For the A&E series with Patrick Swayze, see The Beast (2009 TV series)

The Beast (2009 TV series)

The Beast is an American crime drama series starring Patrick Swayze and Travis Fimmel. It debuted on the A&E Network on Thursday, 15 January 2009 at 10 PM EST. On June 15, 2009, Entertainment Tonight announced that the show was canceled due to Swayze's pancreatic cancer...

The Beast is an American drama series

Dramatic programming

Dramatic programming in the UK, or television drama and television drama series in the US, is television program content that is scripted and fictional along the lines of √a traditional drama. This excludes, for example, sports television, television news, reality show and game shows, stand-up...

 that aired on ABC

American Broadcasting Company

The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...

. Created by Kario Salem

Kario Salem

Kario Salem is an American television, film, and stage actor and screenwriter.-Career:In 1997, Salem earned an Emmy Award as a writer for the television special Don King: Only in America, which also earned him a PEN nomination. The film also won the Broadcast Film Critics Award and Peabody Award...

, the series premiered on June 21, 2001 and was canceled after five episodes.

Synopsis

The series stars Elizabeth Mitchell

Elizabeth Mitchell

Elizabeth Mitchell , is an American actress/modelwho is known for her roles as Dr. Juliet Burke on ABC's TV series Lost and as FBI agent Erica Evans on V. She has starred in such films as The Santa Clause 2, The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause, and Gia.-Early life:Mitchell was born Elizabeth...

 as Alice Allenby, a New York journalist who takes a job at World News Service, a Los Angeles based 24-hour

24-hour news cycle

The 24-hour news cycle arrived with the advent of television channels dedicated to news, and brought about a much faster pace of news production with increased demand for stories that can be presented as news, as opposed to the day-by-day pace of the news cycle of printed daily newspapers...

 cable news

United States cable news

Cable news refers to television channels devoted to television news broadcasts, with the name deriving from the proliferation of such networks during the 1980s with the advent of cable television. In the United States, early networks included CNN in 1980, Financial News Network in 1981, and CNN2 ...

 television station. Supporting cast members include Jason Gedrick

Jason Gedrick

Jason Gedrick is an American actor best known for his work on the television series Murder One and Boomtown and the motion picture Iron Eagle....

 as news anchor Resse McFadden and Frank Langella

Frank Langella

-Early life:Langella, an Italian American, was born in Bayonne, New Jersey, the son of Angelina and Frank A. Langella Sr., a business executive who was the president of the Bayonne Barrel and Drum Company. Langella attended Washington Elementary School and Bayonne High School in Bayonne...

 as Jackson Burns, the owner of World News Service.

Main cast

• Elizabeth Mitchell
  Elizabeth Mitchell
  Elizabeth Mitchell , is an American actress/modelwho is known for her roles as Dr. Juliet Burke on ABC's TV series Lost and as FBI agent Erica Evans on V. She has starred in such films as The Santa Clause 2, The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause, and Gia.-Early life:Mitchell was born Elizabeth...
  
   as Alice Allenby, a reporter from New York who began working at WNS in the pilot. She was became a celebrity after her first story and the public and Jackson viewed her as an on-screen beauty and was often complimented on her good looks.
• Jason Gedrick
  Jason Gedrick
  Jason Gedrick is an American actor best known for his work on the television series Murder One and Boomtown and the motion picture Iron Eagle....
  
   as Reese McFadden, the main anchor for WNS who made the job his own.
• Frank Langella
  Frank Langella
  -Early life:Langella, an Italian American, was born in Bayonne, New Jersey, the son of Angelina and Frank A. Langella Sr., a business executive who was the president of the Bayonne Barrel and Drum Company. Langella attended Washington Elementary School and Bayonne High School in Bayonne...
  
   as Jackson Burns, The owner of WNS and lover of Sonia. He created the channel and treated everyone like who worked for WNS like his family, especially Alice, who he felt he needed to protect.
• Naveen Andrews
  Naveen Andrews
  Naveen William Sidney Andrews is a British American actor. He is best known for portraying Kip in the movie The English Patient and Sayid Jarrah on the American television series Lost.-Early life:...
  
   as Timir Naipaul, worked for WNS as a camera man and other things. He named the show the beast and that became the nickname for it by everyone.
• Wendy Crewson
  Wendy Crewson
  -Life and career:Crewson was born in Hamilton, Ontario, the daughter of June Doreen and Robert Binnie Crewson. She attended Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, where she won the prestigious Lorne Greene Award for outstanding work in the theater. She then studied at the Webber Douglas Academy...
  
   as Maggie Steech, works for Jackson and has a desire to have a child but she finds out she cannot have children.
• April Grace
  April Grace
  April Grace is an SAG Award-nominated American actress.In the early 1990s, Grace landed a recurring role as the transporter chief on Star Trek: The Next Generation. Interspersing acclaimed and award-winning stage work in Los Angeles with her film and TV roles, the actress slowly rose from bit parts...
  
   as Sonia, A reporter for WNS and lover of Jackson.
• Peter Riegert
  Peter Riegert
  Peter Riegert is an American actor, screenwriter, and film director, best known for his role as Boon from Animal House and crooked New Jersey State Assemblyman Ronald Zellman on the HBO original series The Sopranos.-Early life:...
  
   as Ted Fisher, Works for Jackson and has anger issues. He has been fired from every other broadcasting station in the country.
• Harriet Sansom Harris
  Harriet Sansom Harris
  Harriet Sansom Harris , often credited as "Harriet Harris" is an American actress best known for her portrayals of Bebe Glazer on Frasier and Felicia Tilman on Desperate Housewives. She won a Tony Award in 2002 as a Featured Actress in a Musical for playing the evil white slaver Mrs. Meers in...
  
   as Mrs. Sweeney, Jackson's assistant and the mother of WNS.
• Kario Salem
  Kario Salem
  Kario Salem is an American television, film, and stage actor and screenwriter.-Career:In 1997, Salem earned an Emmy Award as a writer for the television special Don King: Only in America, which also earned him a PEN nomination. The film also won the Broadcast Film Critics Award and Peabody Award...
  
   as Harry, The eyes of WNS. He watches everyone and decides what is aired on the web and, when there's nothing else to put on, the TV.

Episodes

Episode #	Episode title	Original airdate
1-1	"The Price"	June 13, 2001
1-2	"The Damage Done"	June 20, 2001
1-3	"The Delivery"	June 27, 2001
1-4	"Travinia ... Gently Down the Stream"	July 11, 2001
1-5	"Travinia ... Life Is But a Dream"	July 18, 2001
1-6	"Functional Family"	July 25, 2001

External links

• Review of the series at usatoday.com
  USA Today
  USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...