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It’s a brighter day for superstar chef Gordon Ramsay since his long, painful legal battle with his father-in-law was resolved.  In fact, he tells us, “I feel so much better now than I have in the last 10 years.  If anything, I feel more creative.  And I totally understand the business top to bottom.”

The chef and his wife’s father – his former business partner and close friend Chris Hutcheson, whose scandalous double life with a secret second family has provided years of fodder for the British tabloids — reached a settlement worth in excess of $3.24 million in February.  “I don’t sit and dwell and start crying over spilled milk.  Coming to terms with an awkward position, my father-in-law squandering money after working so hard.  If you can’t trust family, who can you trust?  But, we’re over that hurdle now.  I’m in complete control.  We’ve repositioned, restructured,” Ramsay says.  And he adds, “I’ll never put myself in the position again.”

The dashing, famously volcanic chef-restaurateur-entrepreneur-producer-TV star has his time booked two years into the future.  He is all over Fox’s schedule this summer, with three prime-time shows:  Premiering May 29 are new seasons of his popular “Hell’s Kitchen” and “MasterChef” shows, and, come June 4, his new “Hotel Hell.”  As for the inevitable questions about over-exposure, he notes, “I’ve had those questions for the last 10 years, to be honest.  No one ever gets tired of quality.”  The shows are diverse, he stresses.  “‘Hell’s Kitchen’ is a professional format, providing aspiring wannabe chefs with a unique opportunity for success.  This year’s prize is just out of this world.  ‘MasterChef’ is completely amateur — a domestic theme.  The format is something quite unique.  And ‘Hotel Hell’ is, in many ways, the next step on from ‘Kitchen Nightmares.’  I always, you know — before anything gets canceled I want to move it up a notch and take it forward.”

Christian Slater tells us he and the rest of the “Breaking In” team have all been “holding our breath” waiting to find out the fate of the Fox series — that was cancelled last May and then un-cancelled in August.  The comedy has been struggling, unable to hold onto the viewers of its lead-in, “New Girl.”  Having been around the cancellation block several times now, the star is bracing himself.

“It all comes down to ratings and people tuning in.  That’s what the networks care about.  It all comes down to America either saving it or killing it — and then having to deal with everybody saying, ‘Oh, I really loved that show.’  Definitely that’s what happens. I’ve done this three times now, and people say, ‘Oh, why’d they take it off?’” he imitates. Slater, of course, is referring to his 2008 series, “My Own Worst Enemy,” and 2009 drama show, “The Forgotten.”

You have to hand it to him.  Despite the frustrations, he’s certainly been doing his all to promote “Breaking In.”  He’s on Jimmy Fallon’s show tonight (3/23) and appeared on Ellen Degeneres’ show a few days ago, in addition to chatting with media.

“I enjoy it.  It’s a funny show, a funny premise,” he says of his comedy about a team of hackers and thieves that tests high-end security systems by breaking into them to find their flaws.  Asked if he hesitated to return when the show was “un-cancelled,” he says, “Only because I had just relocated to Miami, I was really kind of unsure of whether I wanted to come back to L.A..  That was really it.  There wasn’t any anger or sadness regarding the show in any way.  I basically had just moved.  That was the only issue for me.  I enjoyed doing it, and as long as I had the opportunity to do more work with those guys I was happy,” he says of creators Adam Goldberg and Seth Gordon.

As far as the revamp of the show, with Megan Mullally coming in to play the team’s unwanted new corporate boss, Slater says, “Certainly when they told me that’s who they were going after — and then when they got her — it was very exciting.  She’s great.  I’m a huge fan of her work on ‘Will & Grace.’  She is definitely a very funny woman, and she’s brought so much joy and really works very hard, very diligently to get all the material as good as it can possibly be.”

Ahead on the show are love triangle elements that have to be dealt with, Slater says, “And there’s a lot of sendups to movies from the past – ‘Indiana Jones,’ ‘Back to the Future.’”  The episode that just aired borrowed from the cult hit feature that started it all for Slater, “Heathers.”  Unfortunately, the show again sustained a post-“New Girl” viewer drop-off.  By the time you read this, Slater may well know whether or not he’ll be heading back to L.A. for more shooting – or not – as it’s decided whether this will be a 10 or 13 episode season.

Either way, he’s looking forward to settling in as a Miami resident, getting some sun, and going fishing.

Why the move?  Why Miami?  “I thought I’d like to have a little distance between myself and Los Angeles.  I started coming out here last year and was going down to the Florida Keys, which I really enjoyed, then I started migrating up north to Miami.  I just liked the size of it,” says Slater.  “It’s not all inundated with show business.  It’s just nice to have a little bit of normalcy.”

