters Thursday. But “the kinds of things we’ve wanted haven’t changed.”

Parker will produce a half-hour comedy pilot called “Washingtonienne,” based on Jessica Cutler’s controversial book about her racy life as a political aide and blogger in Washington.

Winter is working on “Boardwalk Empire,” a drama about Atlantic City in the 1920s.

And Simon, with his longtime writing partner Eric Overmyer, will produce “Treme,” a drama about life in post-Katrina New Orleans. Simon is also an executive producer of “Generation Kill,” the HBO Iraq drama premiering Sunday.

Executives also confirmed that the long-awaited TV movie tied to “Deadwood” – which was supposed to tie up loose ends left hanging after the series was abruptly canceled – is not happening.

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Scott Collins

Watch out for vampires’ fangs

HBO’s coming drama, “True Blood,” is based on the Charlaine Harris series of books set in the backwoods of Louisiana, in a world where vampires and humans coexist but vampires are treated as outcasts. The series debuts Sept. 7.

Asked if vampires carried an underlying message about gay rights, executive producer Alan Ball told reporters Thursday there’s no hidden message. “I really don’t look at the vampire as a metaphor for gays,” he said.

“For me, part of the fun of this whole series is that it’s about vampires, so it’s not that serious,” he said. “However, they do work as a metaphor for gays … for anyone that’s misunderstood. At the same time it’s not a metaphor at all.”

Ball, creator of HBO’s former hit series “Six Feet Under,” said he didn’t come to the project as a vampire enthusiast. “I haven’t seen ‘Buffy’ or ‘Angel.’ I’ve never read the Anne Rice books. All I knew was the movies I’d seen,” he said.

So he took pains to ground his vamps in the real world. In “True Blood,” most of the myths about vampires were created by vampires themselves so that they could pass for humans. When staked, they don’t always instantaneously turn to dust. They’ve also got cooler fangs.

“We went to great pains to depict the fangs,” Ball said. “They’re like rattlesnake ones that click forward.”

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D.M.

Nash and Spike have got game

One of the odder couplings of the press tour came Thursday when Phoenix Suns star Steve Nash and New York Knicks fan Spike Lee shared a stage to promote their upcoming projects for ESPN Films.

Lee directed a documentary, “Game Day With Kobe,” that is slated to air in the fall. The director, who struck up a friendship with Lakers star Kobe Bryant while shooting a commercial in Rome, used 30 cameras for his portrait, which centers on a playoff game against the San Antonio Spurs.

Meanwhile, Nash, a longtime film enthusiast, is making his directorial debut for an ESPN documentary about Terry Fox, a young athlete who died of cancer in 1981. Fox inspired fellow Canadians with his heroic goal to run across the country to raise money for cancer research. Despite having an artificial leg, he ran more than 3,000 miles before illness eventually forced him to quit.

Naturally, with Lee, the director of such films as “Do the Right Thing,” “Malcolm X” and “Jungle Fever,” on stage, the questions veered toward the political. Asked about the chances of Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic nominee, winning the White House in November, Lee confidently predicted victory.

“It’s going to be one of the most historic moments in American history, world history,” he said. “Everything will be affected by this seismic change in the universe.”

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Martin Miller