Ten declined to officially confirm the news, but the newspaper [The Daily Telegraph] was told the decision was final and that production company Roving Enterprises would be advised.

The network’s director of programming, David Mott, said they were extremely pleased with the present success of the show.

“I’m so proud of this show after we took a huge risk and everyone wrote it off at the beginning.

“But we tweaked it, gave it a more newsy edge and Charlie’s old look was a victim of that process. The old look wasn’t right and the new one is. We’re very, very happy at how Project is coming along,” he added.

Network insiders suggested that the team’s recent image and wardrobe overhauls have also contributed to the improvement. Presenters Carrie Bickmore, Dave Hughes and Charlie Pickering were all given ‘straight-overs’ so they represented newsreaders.

The Logie award winning, almost one year old show beat all competition in the 7pm timeslot last night in total viewers and all demographics. 1.11 million viewers watched nationally, the most viewers the show has received since its premiere week. Earlier this week it also pushed the million mark.

MasterChef following 7pm obviously helps but the show had already added at least 100,000 regular viewers before the MC juggernaut this year. Hopefully the trend continues, having watched every single episode of the show thanks to the magic of the IQ, I can say its been an uphill struggle but the show has turned itself around into a show you truly enjoy watching.

Her co-host Charlie Pickering’s other show, Talkin’ ‘Bout Your Generation, picked up two awards, including Most Popular Light Entertainment.

The awards go to stars yet to breakthrough in Hollywood. Chris Hemsworth and Ryan Kwanten will be among the recipients. AIF will also announce at the ceremony the 2010 winner of the Heath Ledger Scholarship.

The scholarship, judged by a panel of Ledger’s friends, will go to an Australian actor yet to break into Hollywood.

Source: ABC Online

Head of Programming and Production for Seven Network, Tim Worner had this to say about the announcement:

“We didn’t think it was going to be easy. We went into it knowing it was going to be a pretty difficult challenge, but we wanted to give it our best shot. We don’t think we’ve done that yet, the show’s still got legs, there’s no question.

“The ratings tell one story. But looking at the show, and from what people tell you about the show, there’s another story.”

Worner remains supportive of Helliar and envisages the show returning in its early evening timeslot.

“He’s put his heart and soul into that show. He’s bloody funny,” he said.

“It’s always been our ambition to come up with something that’s family friendly, as a point of difference. We want something that’s fun that everyone can watch. There are parts of that show that are incredibly good fun.”

In the meantime, Helliar is out promoting his film I Love You Too which hits cinemas May 6th.

RoveOnline has a great wrap up of media interviews while he is over there. Including this one from The Edge FM where the host apologises for a previous PR stuff-up with a literal hatchet burying.

Rove who has appeared three times on E!’s Chelsea Lately has reportedly had talks with host Chelsea Handler for a permanent hosting gig.

The Australian chatshow host, who married actress Walton in a private ceremony last June, bought the $1.2 million property just outside Los Angeles to help the couple build successful international careers.

Talking about the country retreat style setting of their new home, Walton told Woman’s Day magazine: “It’s important because the world is so frenetic. I love bushwalking, and Rove’s a twitcher, so I’ve started enjoying bird-spotting, too.”

She added: “More and more, the idea of having a child appeals. And it hasn’t always been that way.”

You can see photos and the full story at the Woman’s Day website.

The Herald Sun also gave it a review following its premiere:

PETER Helliar channeled his inner Rove McManus for the debut episode of Channel 7’s new footy show, The Bounce, tonight.

The structure of The Bounce was nearly a carbon copy of McManus’s Sunday night entertainment show Rove, which ended last year.

A clearly nervous Helliar stumbled early with a too-fast opening monologue that was straight out of Rove. Later gags felt as if they were lifted from Helliar’s Pete Space segment on Rove.

A challenge for Helliar on The Bounce was always going to be doing the meat-and-potatoes hosting duties as well as being funny. It’s a dual role that undid super-talented comedian Mick Molloy on The Nation.

Tonight it wasn’t quite there but it was the first show and it will definitely get better. Peter Helliar just needs to relax.

Hamish and Andy dig deep for Channel 31, kind of. Crikey’s story yesterday highlighting struggling Melbourne community TV station Channel 31’s desperate plight produced instant results, with Austereo comedy duo Hamish Blake and Andy Lee kicking in $1,000 for their alma mater shortly after our story went live. But that’s where it ended — sadly, no response has been received from C31’s other glittering graduates, including Rove McManus, Peter Helliar and Corinne Grant. McManus’ manager Kevin Whyte told Crikey that an email received yesterday morning was “the first we’d heard” of the subscriberthon and that he was happy to take out a basic subscription for himself, pending a response from Rove.

Channel 31 has been hit hard by the Federal Government’s mandated switch to digital television and the need to upgrade its studio facilities. Without an immediate cash injection the station could be forced to stick with its second-rate analogue signal, which is being switched off around Australia.

For years, Channel 31 has served as an incubator for talent that has then been poached by commercial networks keen to exploit the youth advertising market, with megastars Rove McManus, Corinne Grant and Peter Helliar all making the jump to the big league.

The question is should the past stars be expected to finanically help the station? Feel free to leave your comments below.

Also an interesting tid-bid from the Crikey story…

Speculation has been swirling for months that Rove will soon stitch up a lucrative Los Angeles-based chat show deal following high-profile appearances last year on the Jay Leno Show.