#1 New York Times Bestselling Author & TV Producer
The WB announced their schedule today. The highlights: Don Johnson returns to primetime as a lawyer in JUST LEGAL and director David Nutter continues his amazing winning streak — his pilot SUPERNATURAL made it on the sked. Out of 11 pilots he’s shot, 11 have sold. Midseason shows include BEDFORD DIARIES, a series about sex educators at a NY college, comes from HOMICIDE & ST. ELSEWHERE writer/producer Tom Fontana.
You can find the complete schedule, as reported by TVTracker, on the jump.
There have been a lot of final episodes this season — NYPD BLUE, JAG, ENTERPRISE and EVERYBODY LOVES RAYMOND — and they have all shared several things in common: they were boring, bland, and truly anti-climactic. It was as if the writers were making a conscious effort not to tie things up in a meaningful and emotionally-resonant way. Or simply didn’t want to make the effort. None of these finales came even close to matching the impact of the last episodes of shows like THE FUGITIVE, LARRY SANDERS, MARY TYLER MOORE, MASH, CHEERS, NEWHART, STAR TREK: TNG, ST. ELSEWHERE, THE FUGITIVE, DALLAS, WHO’S THE BOSS, THIRTYSOMETHING, BUFFY, HOMICIDE, THE ODD COUPLE, or even FRIENDS.
Granted, there have been stinker finales before (MIAMI VICE, HILL STREET BLUES, MacGYVER, DESIGNING WOMEN, HAWAII FIVE -O, COSBY, MAGNUM PI, SEX AND THE CITY, SEINFELD, QUANTUM LEAP, MURPHY BROWN, NORTHERN EXPOSURE, etc), but at least they made an effort at leaving viewers with something special.
If the writer/producers aren’t going to bother doing something really terrific with their final episodes, then how about this: Don’t do one.
Maybe we should go back to the way things used to be, when most shows didn’t do final episodes, even if they knew the ax was about to fall.
GUNSMOKE never had one. Neither did BONANZA, STAR TREK, MURDER SHE
WROTE, MARRIED WITH CHILDREN, LOST IN SPACE, THE ROCKFORD FILES,
MAVERICK, THE BRADY BUNCH, MANNIX, I LOVE LUCY, to name a few.
In a way, not doing a wrap-up episode makes sense. Most series are designed to be open-ended, to go on forever. Isn’t that how we really want to remember our TV characters, living on as we remember them best?
Do we really need, when the time comes, "Final Episodes" of LAW AND ORDER, ER, ACCORDING TO JIM, CSI, GROUNDED FOR LIFE, CROSSING JORDAN and TWO AND A HALF MEN?
TVTracker reports that ABC has announced their fall schedule. BLIND JUSTICE and EYES are among the notable, though not surprising, cancellations. Hitmaker JJ Abrams two pilots, THE CATCH and PROS AND CONS failed to make the sked, despite the success of LOST and ALIAS. But the influence of LOST is certainly reflected on the new schedule. Like NBC’s new roster, there’s quite a few new "speculative" fiction shows on tap, including a reimagining of THE NIGHT STALKER (from X FILE’s alum Frank Spotnitz) and INVASION, a Shaun Cassidy-produced series about aliens who secretly arrive in the Everglades in the midst of a terrible storm and a Park Ranger’s efforts to unlock the mystery. Other new series include COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF, about the first female President, from writer-director Rod Lurie.
In addition to the new fall series, Zap2it reports that ABC has picked up several series for midseason: Additional Series
Orders: CRUMBS, THE EVIDENCE, IN JUSTICE, LESS THAN PERFECT, THE MIRACLE
WORKERS, SONS & DAUGHTERS.
Both "The Evidence" and "In Justice" reflect ABC’s aspirations to land a
strictly procedural hit, the network’s equivalent of a "CSI" or "Law &
Order." In "The Evidence," an eclectic cast — featuring Orlando Jones, Martin
Landau and Nicky Katt — solves crimes by putting together an assortment of
evidence that the audience has already seen. "In Justice" follows a lawyer (Kyle
MacLachlan) and an investigator (Jason O’Mara) struggling to get innocent people
out of prison.On the comedy side, Fred Savage ("The Wonder Years") is back in "Crumbs,"
about two estranged brothers forced to reunite to take care of their deranged
mother and run the family business. Things remain in the family on "Sons &
Daughters," a semi-improvised look at grown-up siblings, executive produced by
Lorne Michaels ("Saturday Night Live").Following in the footsteps of this season’s alternative programming successes
like "Supernanny" and "Wife Swap" and the emergence of "Extreme Makeover: Home
Edition," ABC will also have "Miracle Workers," a reality show about doctors who
perform revolutionary procedures on regular people, ready for midseason.
