Marisa Tomei is set to star in a comedy pilot for CBS titled The Rich Inner Life of Penelope Cloud. Tomei will play a writer who's struggling to write a second novel after her first novel is met with great acclaim. Like all the other pilot announcements, this one doesn't offer many details, except that Tomei's character learns to recapture the optimism of her youth.

I have to say, I've never understood anyone who feels that children are automatically optimistic. As far as I can remember, I was never all that optimistic as a kid. If anything, I was morbidly realistic: while my friends would laugh at Tom and Jerry cartoons I would see Tom's continuous battering as a symbol of the futility of existence and the inevitability of death. I wonder if CBS has any interest in a pilot about a kid who watches cartoons and then crawls under his bed and cries for six hours? I should give them a call.