Although TheNewBTV’s first big-name star may not be real famous, he certainly meets the definition Binghamton famous.

Ryan Vaughan, the popular English professor, is hosting a new talk show on the student-run television channel that will feature guests, monologues, sketches and a pizza theme.

“You’ll be able to tell how interesting the guest is by how much pizza I eat,” he insisted.

He hopes to make his show stand out from others by inviting guests that may not come directly to mind, giving preference to students rather than administrators.

“I would love to interview some engineering student on something crazy,” Vaughan said. “There are so many people here in the sciences doing insane dissertations. I would love to talk to them, mostly to highlight how primitive and stupid I am.”

Michael Zagreda, a producer for the show, hopes to structure it similarly to other popular talk shows.

“We want it to have that almost late night talk show feel,” said Zagreda, a junior majoring in computer science. “He has not really decided what the monologue’s going to be. It might be about current events.”

Vaughan, who has a near-perfect score on ratemyprofessor.com, is among the most popular professors at BU. Simply registering for his classes can be difficult because they fill up so quickly.

“For people who can’t take his class, this is another way for him to give a lecture,” Zagreda said.

In an effort to get TheNewBTV more involved with campus, students will be able to independently film their own sketches and shorts and send them in to have them aired on the program.

While the show is still in its embryonic stage, Vaughan hopes that the pilot will be shot within the next week.

The opening of his show was taped last week, and more than 300 students participated in its filming. In it, Vaughan is teaching a large class but abruptly leaves when a pizza deliveryman comes with his order; the entire class follows him out.

“It is pretty symbolic of how his students follow him in real life,” said Scott Sommer, BTV’s production manager, who came up with the idea for the show.

Sommer, a senior majoring in cinema, said that Vaughan’s creative personality will carry the show.

“He is the driving force behind [the show] and has complete creative control over it,” he said. “Everything is coming more or less straight from him.”

One of Vaughan’s main objectives for the show is to help bring esteem back to BTV.

“The administration has put a lot of money into the station and they got a lot of equipment, but some people just don’t know or care about it,” Vaughan said.

However, according to Alex Kleiner, president of TheNewBTV and a senior double-majoring in computer science and cinema, money is still tight.

Aaron Feineberg, an undeclared freshman, said he only sees TheNewBTV when he is flipping through channels.

“It seems like whenever I’m on channel 6 there isn’t anything playing,” Feinberg said.

Poor scheduling and lack of structure is one of TheNewBTV’s problems that Vaughan would like to see fixed; he said that his show will tape and air consistently on channel 6.

“It will be funny and it will be on,” he said.

Sommer agreed that scheduling has been an issue in the past.

“The scheduling for last semester has been a little iffy,” he said. “Now that we have tightened up our schedule we will have set times for our weekly shows like Vaughan’s talk show, ‘The Bro Code’ and our news show.”

Alex Kleiner said that this semester has been a big improvement for TheNewBTV.

“Both our membership and our viewership have been consistently growing, and we are producing more shows each week,” Kleiner said. “We also continue to strive towards increasing the quality of every broadcast that we host, with the aim of reaching industry-standard quality in the very near future.”

TheNewBTV has aired six new shows this semester: “Super Ian vs. the Nesh,” “Comics Anonymous,” “Gametime!,” “Cup of Joe,” “What 4,” and “Common Occurrences.” All are talk shows, with the exception of “Common Occurrences.”

Vaughan also wants to integrate TheNewBTV with his classes. He is thinking about teaching a television writing class in which four groups of five students would each write and produce a show for the station, creating four new shows in one semester.

“In a perfect world, you have a media studies department and there are instructors there so you can take these courses in tandem, so you are writing and then producing and getting credit for both,” Vaughan said. “But that’s a long way off.”

However, some at TheNewBTV are wary of integrating too much with academics.

“TheNewBTV must remain a creative and professional student-run outlet,” Kleiner said. “However, I believe that there can be major advantages to partnering with departments within the University in specific projects and as general advisers.”

TheNewBTV currently has interns from the computer science department developing software for them.

According to Scott Sommer, Vaughan’s talk show is getting more buzz than any other show at TheNewBTV.

Andrew Williamson, a senior majoring in computer science, took one of Vaughan’s classes and is excited to see how Vaughan’s in-class comedy translates into a talk show.

“Ryan Vaughan is the fucking man and the show is going to be really cool,” he said.