The new schedule is on the jump.
TVTracker reports that FOX has picked up a series version of Kathy Reichs’ Temperance Brennan novels… in a way. The series is actually a blend of the books and the true story of Reichs herself who, like her heroine, as a forensic anthropologist. There have also been a few other creative tweaks made by writer/producer Hart Hanson. Here’s the logline from TVTracker:
Network: FOX
Genre: Drama
Title: BONES
Studio: 20th Century Fox
Television
Commitment: Series Pick Up (13 Episodes)
Auspices: Hart Hanson
(EP, W-Pilot), Barry Josephson (EP N/W), Kathy Reichs (EP N/W), Greg Yaitanes
(D-Pilot)
Cast: Jonathan Adams, David Boreanaz, Michaela Conlin, Emily
Deschanel, Eric Millegan, TJ Thyne
Logline: When law enforcement calls upon Dr. Temperance Brennan and her team of scientists to assist with murder investigations, she often finds herself teamed with Special Agent Seeley Booth, a former Army sniper whose mistrust of science and scientists leads them to clash both professionally and personally while solving the toughest cases in the
new one-hour drama BONES.
Here’s the new NBC schedule, as circulated by TVTracker. CROSSING JORDAN continues to hang-on, against all odds, but you’ll notice the schedule doesn’t include LAW AND ORDER: TRIAL BY JURY. Maybe three branded spin-offs is all viewers can handle. Other cancellations include MEDICAL INVESTIGATIONS (which started out hot but faded fast), LAX, THIRD WATCH, HAWAII and AMERICAN DREAMS. SCRUBS and FEAR FACTOR have been held back until midseason. For more details on the new shows, check out Zap2it.
UPDATE: Dick Wolf isn’t very happy about L&O:TBJ getting the ax. He tells Variety that he’s
"extremely upset and disappointed."
"I
find the decision inexplicable, and frankly, inconceivable," Wolf said
Friday, working on the assumption that the fourth flavor of his
"L&O" brand was dead.Peacock brass still weren’t saying anything about the show Sunday.
Wolf
said he was "enormously proud" of "TBJ," noting that the casting of
thesps such as Candice Bergen, Annabella Sciorra and Lorraine Bracco
made the skein "A-level television.""It was a good show. It was the exact formula that made the brand so valuable," he said.
While
there’s no doubt "TBJ" was far from an instant hit, it’s worth noting
that all of the "L&O"-branded skeins have been relatively slow
starters.
The schedule follows on the jump.
There are lots of ways that those of us who work in television find out that our shows have been cancelled. This is one of them.
Networks and studios always drool over big-name screenwriters and dangle pilot deals in front of them…then, inevitably, pair them with experienced showrunners if the pilot goes to series. Veteran showrunner, and now Oscar-nominee, Paul Haggis is finding the drool doesn’t go both ways. Movie studios don’t clamor for TV writers.
Take the case of "Million Dollar Baby" writer Paul Haggis and his new film "Crash," which debuted in U.S. theaters on Friday.
Haggis,
a veteran television writer, saw his screenplay for "Million Dollar
Baby" turned into Oscar’s best film of 2004 by Clint Eastwood. It
earned three other Oscars: best director for Eastwood, actress for
Hilary Swank and supporting actor for Morgan Freeman.But when it
came to "Crash" — a film he wrote and directed that looks at race and
class among Americans in Los Angeles — he said no major studio would
give him the money to shoot it because, among other things, Hollywood
saw him as a TV guy."The stigma is still there. No matter how
many times someone breaks through, they still think that is the one
exception," Haggis said, referring to studio executives.
I wonder why that is?
