"America: A Tribute to Heroes" was a two-hour primetime television special that aired on Sept. 21, 2001 -- 10 days after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and one week after the idea was first broached to producer Joel Gallen.

The special, which aired simultaneously on the four major broadcast networks and on scores of other cable and international networks, featured performances by Bruce Springsteen, Stevie Wonder, U2, Paul Simon and 17 others, and short speeches by another two dozen celebrities, including Tom Hanks, George Clooney, Will Smith and Muhammad Ali. It raised an estimated $150 million in two hours for the United Way's Sept. 11 fund.

A 2002 Emmy winner...

Before "Rescue Me" closed out its seven-season run Wednesday, it creators revealed two endings they seriously considered for the firefighter drama -- before opting for the one that made the cut.

Also read: 'Rescue Me': a Crass, Brutal and Accurate Record of 9/11

Peter Tolan and Denis Leary discussed the rejected final scenes during a panel at the Television Critics Association summer press tour. They were joined by several in the cast, including Stephen Pasquale, who played firefighter Sean Garrity, and Callie Thorne, who played Tommy's mistress, Sheila Keefe.

...

In the days after Sept. 11, 2001, as we watched the footage of the planes flying into the World Trade Center over and over again, many noted how much the whole spectacle looked like a movie. It was the dastardly plot of a James Bond villain who wasn’t stopped by 007. It resembled something from the Michael Bay/Jerry Bruckheimer playbook.

There were immediate predictions, of course, that old-school action movies with elaborate explosions would somehow have no place in a post-9/11 world, but that’s what they said about irony and celebrity gossip, too. Like every other facet of American society, the movie business was shaken, but it went on.

Nonetheless, in a number of ways, the repercussions of 9/11 itself continue to reverberate through the movies. And while the horrific events of that day don’t often take center stage on the big screen -- with a...

Since the Emmy Awards came into existence in 1949, they had never been postponed or canceled until 2001. In that year it happened twice.

I was elected chairman/CEO of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences in August 2001, almost a month to the day before 9/11. The Emmy broadcast was scheduled for Sept. 16 of that year.

This meant that the first big decision on my watch was whether it was possible -- five days after the worst act of terrorism in history -- to imagine a walk down the red carpet with Hollywood celebs.

Clearly, it wasn't.

When my running partner and I saw my wife, Jackie...