Kiefer Sutherland Fox photo

Kiefer Sutherland smiles when he talks about anticipating the late  April-early May start of production on the big-screen “24″ movie.  “That’s like going home,” he says of getting back into Jack Bauer’s skin.

 It’s been more than five years since the “24” team first set its sites on making a feature.  Sutherland acknowledges, “That process has taken us so long; it’s such a complicated script to write.  Normally, we have 24 hours to tell a story.  Trying to condense it into two hours involves a lot of hard choices:  What kind of story do you want to tell?  How political do you want to make it?  How character-driven do you want to make it?”

Sutherland was in fine form at the Television Critics Association  Winter Press Tour this week, talking about his Jan. 25-debuting Fox “Touch”  series that has him as the father of a mute, possibly autistic boy who has an  astonishing understanding of numbers and their correlation to the universe.  The star was also was among the notables on hand at Fox’s party at Pasadena’s historic Castle Green Hotel, where he chatted away gamely and amiably even though a small group of reporters pretty much backed him into a little space behind a grand piano.  He elaborated on some of what he talked about at the earlier press conference — including the “24″ film.

As far as the answers to all those questions about how political and/or character-driven the big screen “24” will be, he laughed and said, “You’ll have to wait and see it.”  He said that several “great actors have expressed interest in [acting in] it, either as an ally or villain.” 

Sutherland also anticipates more big names to turn up on “Touch” — which already boasts Danny Glover as a researcher who has a handle on matters where quantum physics meet metaphysics.  “Because it’s a procedural drama as opposed to a serialized show, we could get someone in and out as quickly as an episode,” noted Sutherland, who is also a producer on the series.  “Or, if someone was interested in being involved in a longer arc, I’m sure we could accommodate them.” 

Sutherland definitely made the most of his two years away from the TV cameras.  Asked what the time meant to him, he said, “I got some rest.  I got to think about other things I wanted to do.  I got to do two films I was very excited about, with very different characters.”  Those are Mira Nair’s upcoming “The Reluctant Fundamentalist” with Liev Schreiber and Kate Hudson, and Lars von Trier’s “Melancholia” with Kirsten Dunst. 

“And doing  That Championship Season on Broadway.  I did those things and also had some time off, and got some rest — and realized that I missed working.”  

Lauren Alaina

 ”American Idol” sweetheart Lauren Alaina certainly won’t be on her own when she celebrates New Year’s Eve in Las Vegas as part of Fox’s “American Country New Year’s Eve Live.”  “I’m bringing quite a few people with me — my Mama and Daddy, my brother and his girlfriend, and my three best girlfriends from home,” the Rossville, Georgia native tells us.  Alaina, who turned 17 last month, adds, “I don’t really know what I can do in Vegas.  Maybe my parents can win some money.”

 Alaina has barely taken any time off since she first auditioned for “Idol’s” tenth season in 2010.  She wound up runner-up to fellow teenage country phenom Scotty McCreery in May — and won the hearts of music fans across the land.  Since then, she’s toured with the “Idol” finalists, performed on the Grand Ole Opry stage (her dream come true) and other big-time gigs, and released her first album, “Wildflower,” which debuted at No. 5 on the Billboard 200.  Come Jan. 20, she hits the road again, with Jason Aldean’s My Kind of Party tour.

 ”‘American Idol’ kind of prepared me to work really hard all the time, seven days a week,” she says.  “It was like boot camp for everything happening now.  I’m good at staying out on the road — and I wouldn’t want to take a break and miss an opportunity, if one of those once-in-a-lifetime deals came along.”

Outside of the Party tour, she’s not sure what’s ahead in 2012.  “I just want it to be as good a year as 2011 has been.  It’s been such an incredible year, so many doors have opened to me that I dreamed of opening.  Literally everything I’ve ever wanted to do, I’ve been able to do in the past year.”

So what’s next?  Has Hollywood come calling? 

“I have discussed that a little bit,” Alaina replies.  “Some day I’d love to do acting, but I feel I’m not really ready for it in my career.”

Right now, of course, she’s focused on “American Country New Year’s Eve Live.”   Comedian and actor Rodney Carrington hosts the show along with “Pawn Stars” personalities Rick Harrison and Austin “Chumlee” Russell.  Rodney Atkins, the Eli Young Band and Toby Keith are among the performers, along with Alaina.  “It’s such an honor to be part of it, I’m really excited.  I haven’t gone to that many concerts, but Rodney Atkins — he’s one of them I went to, out to the Riverbend Festival near my town.  So now, to get to perform at the same place he’s going to be at is really exciting.  And I’ll get to have my Daddy meet Rodney Carrington.  He’s a fan.”

