HBO is about to kick off a three-hour bloc of press tour panels, mostly for new shows like the Milch/Mann horseracing drama “Luck,” Julia Louis-Dreyfus in Armando Iannucci’s “Veep,” Lena Dunham’s “Girls” and Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant’s “Life’s Too Short.” And now we know the premiere dates for all of those shows, plus when “Game of Thrones” season 2 will begin.
In press releases given out to the media ahead of the panels, HBO announced that “Game of Thrones” season 2 (which will again be 10 episodes) would debut Sunday, April 1 at 9 p.m. “Girls,” a comedy about 20something women in Brooklyn which Dunham (“Tiny Furniture”) wrote, directed and starred in (and produced along with Judd Apatow), kicks off its 10-episode first season Sunday, April 15 at 10:30 p.m. “Veep,” in which Louis-Dreyfus plays the Vice-President of the United States, begins its eight-episode first season Sunday, April 22 at 10 p.m.
“Luck” had previously been announced as debuting on Sunday, January 29 at 9 p.m. for a nine-episode season(*), and “Life’s Too Short” will debut its seven-episode season on Sunday, February 19 at 10:30 p.m., following the third season premiere of “Eastbound & Down.”
(*) Yes, it seems HBO has a lot of irregular episode orders this year, but in some cases they’re working with foreign talent, and in others they may be dealing with either budget or scheduling issues. (Dustin Hoffman may not have had a bigger window for “Luck” season one, for instance.)
HBO also announced that “Game Change,” a TV-movie about the 2008 presidential election(**) starring Julianne Moore as Sarah Palin and Ed Harris as John McCain, will air Saturday, March 10 at 9 p.m.
(**) Reminder, as always, about the No Politics rule for this blog, which was created as a result of that 2008 election.