CABLE Sundance to air Franken's show

Air America's chairman said the change will increase the show's exposure.
NEW YORK (AP) -- Satirist-commentator Al Franken will return to his TV roots next month when his radio show begins appearing on cable's Sundance Channel.
Beginning Sept. 7, "The Al Franken Show," heard live each weekday from noon to 3 p.m. on Air America Radio, will go on display in a one-hour edition on Sundance each night at 11:30 p.m. and 2:30 a.m., executives at both networks told The Associated Press.
The "Franken" TV hour is scheduled through the November election, but all parties voiced hope the show would continue on Sundance indefinitely.
"It would be nice if it were a permanent home," Franken said.
Political humorist
A writer-performer who helped launch NBC's "Saturday Night Live" three decades ago, Franken in recent years has been more identified as a left-leaning political humorist whose best-selling books include "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right."
He became a talk-show host when Manhattan-based Air America signed on in March as a response to the mostly conservative world of talk radio.
At Air America, Franken joined a roster of other liberal personalities including actress-comedian Janeane Garofalo, radio veteran Randi Rhodes and Lizz Winstead, a co-creator of "The Daily Show."
The Air America network includes stations in 17 markets that include New York, Miami, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Anchorage, Alaska, and, starting next week, San Diego.
It is also heard on the XM and Sirius satellite radio networks, as well as through the Internet on streaming audio.
Distribution through Sundance will mean welcome added exposure for the show, and Air America overall, said Doug Kreeger, the network's chairman.
"It takes the network and lets people see how it works," he said. "It puts a face to our voice."
About the show
Each day, with co-host Katherine Lanpher, Franken offers irreverent commentary, interviews and comedy segments often with an anti-Bush Administration theme: "Anything I can do to get this guy out of office I'll do, and to get [John] Kerry in," he said.
Franken's unabashedly partisan slant was somewhat beside the point in bringing him to Sundance, said Larry Aidem, president of the network (a venture between Robert Redford, NBC Universal and Showtime Networks Inc.).
"In a digital television environment, it is important to be relevant and talked about," said Aidem, "but that's not to say we'll do anything to get on the radar screen."
More important, he said, was the effect the Franken show would have on broadening the scope of the network, whose primary focus is independent feature films and documentaries.