Martha Plimpton Fox photo by Matthias Clamer

Martha Plimpton was part of one of viewers’ favorite bits at the recent Emmy Awards – when she and her fellow Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy nominees rushed to the stage as their names were called before Melissa McCarthy was crowned winner.  To hear the “Raising Hope” star tell it, the Awards marked one of very few nights she’s spent out on the L.A.scene.

“I’m so busy working, I don’t have much time for other things.  The days are long and they’re going to stay as they are,” she lets us know.  “But fortunately the vibe is good on the set.  I feel like we’ve become really good friends, we love working together and we really enjoy each other’s company.”  Also, she says, they’ve been having a lot of fun with the new season of their zany Fox show that’s centered on the trashy but loving Chance family — including baby Hope, and inept young baby daddy Jimmy (Lucas Neff).

Talking about what viewers can expect as the new season continues to unfold she says, she says, “We have a family trip to Vegas coming up (Oct. 5).  Amy Sedaris is back for that episode.”   Sedaris plays her cousin — the cousin who dad the hots for her husband, Burt (Garrett Dillahunt).  “We’re going to meet Burt’s parents,” she notes, referring to guest stars Lee Majors (”The Six Million Dollar Man”) and Shirley Jones (”The Partridge Family”).  “You’re going to see a lot of us in our younger years. We’re going to do a lot of flashbacks.

“Originally, we had these two younger actors playing us.  We’re going to play ourselves younger more often, I think, this season.”   

When Plimpton does get a longer work break, she heads East.  “I still live inNew York.  When we shoot, I’m out here and I rent a furnished place.   New York is still my home.”

Nicole Scherzinger NBC photo

Pop siren Nicole Scherzinger is getting a special kick out of fashion mags and websites following her as a trendsetter these days.  “For a long time, people only saw me as a tacky Pussycat Doll who only wore leopard print,” she candidly points out.  “Once people have a certain view in their minds, it’s kind of hard to get past that.  Wearing ladylilke clothes I love and feel good in — to get positive response from that is really fun.  I have a great team of stylists.”

Her attention in the fashion world is just one indication that Scherzinger is at the top of the celebrity hot list right now.  There’s also her first solo album, “Killer Love” coming out this fall, generating heat — and her latest reality role as an “X Factor” judge alongside Simon Cowell, Paula Abdul and L.A. Reid.  The Fox show debuts Sept. 21, but she’s already judged competitors in six cities and gone through a grueling “boot camp” experience.  Contestants faced a series of tough challenges — and more than 125 were eliminated in just five days.

“That was the hardest part — letting people go,” says Nicole.   

She had her “X Factor” baptism as a guest judge on the U.K. version of the show.  “I wasn’t able to say ‘No.’  I’d say, ‘It’s not a ‘No,’ it’s just a ‘not now.’  I empathized with all the peformers,” she recalls.  She’s saying “No” now, though Nicole says she still feels empathetic. 

“For me, what has probably been the biggest surprise is that I’ve become more outspoken, that I speak my mind, that I’ve come out of my shell in that way.  I don’t know if it’s Simon’s dark side rubbing off on me or what,” she says with a laugh, “but it’s there.  There’s no acting,, none of that.  There’s no, ‘So-and-so has this role.’  It’s real people, real emotions — that energy.  Simon is very good about that.”

The influence might have been a two-way street.  A few weeks ago, Paula Abdul made the remark that notoriously caustic Simon was “turning into me,” which people found a tad confusing.  Nicole elaborates that “We felt that we were rubbing off on him, that he was coming more from his heart.”   

She also notes, “The thing about Simon, working with him — in the beginning, they don’t tell you anything.  They just throw you in the deep and it’s sink or swim.  The one thing he does say is, ‘Just be yourself.  Don’t hold back.’ You are then inspired to sort of match his level.”

Scherzinger has come a long way.  She gets kudos for hard work, with a past that includes winning a season of “Dancing With the Stars,” serving as a judge on “The Sing-Off” and doing an early career stint with the girl group Eden’s Crush.  “This is an awesome new chapter of my life,” she tells us. “It feels like the stars are lining up.”

Jane Lynch and her minions Fox photo

Soon-to-be Emmy host Jane Lynch didn’t hesitate a moment this week when asked by a member of the press whether she felt any responsibility to make sure there were gay-centric elements to this year’s show.

“No,” she replied.  And, when pressed further on the matter — did she think there  should be gay moments, gay humor on the Emmys? — she made her feelings even more clear:  “I’m a person, not just a gay person, so I don’t focus on things like that.  I just focus on good shows and being funny.”

The hugely-funny lady, who won Emmy honors for her unforgettable work as Coach Sue Sylvester on “Glee” last year, was fielding questions about the Sept. 18 Emmys.  She’s already a couple of weeks into show prep.  And by the way, yes, she’ll be changing costumes at each break.

