A year ago, I wrote abou lost TV series that were ordered and shot but never aired. Variety reports that the new CBS series WATERFRONT is destined to be another show that will only be broadcast in oblivion.
Over at the Eye, "Waterfront" was originally slated for midseason.
But with few holes to fill on its sked, CBS execs decided to pull the
plug on the drama from Warner Bros. TV.Jack Orman created the
skein, which starred Joe Pantoliano as the mayor of Providence, R.I.
William Baldwin, Mary Stuart Masterson and Larenz Tate also starred.Four
episodes, plus the pilot, of "Waterfront" had already been shot.
Insiders said net execs weren’t completely pleased with the show’s
direction; without a pressing need to schedule it, the net decided to
pass.
Each episode of the show probably cost at least $2 million to produce. Plus it’s likely that the producers and cast have pay-or-play deals, meaning they will have to be paid for 13 episodes whether they are shot or not. So this decision essentially means that CBS will be flushing over $10 million down the toilet.
What do they do with such unaired shows? Do they at least bring them out on DVD? Or do they just get shelved and forgotten? Or even deleted? It seems like an awful waste of talent, time and money.
kete
By “broadcast in oblivion”, do you mean YouTube or BitTorrent?
Mark
That’s too bad. I always liked Joe Pantoliano since seeing him (ok, don’t laugh) Eddie and The Cruisers. It would have been cool to have an entire series built around him.
I like Joe Pantoliano but he’s had a few dogs .. I never liked The Handler either. I actually saw part of the pilot for Waterfront today and if we’re speaking frankly, no big loss (except monetarily to CBS).
Hey why not? I’m sure you and Bill would love to make tons of money without having to put up with the weekly grind.