After three extremely successful seasons NBC’s popular poker show Poker After Dark will begin its fourth run from July 14.

This means that show will cash on the WSOP euphoria without clashing with it.

The first three seasons featured a revolving mix of poker celebrities in six-handed freeze outs with the winner taking the prize of $120,000. Season IV will break with this format.

The first week of Season IV will feature high-stakes cash games between six well-known poker celebrities. They are online-turned-live-play phenomenon Tom “durrrr” Dwan; 11 WSOP bracelets winner Phil Hellmuth; high-stakes player Mike Baxter; 5 WSOP bracelets winner Allen Cunningham; Cirque de Soleil CEO Guy Laliberte; and cash game veteran David “Viffer” Peat. Of the six contestants, Dwan and Hellmuth put in a brief appearance on televised poker. They faced each other in the first round of the 2008 National Heads-Up Poker Championship, where because of a bad beat, Dwan defeated Hellmuth in just three hands.

The other four players will be making their television debut with this show. The players will start with blinds of $200/400, the minimum buy-in is $100,000, the maximum buy in is $250,000, and the minimum for rebuys is $50,000. A second week of cash games is scheduled to start on October 13. That will feature Patrik Antonius, Dee Tiller, Howard Lederer, Doyle Brunson, Gabe Kaplan, and Eli Elezra. So there is plenty of action in store in Poker After Dark.

The format is not the only thing that is new on Poker After Dark Season IV. The show has a new host in the stunning Leeann Tweeden. Leeann replaces Season III host Marianela Pereyra. Marianela had been inducted for Season III after the regular host Shana Hiatt could not continue as she was expecting. Leeann is neither new to television nor to poker. She made her television debut for the Venus Model Search fitness trainer.

Leeann has also done several sports based programs such as Fox Sport Network’s Fitness Beach and The Best Damn Sports Show Period. She has two poker shows to her credit. The first one was the Mansion PokerDome Challenge way back in 2006, where she interviewed players exiting from the program. Then earlier this year she was the sideline reporter in another NBC program, National Heads-Up Poker Championship.

Leeann graduated from The Osbourn Park Senior High and right away entered the world of modeling. She got a big break in 1992 when she won the Venus International Model Search contest. Her first magazine cover was the Swimwear USA Magazine. In 1994 she made her Playboy debut as cover girl and since then has done several assignments for the magazine.

Therefore viewers have a lot to look forward to when they sit down to watch Season IV of Poker After Dark. The first episode will go on air late night Monday Eastern Time on July 14. There will be five episodes on consecutive nights at the same time from Monday to Friday. Following the earlier trend there will be a special “Director's Cut” episode on late Saturday night. The episodes can be viewed on the same day through the NBC web site nbcsports.com/poker