NEW YORK, May 17 (UPI) -- CBS is looking to maintain its primetime dominance next season with seven new dramas featuring some of Hollywood's top stars.
Emmy Award winner James Woods plays a celebrity defense lawyer in "Shark," Ray Liotta, Virginia Madsen and Australia's Simon Baker star in the criminal drama "Smith," Skeet Ulrich leads the cast in the thriller "Jericho" and Stanley Tucci will star in "3Lbs," a mid-season replacement drama about a brain surgeon with a deteriorating mind, TVWeek.com reported.
Joe Pantoliano and Mary Stuart Masterson are the stars of "Waterfront," the Eye Network's fifth new drama, also scheduled to bow mid-season.
Only two new comedies are on tap for the 2006-2007 CBS season -- "The Class" from "Friends" creator David Crane and the mid-season offering from Adam Sandler's production company, "Rules of Engagement" starring Patrick Warburton, best known as Puddy on "Seinfeld."
The network's long-running "Sunday Night Movie" franchise will be replaced by popular returnees "The Amazing Race," "Cold Case" and "Without A Trace," CBS President and CEO Leslie Moonves told reporters Wednesday at the network's New York headquarters.
Several freshman series will be back on the 2006-2007 schedule including "How I Met Your Mother," "Criminal Minds," "The Unit," "Ghost Whisperer," "The New Adventures of Old Christine" and "Close to Home."
