'Medium' folks have large chip on their shoulders

PASADENA, CALIF. — The folks at "Medium" aren't bitter about their experience at NBC.

Yeah, not much.

"I just wanted to take a moment and sort of note the obvious, which is that we're here at CBS now, and we're thrilled to be here," said creator/executive producer Glenn Gordon Caron. "And it's been a while coming."

After five seasons of feeling neglected — even abused — by NBC, the show has moved to a network that has a reason to care about the show. "Medium" is a product of CBS Productions (as it always has been).

According to Caron, five years ago when the pilot had been produced at CBS Productions for NBC, various CBS network executives expressed the thought that "Medium" would fit well on their network. "We've had this sort of casual conversation for years about — wouldn't it be wonderful to be at CBS? When the negotiations with NBC for renewal went south, CBS stepped into the breach. But it's a possibility that's always been out there."

Not that it was quite that easy. NBC executives dithered for months, neither dropping "Medium" nor picking it up. And CBS sort of hovered in the background doing the same.

"I'd been told unofficially we were getting picked up (by NBC)," said Patricia Arquette, who stars as Allison, the medium who receives visions from the dead. "I was about to buy a house. Then I got told we got dropped, I was unemployed. And then I got a job. It was like, 'You're hired, you're fired, you're hired.' "

"One of my friends ... sent me an e-mail saying, 'The pickup of "Medium" is one of my favorite soap operas on television right now,' " said Jake Weber, who plays Allison's husband, Joe.

Caron did his best to sound grateful to NBC. "Well, truthfully, we occupy a really, really, really small part of the agenda that is NBC and all of the network and the cable companies and all of the other things. ... I mean, again, we had five good years with NBC. Had we not, we wouldn't be here today.

But it obviously wasn't easy. Even when Caron was expressing gratitude that "Medium" will air on Fridays at 8 p.m. — after "Ghost Whisperer" — this fall, he took a shot at NBC.

"I think 'Ghost Whisperer' is clearly a show that people really like. And frankly, given our history, it's nice to follow a show that people really like," he said.

Caron kept saying he had no hard feelings toward NBC, but he missed no opportunity to deliver digs against that network: