Quick Takes - June 17, 2011

‘Wanted’s’ run ending

This week marks the final weekly airing of “America’s Most Wanted” on the Fox network after 23 years and 1,153 fugitives nabbed.

“I don’t think it’s hit me yet,” John Walsh, the host and driving force of what he turned into a nationwide crime watch, said Thursday. “Saturday when I see the last show — that’s gonna be painful.”

But that broadcast, which airs at 9 p.m., is billed as the season finale — not the series conclusion — on the “AMW” website.

“I’m fighting hard to keep this franchise going,” Walsh explained. “It’s a television show that gets ratings and saves lives, and we’ll find somewhere to keep going. We’re not done.”

—Associated Press

Nic Harcourt going to MTV

After more than a decade at KCRW-FM (89.9), Nic Harcourt is leaving the Santa Monica-based radio station to focus on a gig at MTV.

Harcourt, who hosted the public radio station’s nationally recognized alternative-music program “Morning Becomes Eclectic” from 1998 to 2008, will be a music supervisor in residence at the cable channel, where he will help choose tunes for shows.

Harcourt was the third host of “Morning Becomes Eclectic,” after Tom Schnabel and Chris Douridas. The program is now hosted by Jason Bentley. More recently, Harcourt hosted a weekend music program on KCRW; that show’s last airing was Sunday night. He also previously served as music director at KCRW and was considered influential in the rise of numerous artists, including Coldplay and Norah Jones.

—Scott Collins

Hefty print run for ‘Wimpy Kid’

The “Wimpy Kid” will be back this fall, with a most un-wimpy first printing.

“Cabin Fever,” the sixth book of Jeff Kinney’s mega-selling “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” series, is coming out Nov. 15. Amulet Books, an imprint of Abrams, announced Thursday a first printing of 6 million copies, among the biggest for any book in recent memory. Over 40 million “Wimpy Kid” books have sold worldwide.

One reason the print run is so high: No e-books. Abrams President Michael Jacobs said he and Kinney agreed that the technology was not yet adequate for the heavily illustrated works and that it was good to have kids read on paper.

—Associated Press

Library acquires Leary papers

The New York Public Library announced Thursday that it has acquired the papers of LSD guru Timothy Leary, who coined the phrase “turn on, tune in, drop out.”

The 335 boxes of papers, videotapes, photographs and other Leary artifacts will provide scholars with access to one of the most influential figures of the 20th century, library officials said.

“Leary’s papers are an unparalleled resource for researchers studying the emergence and development of the American counterculture,” manuscript curator William Stingone said.

Leary was a Harvard psychology lecturer who became notorious for advocating the therapeutic use of psychedelic drugs including LSD and psilocybin mushrooms. President Richard M. Nixon called Leary “the most dangerous man in America.” Leary spent several years in prison and in exile abroad in the 1970s. He died in 1996.

—Associated Press

Huffington Post taps Rita Wilson

The Huffington Post is launching a new site aimed at the baby boomer generation, and Rita Wilson will

direct its vision and content.

AOL Huffington Post Media Group President and Editor-in-Chief Arianna Huffington said Thursday that the actress and producer will be editor-at-large of Huff/Post 40, which is set to launch in August.

Huffington said that the new site is designed to appeal to men and women over 40 and will be “both about news and about people sharing their own experiences about that stage in life.”

The 54-year-old Wilson, married to Tom Hanks, has acted in movies, on television and on Broadway. She has also written stories on style and health for O, the Oprah Magazine, and Harper’s Bazaar, where she has been a contributing editor since 2006.

—Associated Press

‘New’ Gershwin musical planned

In 1992, “Crazy for You” was billed as “The New Gershwin Musical Comedy.” Now a newer one is on the way, called “Nice Work If You Can Get It.”

Matthew Broderick will return to Broadway to star in the show, which will be directed and choreographed by Kathleen Marshall, who won a Tony Award on Sunday for her work on the revival of “Anything Goes.” The book is by Joe DiPietro, who won Tonys last season for his book and score of “Memphis.”

The musical is described as a screwball romantic comedy set in the 1920s, with Broderick playing a rich playboy who gets mixed up with bootleggers.

—Sherry Stern