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Cutters’ Grant Gustafson has earned a special place in the pantheon editorial excellence by having editing two of the most popular Super Bowl commercials of the decade.

In the “Super Bowl’s Greatest Commercials” special that aired on CBS Feb. 4, the Friday before Super bowl XLV, viewers voted his Budweiser spots their first and second most favorite spots.

TEAMWORKS MEDIA produced three PSA campaigns for the Big Ten Conference that have started running on the Big Ten Network:: A second season for “Big Ten Fan Camp;” a revised “Faces of the Big Ten,” and making its debut, “Big Ten Impact the World.”

All three PSAs were produced and directed by TeamWorks’ Mike Sear and fall under the “Big Big Stage. Big Ten.” theme introduced in the fall of 2008. The theme speaks to the breadth, visibility and impact of the Big Ten across all aspects of life and sport.

Chicago is a city teeming with comedy talent (you have to have a sense of humor to live here) and no where is it more explicit in films than the Chicago Comedy Shorts Festival.

The 13th annual Comedy Shorts again combine with the Chicago Comedy TV Pilot competition for a night of hilarity July 22 at the Cultural Center theatre.

The Chicago area’s only dedicated comedy film night is presented by founder Marion Sours’ Wits End Productions, co-sponsored by the Chicago Film Office.

WOMEN IN FILM’S well-attended Executive Breakfast March 31 takes on a very broad subject — a panel discussion about “Bringing Production to Chicago.”

That provocative title could mean Hollywood features. Or it also could mean trying to stimulate commercial production, since Dan “Ziggy” Ziguluch, Draftfcb’s production head, is a panelist, along with the IFO’s Betsy Steinberg. Producer and former IFP president Sandy Gordon is the moderator. The Wit Hotel is the venue.

That overly long Hollywood dry spell will finally end in early March, with three TV pilots getting underway, a fourth being talked about for early spring, and a Vince Vaughn feature in May.

“Matadors,” from Sony TV and writer/executive producer Jack Orman, is in production offices at Chicago Studio City in preparation for shooting the first or second week in March.

VINCE VAUGHN will team up with director Ron Howard for the first time this spring on an untitled comedy about infidelity. Vaughn always can be counted on to boost Chicago as the location whenever he can.

The last and only time Howard shot in Chicago was “Backdraft,” in 1991. Overall his experience here was a good one, except for a location conflict that so incensed the director that he vowed never to shoot in Chicago again. Vaughn, who has had excellent experiences here, may have helped Howard change his mind.

Screenwriter Ken Rance, co-writer of the 2009 film “New in Town,” starring Renee Zellweger and Harry Connick, Jr., will be the celebrity judge who will pick the grand prize winner of the Wisconsin Screenwriters Forum script contest.

Rance will announce his choice from among three finalists, to be announced Jan. 4. The top script will receive $1,000 cash and other prizes.

Contest judges have whittled submissions from around the country to five semi-finalists. They are participating in mock industry meetings mirroring L.A.

All good things must come to an end and Oprah’s extraordinary 25 year TV run in Chicago will end on Sept. 9, 2011, according to ABC.

Oprah’s announcement on her Friday show put an end to weeks of speculation that she may leave daytime syndication and possibly move her show to OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network, Winfrey’s joint venture with Discovery Communications.

“We have the greatest respect for Oprah and wish her nothing but the best in her future endeavors,” the show’s distributor, CBS TV Distribution, said in a statement.

Over the 25 years Oprah has broadcast her daily talk show from Chicago, it was inevitable that one day she would move the show to Los Angeles.

Apparently that day will arrive in 2011 when her CBS syndication contract ends and she will transition to her own Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN) on cable in a joint venture with Discovery Communications.

The world will await the announcement of her future plans by the end of the year. In the past, Oprah either announced her retirement or a move to L.A. and she always cheerily and thankfully stayed right here.

The 100 people, mostly game developers, employed at the Midway Games studio in Logan Square are now employees of Warner Bros. Entertainment, Midway spokesman Geoffrey Mogilner said.

Midway closed Friday on the sale of the majority of its assets, including its Chicago and Seattle game development studios and an intellectual property portfolio that features juggernaut Mortal Kombat, to Warner Bros. Entertainment from $33 million.

“Rather than buying the company and taking on its liabilities, Warner Bros.

Chicago’s first, non-station produced celebrity late night talk show premiered July 3 on CBS Ch. 2, with the pilot episode of “The Good Night Chicago Show.”

Hosted and produced by Steven Saltz, the first half-hour episode of 13 weekly shows features veteran New York actor Frank Vincent, who has played mobsters in film and TV from “Goodfellas” to “The Sopranos.”

Vincent is the star of the $2 million independent mob drama “Chicago Overcoat” from local Beverly Ridge Pictures, slated to premiere this fall. Check it out at

DIRECTOR HAROLD RAMIS receives the “Just for Laughs” Lifetime Achievement Award at the red carpet screening of Columbia Pictures’ “Year One” at the Music Box, June 16.

The special screening is the kickoff for the TBS Presents A Very Funny Festival: Just for Laughs Chicago and is being showcased locally before its June 19 national release.

Thought Equity Motion’s recent NCAA March Madness video app for the iPhone is just another example of how the online stock footage company is using new technology to revive video archives.

TEM produced the highlights packages in partnership with the NCAA, and more than 10,000 users downloaded the app within the first week.

The app contains “Pop-up Video” style player profiles, the teams to watch in 2009, and highlights from classic games, including a celebration of the 30th anniversary of the iconic Bird-Johnson match-up in 1979.