The Corus Entertainment specialty channel on Monday rolled out its summer schedule, anchored by an English language-heavy primetime schedule.

That includes weeknight airings of the George Lopez sitcom, Italian cookery shows David Rocco’s Dolce Vita, Lidia’s Italy and Lidia’s Italy in America and The Sopranos drama nightly at midnight.

TLN president Aldo Di Felice says that digital technology in recent years allowed the long-running specialty channel to spin-off Italian- and Spanish-language niche channels like Mediaset Italia, EuroWorld Sport and Sky TG24 Canada.

That diversification has allowed TLN, which currently reaches into six million Canadian homes, to in turn deliver more English-language, mainstream shows to a multi-generation audience that may not even speak Italian, Spanish or Portuguese.

“The (channel) capacity of the past was limited. Italian and Spanish programming had to wait to get on TV,” Felice recalled.

Now, with new and expanding digital channels, TLN can target a wider audience with English-language shows that reflect the specialty channel’s programming strategy of “living life with gusto,” according to De Felice.

Other summer highlights include a My Fair Wedding marathon on Saturday afternoons, an English language movie at 10 p.m. nightly, under the Mucho Movies banner, and weekend dates for the reality series Jerseylicious and Jersey Couture.

Of course, much of June for TLN will be given over to broadcasting all Italy, Spain and Portugal games at the UEFA Euro Cup 2012 tournament, in the Italian and Spanish languages.

From Playback Daily