It’s been a decade since the first Emmy hosting by an openly gay person — Ellen DeGeneres, who received standing ovations several times at the event, which was delayed twice due to the Sept. 11 terror attacks and their aftermath.  At that time, openly gay characters were still a novelty on TV.  Now, going into the 2011-2012 season, the TV landscape has never been more highly populated by gay, lesbian, and bisexual characters — plus transgendered Chaz Bono and gay Carson Kressley competing on the forthcoming season of “Dancing With the Stars.”  Gay couples are featured on shows from “Modern Family” to the upcoming animated “Allen Gregory,” gay comics inhabit late night (e.g. Fortune Feimster on “Chelsea Lately”) and gay characters and storylines are featured on “Gossip Girl,” “90210,” “Glee,” “Secret Life of the American Teenager” and on and on.

All of which just might make it easier for Lynch to focus on the funny stuff she does so well, rather than being weighted down by a burden of cultural responsibility.

Martha Plimpton Fox photo by Mathias Clamer

Emmy nominee Martha Plimpton lets us know that she and her “Raising Hope” cast mates are bracing themselves for season two of the popular Fox show. The title character on the comedy that focuses on a good-hearted yet very, very seedy family, is no longer an infant.

“She’s growing up in real time,” the actress reports. “We’re not freeze-drying
her. She’s allowed to keep aging naturally. I imagine it’s going to affect
things profoundly. She’ll be running around, talking. There’ll be a lot of
things she won’t be willing to do — you know what I mean? Babies are a lot
easier. Toddlers are a whole other thing.”

As for her own character, Virginia, Plimpton says, “I guess one of the bigger
surprises is that she’s really convinced we’re going to see the end of the world
in 2012. I mean, she’s really committed to that.”

Shooting is just now getting underway for the new season, and Plimpton tells us she feels ready to face those 16-hour days that are a regular part of “Raising
Hope.” Over hiatus, the three-time Tony nominee performed in “Company” with the New York Philharmonic – a performance that was shown in movie theaters across the country.

“It was amazing,” Plimpton says. “It will be on DVD too, which is also really
great.”

Additionally, she guested on an upcoming episode of “The Good Wife.” And then, “I took a break. I took a vacation. I rented a little house on the East Coast
and just relaxed,” she says.

She has yet to figure out what she’ll wear to the Emmy Awards on Sept. 18: “I
don’t have anything like that ready. We’ll have someone help figure that out.”

After all her trips to the Tonys as a nominee, how do the Emmys feel this year?
“I don’t know yet,” she says, smiling. “We’ll have to wait and see what happens
when we get there. I do know I am completely and totally thrilled to be in the
company I’m in.” She’s talking about her fellow nominees for Outstanding Lead
Actress in a Comedy Series: Tina Fey, Melissa McCarthy, Laura Linney, Edie Falco and Amy Poehler.

Simon Cowell

Fox President Kevin Reilly pretty much spelled out the importance of Simon Cowell’s “X Factor” to the network, saying the network had built its fall schedule around the competition that will take up two and a half hours of weekly prime time real estate on the schedule. 

The “X Factor” TCA panel certainly attested to interest in the new show, with a packed Beverly Hilton ballroom that even included Chef Gordon Ramsay.  The main course at an earlier session. the chef stuck around to watch Paula Abdul, Nicole Scherzinger and the rest of the live ”X Factor” panel – and Cowell, who was present via live video hookup.  We happened to be next to the Chef as he responded with a laugh here, a comment under his breath there, clearly into the whole “X Factor”-Cowell oeuvre.  Reilly  referred to Cowell as having a “dark charm” that’s irresistible.  That could describe the chef as well.            

 The panel gave a taste of the all-too-familiar Abdul on the highwire feeling, as her statements meandered.  Would she make sense?  Or fall?  Abdul told the assembled writers that “Simon is turning into me,” for example.  Say what?  She meant he’s a “pussycat” on the new show.  Time will tell.

ALSO:  Another Fox gamble is the modern family-in-prehistoric-times “Terra Nova,” with a producing team that includes “24’s” Brannon Braga — and has Steven Spielberg’s imprimatur.  Many questions had to do with the special effects dinosaurs that inhabit this hostile environment, and whether the “Terra Nova” team could get the episodes finished in time.  Producers were quick to insist they’re going to make it – even though they allowed that there was a “learning curve” for the innovative motion capture photography and CGI techniques being used on the show.  However,  the family at the center of the series has to be relatable, stressed  Executive Producer Jose Molina.  “If the audience doesn’t care about them, it doesn’t matter how great the dinosaurs look.”