By Mondo Times editors
Boulder, Colorado USA
Posted on August 12, 2009 at 11:09pm

New Hosts Named for 'At The Movies'

-- On August 5, 2009, 'At The Movies' named two new co-hosts - A.O. Scott and Michael Phillips. The new season will premiere on September 5, 2009.

At the Movies is produced at WLS-TV in Chicago. The show was originally called "Sneak Previews" and was hosted by Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel.

Film critics A.O. (Tony) Scott of the The New York Times and Michael Phillips of the The Chicago Tribune will co-host the long-running series when its new season premieres the weekend of September 5, 2009. Both of these seasoned and influential film critics, who have appeared on the series repeatedly as guest co-hosts, will bring their extensive credentials and respected personas to the program. The series, which will embark on its 24th season, will continue to employ its "see it," "skip it," or "rent it" ratings system.

A.O. Scott will complete his first decade as a film critic at The New York Times in January of 2010. Over those ten years, in addition to reviewing thousands of new releases, he has written essays and articles about film history and the state of the movie business and profiles of stars and directors for the Times Book Review, Magazine and Week in Review sections. He has been a frequent guest on Charlie Rose, NPR's Talk of the Nation, The John Batchelor Show and many other radio and television programs. Before coming to the Times, Tony was the Sunday book critic at Newsday and a freelance contributor to dozens of publications, including The New Yorker, The Wall Street Journal and The New York Review of Books and Slate. He served on the editorial staffs of The New York Review of Books and Lingua Franca, and has edited A Bolt From the Blue, a collection of essays by Mary McCarthy. Born in Massachusetts, Tony graduated from Classical High School in Providence, RI and received a bachelor of arts degree in literature from Harvard and a master of arts degree in English from Johns Hopkins. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife, their two children and two dogs.

"I'm overjoyed and honored to be joining At the Movies, and especially excited to be working with my colleague Michael Phillips, one of the most intelligent and wittiest critics around," commented A.O. Scott. "This show, with its long history and rich tradition, stands for the idea that there is a place on television for vigorous argument and independent thinking about movies."

Michael Phillips is the film critic of The Chicago Tribune, a position he's held since 2006. He has written about entertainment and the arts as a staff writer and critic for The Los Angeles Times, The San Diego Union-Tribune, The St. Paul Pioneer Press, The Dallas Times-Herald and the Twin Cities weekly City Pages. Phillips has covered movies for Minnesota Public Radio, WGN-AM, MSNBC and has guested periodically on the Filmspotting.net podcast, also heard on Chicago Public Radio.

At The Movies has a convoluted history, to say the least. The show first began in 1975 at WTTW in Chicago when Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel hosted the local movie review show, Sneak Previews. In 1978, the show moved to PBS and was syndicated shortly thereafter by Tribune Syndication and was renamed At the Movies. In 1986, Disney-ABC Domestic Television (then known as Buena Vista Television) acquired the show, calling it Siskel & Ebert & the Movies. Upon Gene Siskel's passing in 1999, the show retained the Siskel & Ebert title until the following fall when it became Roger Ebert & the Movies. In July 2000, Richard Roeper was named Ebert's new co-host and the show was retitled, Ebert & Roeper and the Movies. The show was renamed Ebert & Roeper in 2001 and subsequently was modified to At the Movies with Ebert & Roeper and then to At the Movies. Ebert and Roeper bid farewell to the series in 2008. Ben Lyons and Ben Mankewicz were named co-hosts in July 2008.

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