NBC revamps a bit

NBC has lost its "Friends," but it hasn't lost any of its bluster and bravado — NBC Universal Television Group president Jeff Zucker announced the Peacock's fall schedule with the same overabundance of confidence as always.

Part of that confidence rests on the back of one of the "Friends" — Matt LeBlanc spins off into the new sitcom Joey, which inherits the "Friends" time slot on Thursdays at 7 p.m. The title character moves to Hollywood, joining his sister, his rocket-scientist nephew and a new group of, well, friends.

NBC announced relatively little in the way of change for the fall season, which it's planning to premiere in late August, right after its coverage of the Summer Olympics. Only two sitcoms and three dramas will premiere, although, as part of its plans to program a 52-weeks-a-year schedule, NBC announced an unusually large number of midseason replacement series.

The second fall sitcom is Father of the Pride (Tuesdays, 8 p.m.), which sounded like a much better idea when it was announced almost two years ago — a CGI-animated comedy about the big cats who work in the now-defunct Las Vegas act of Siegfried & Roy. Voices for the characters are provided by John Goodman ("Roseanne"), Carl Reiner, Cheryl Hines and Orlando Jones.

NBC's new fall dramas are:

• LAX(Mondays, 9 p.m.) is described by the network as an "offbeat dramatic series centered in a world unto itself: a major international airport." Heather Locklear and Blair Underwood ("L.A. Law") star.

• Hawaii(Wednesdays, 7 p.m.) is a latter-day "Five-O" — an ensemble cop drama set in the 50th state. Michael Biehn ("Terminator"), Sharif Atkins ("ER"), Ivan Sergei ("Crossing Jordan") and Eric Balfour ("Six Feet Under") star.

• Medical Investigation (Fridays, 9 p.m.), which sounds suspiciously like one of CBS's "CSI" shows — an "elite unit" from the National Institute of Health races to life-or-death emergencies across the country.

The midseason slate includes three sitcoms-in-waiting: Crazy for You, about the "highly unusual courtship" of two young New Yorkers (Josh Cooke and Jennifer Finnigan); The Men's Room, about three men (Scott Cohen, John Cho and Eric Lively) at different stages of life; and The Office, the Americanization of the British hit. NBC is apparently undeterred by the huge failure of its Americanization of "Coupling" last season.