BRIEFS

CABLEWORLD STAFF

The executive producer/show-runner of FX's The Shield has re-upped thanks to a new deal worth nearly $6 million over two years, or more than $200,000 per episode ? unprecedented sums for basic cable. FX owner News Corp. is sharing the cost of keeping Shawn Ryan on board with its Fox TV Studios and 20th Century Fox TV divisions. The Shield is losing Ryan's boss ? FX entertainment president Kevin Reilly ? this summer to NBC. Reilly has been hired to help Jeff Zucker position the network for a post-Friends existence, and potentially step up to the top programming spot if Zucker moves back to New York, as widely predicted.

At last week's Licensing Show in New York, Disney signed an exclusive deal with Wal-Mart for Disney Channel's Kim Possible franchise. Nickelodeon execs also shopped products based on the video game Tak and the Power of JuJu, which Nick hopes will become its next breakout character, while other Viacom execs talked up licensing possibilities for the planned rebranding of TNN to Spike TV on June 16 ? which may or may not happen, depending on the outcome of court proceedings between Spike Lee and Viacom.

Turner Classic Movies pays tribute to Gregory Peck with a daylong 11-film tribute that kicks off at 6 a.m. today with Man With a Million and wraps at 3:30 a.m. on June 17 with The Paradine Case. Among the highlights in TCM's tribute to Peck, who passed away last week at age 87, is The Yearling at 3:30 p.m., which brought him one of the four Oscar nominations he received before winning the award for 1962's To Kill a Mockingbird. While that classic is not included in this tribute, Peck fans can also watch A Conversation With Gregory Peck, a two-hour special filmed in 1999, at 8 p.m.

Sopranos executive producer David Chase is in talks with HBO for a sixth season, and James Gandolfini doled out $500,000 checks to his fellow actors on the series, sharing the wealth from his new contract, according to reports.

Joseph Cohen, the former president of the Madison Square Garden Network, last week bought the Hughes Television Network, a sports service which transmits away games to hometowns.