ARTS AND ENTERTAINMENT REPORTS FROM THE TIMES, NEWS SERVICES AND THE NATION’S PRESS.

TELEVISION

A Quarter-Century of Muppets

In honor of the 25th anniversary of “The Muppet Show,” the first Muppetfest--a two-day celebration of Jim Henson’s puppets--will be held at the Pasadena Civic Center on Sept. 22 and 23, kicking off a yearlong series of activities. The TV series made its debut in syndication on Sept. 26, 1976, and continued for five seasons with 120 shows. Open to all Muppet fans, the fest will include guest appearances by the original puppeteers and writers who helped create the Muppets, live musical performances of original Muppet music, screenings of rare footage, presentations from Jim Henson’s Creature Shop and interactive exhibitions. In addition, a VIP charity event will be held at the Jim Henson Company’s studio in Hollywood. Visit https://www.henson.com for details on registering for Muppetfest, which organizers hope to make an annual event.

Good News for Dan Rather

Evening newscast ratings have been in flux in recent weeks, and last week “CBS Evening News With Dan Rather” finally got some good news from Nielsen Media Research. The program finished first in total number of viewers for the first time since the week of July 20, 1998, with an average of 8.29 million viewers. The long-dominant “NBC Nightly News With Tom Brokaw,” which aired at unusual times two nights because of basketball coverage, came in second with an average of 8.16 million, while ABC’s “World News Tonight With Peter Jennings,” which was preempted Monday and Thursday for hockey coverage, was third with 7.92 million.

MOVIES

Night of 100 Thrills

Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 film shocker “Psycho,” starring Anthony Perkins and Janet Leigh, ranked No. 1 on the American Film Institute’s list of America’s “most thrilling” films, revealed Tuesday night on a three-hour CBS special, “AFI’s 100 Years . . . 100 Thrills.” Next in order on the thrill-meter were “Jaws,” “The Exorcist,” “North by Northwest,” “The Silence of the Lambs,” “Alien,” “The Birds,” “The French Connection,” “Rosemary’s Baby” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” The list spanned from Harold Lloyd’s 1923 film “Safety Last” to 1999’s “The Matrix” and “The Sixth Sense,” and included horror, musicals, sci-fi, suspense, sports, disaster and westerns. The list included nine Hitchcock films, six by Steven Spielberg and five by Stanley Kubrick. Harrison Ford (“Raiders,” “Blade Runner,” “The Fugitive,” “Star Wars”) and Claude Rains (“Casablanca,” “The Adventures of Robin Hood,” “Lawrence of Arabia” and “Notorious”) topped the list of actors appearing in the chosen thrillers, each starring in four films that made the top 100.

THEATER

Second Home for CTG

The Culver City Council on Monday approved an agreement between the Center Theatre Group and the Culver City Redevelopment Agency for use of the historic Culver Theater as an additional space for CTG programming. The agreement will allow CTG, the umbrella organization for downtown’s Ahmanson Theatre and Mark Taper Forum, to raise funds and to come up with renovation plans for the theater. The space will include two stages for performances--a flexible theater on the main floor that will seat 300 to 425 patrons, and a laboratory space on an upper level that will accommodate up to 100 and will be used for rehearsals, readings and young people’s programs.

‘Producers’ Too Hot to Handle

How hot are tickets for the Tony Award-winning “The Producers” on Broadway? The Mel Brooks musical is sold out through the middle of next year, and at Barlow-Hartman Public Relations in New York, the show’s press agents are logging 150 requests a day begging for house seats. The agency has assigned a full-time employee who spends his entire day spoiling other people’s days. “After each ‘no’ you have to listen to a sob story,” said John Barlow. “The person answering the phone cannot get anything else done. In my 13 years in the business, there has never been anything like this.”

QUICK TAKES

The J. Paul Getty Museum has announced a major gift from art collector Christian Keesee of 256 photographs by American photographer Brett Weston, the son of photographer Edward Weston. . . . “Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks,” which opened last week at Westwood’s Geffen Playhouse with Uta Hagen and David Hyde Pierce, will be extended through July 8. . . . In its second week of post-”Sopranos” Sundays, HBO saw only a slight viewership drop for “Sex and the City,” while “Six Feet Under,” the pay network’s new drama, lost some ground off its debut. At 9 p.m., “Sex” attracted roughly 5.5 million viewers, followed by the season premiere of “Arli$$” at 9:30 p.m., which drew slightly under 4 million viewers, about the same number that tuned in for “Six Feet Under” at 10, down about 1 million from its first installment.