Actress Jennifer Love Hewitt attends the panel discussion for CBS' "Ghost Whisperer" at the Beverly Hilton.   Frederick M. Brown / Getty Images

Shortly after 4, Jennifer Love Hewitt said: "My character is one of my favorite people that I've been introduced to."

In "Ghost Whisperer," she plays a psychic who acts as a kind of therapist/social worker/confidante resolving issues between the dead and their living loved ones. Yeah, that old saw.

"It's a show about a lady who helps earthbound spirits," best-selling author and "Ghost Whisperer" co-executive producer James van Praagh said, demonstrating the reduce-it-to-one-sentence pithiness that no doubt helps in a pitch meeting.

Onstage, Van Praagh was sitting next to Love Hewitt. Both seemed to be alive, he in a blue blazer, she in a white boustier.

Mostly, the cast and producers fended off TV-critic skepticism about communicating with the dead and the fact that "Ghost Whisperer" seems like a rip-off of NBC's "Medium." The second is the more important matter. On "Medium," of course, Patricia Arquette uses her gift to fight crime. On "Ghost Whisperer," Love Hewitt doesn't. Fight crime, that is.