The misadventures of Jill Murray continue. The Norwood native, who had never written a TV sitcom before, says the WB has bought 12 episodes of her show, The Misadventures of Fiona Plum,for midseason.

        “It's very exciting. We start production in August,” says Ms. Murray, 28, a 1991 Purcell Marian High School graduate.

        Ms. Murray and her sitcom partner, Jonathan Prince (UPN's Grown Ups),got the call Thursday, one week after WB announced its fall schedule.

        Fiona Plum stars Kelly Brook from MTV Europe as a young witch working as a nanny for a Seattle couple. Omar Gooding (Cuba's younger brother) plays her warlock-in-training adviser. Michael York (Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me; Knots Landing)plays the husband, a marine biologist.

        The sitcom was inspired by Ms. Murray's work as a Beverly Hills nanny for Mr. Prince and his wife, actress Julie Warner (Danni Lipton on CBS' Family Law).

        WB, which will launch six new sitcoms this fall, will need midseason back-up series if shows bomb. It also has ordered A Young Person's Guide to Becoming a Rock Star from North College Hill comedian John Riggi (The Larry Sanders Show). Rock Star,based on a British series, will star John Lydon, best known as Johnny Rotten from the Sex Pistols.

        Fiona Plum could be a companion show for Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, which leads off WB's 8-10 p.m. Friday comedy block this fall.

        Following Sabrina will be Maybe I'm Adopted with Reagan Dale Neis, Julia Sweeney (Saturday Night Live) and Fred Willard;country singer Reba McEntire as a divorced mother in Deep in the Heart; and Bob Saget as a single father in Raising Dad.

        “They could put us on between November and April, when anything fails,” she says. “Someone said it could be on in November.”

        WB's other midseason series are Glory Days,a new drama by Kevin Williamson (Dawson's Creek, Wasteland); a reality series called No Boundaries; and For Your Love.

        Survivor note: CBS President Les Moonves told TV critics last week he may slightly change the format for Survivor 3 to be shot in Africa this summer.

        CBS may do one less episode, so that four finalists (not three) go into the two-hour finale, he says.

        The network plans two Survivor series next season, one in the fall and another in March, after NBC's Winter Olympics telecasts during February sweeps.

        Warner time: It's been more than a month since WB lost Buffy the Vampire Slayer to UPN, a channel not carried by Time Warner — and Time Warner operators still don't have the story straight.

        Enquirer reader Patricia Rayl says she called Time Warner May 17 and asked why the system doesn't offer UPN affiliate WBQC-TV (Channel 25) and was told it was because Channel 25 “was asking for too much money to be on their service.”

        That's not true. It's the other way around: Time Warner is asking for too much money from low-power WBQC-TV to be added to the cable lineup.

        Elliott Block, Channel 25 general manager, says Time Warner wants him to pay infomercial rates — more than $1.3-million a year — to lease a channel. He has offered his channel free to Time Warner, if added to basic cable.

        Virgil Reed, Cincinnati Time Warner president and general manager, says he doesn't have space on basic cable. He also only wants the UPN shows, not Channel 25's syndicated programming. (The federal government does not require cable systems to carry low-power stations.)

        Here's a suggestion: Why not put Channel 25 on the growing digital lineup, as Time Warner did for the Odyssesy channel?

        Buffy, Star Trek and WWF fans would be happy; Channel 25 would be happy; and Time Warner would be happy to have more customers upgrade to digital service. It's a win-win for everyone.

        Buffy update: WB won't pull Buffy from the summer lineup after all. WB will move Buffy reruns from Tuesday to 9 p.m. Wednesday starting June 6.

        By the way, Buffy fans should not be alarmed by her death in the season finale, which the weasels at WB promoted as the “series finale.” Star Sarah Michelle Gellar and creator Joss Whedon have a two-year contract with UPN.

        Mr. Whedon told USA Today that Buffy will return this fall, despite being dead and buried.

        “We're going to pull her back,” he says. “But it's going to be strange.”

        Next Doerr: Stephen Doerr, a Cincinnati native and former Channel 12 news producer, has been named NBC senior vice president for news, programming and creative development for the company's owned-and-operated stations. He will move to New York from Dallas, where he has been president and general manager of NBC's KXAS-TV.

        E-mail jkiesewetter@enquirer.com. Past columns at Enquirer.com/columns/kiese

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