Randall Wallace went from moderate success in TV ("Sonny Spoon," "JJ Starbuck," etc.) to much bigger success in film ("Braveheart," "We Were Soldiers," "Pearl Harbor" etc.) And, of course, there are TV writers like Paddy Chayefsky, Reginald Rose, Rod Serling, Alvin Sargent and other folks from TV’s so-called "Golden Age" who went on to big careers in film. On the other hand, TV heavyweight David E. Kelley’s two forays into film have been big duds. And neither Steve Bochco nor Steve Cannell have been able to get a major studio film off the ground.
Can you think of anyone recently who has been a success in TV and who has earned equal success in film? Some guys, like Terry Winter (Sopranos) and Paul Bernbaum (A-Team) are poised for it with upcoming films…
The networks announce their fall schedules in a week or two and, usually, around this time tapes of the various pilots under consideration start floating around town. But this season, that has changed. Variety reports that studios are cracking down on the practice. The studios are getting so tight with tapes, even the producers of the pilots have a hard time getting screeners of their own shows.
"It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen," said one insider at a major
tenpercentery. "You hear rumors of execs telling assistants they could go to
jail if they leak something out."Another said he can’t even get his hands on his own network’s tapes, at least
prior to the pilot’s official screening. Studios and nets always make noises about not wanting tapes to be traded with
other studios or nets. So why are the rules actually being enforced this year?Some trace it back to a dictate from top brass at 20th Century Fox TV, who
laid down the law last month when early copies of a couple of the studio’s
pilots started floating around town — even before the networks where the shows
are set up had had a chance to formally screen them. Others speculate that Leslie Moonves’ control of Paramount Television has
further restricted the free flow of tapes. Moonves insists on a strict cone of
silence surrounding the development process at his units.As frustrating as the crackdown has been for some, one studio exec said it’s
necessary in a world where "there’s a tremendous incentive for agents to try to
create a bad buzz" about projects with which they’re not associated."When you have people who’ve seen tapes calling network execs and saying, ‘Do
you really like that?,’ it starts to have an impact on your project," the
exec said.One agent admitted he’s guilty of spreading bad buzz. "Everyone talks shit
about everyone’s pilot," he said.
I wonder if the crackdown will be as strongly enforced after the schedules are announced. Usually, tapes of busted pilots start floating around town during the summer and you get a chance to see what didn’t make the schedule and why.
Last season, I was eager to get my hands on the Lost in Space pilot directed by John Woo and had a hell of a time tracking down a tape through my usual sources (When you’ve written a book on unsold pilots, and filmed two TV specials about’em, you have lots of sources). But once I did get the tape and put it in the VCR I could see why WB wanted to bury it. It was horrendous, misguided, and stupid. (I’m still trying to get a copy of The Time Tunnel revival pilot).
Many years ago, I really wanted to see the Stephen J. Cannell-produced Hawaii Five-O pilot starring Gary Busey and Russell Wong. But it was done for CBS, and Moonves is notorious about keeping his busted pilot under lock-and-key. It took me a year or so, but I finally scored a tape from someone who made me promise not to tell anyone where I got it for fear that Moonves would crush him. It wasn’t so bad…but it wasn’t so good, either.
I received a reply from the guy with the great idea for a TV show who needed someone with "industry credibility" to team up with.
Feel the need to vent? No problem! Since we don’t each other, it can’t be
personal. A simple, "not interested" would have done the trick though.
The television saying you mentioned….we say that same thing in
marketing and advertising! Since I’m a professional in my chosen field too
(no, really), I receive numerous offers to partner from people looking to break
in. Though it almost never goes anywhere, I usually offer some slight
encouragement. The upside is so much greater than the downside and the cost to
let it play out is so insignificant…..so why not?
Instead of offering encouragement, I offer honesty and reality. Obviously, you didn’t want to hear either. You can’t expect to scrawl a drawing of a car on a napkin and sell it to Ford… why should you expect it to happen with a TV series idea? The way to break in is not to look for shortcuts, for a way to start at the top…which is what you are trying to do. The way to break in is to write a terrific script, get hired as a freelancer on a show, get picked up on staff, then work your way up the writer/producer ladder until you reach the point in your career when someone from a studio or network calls and says "Hey, got any ideas for a series?"
As for the networks buying years of
experience and a track record……I sincerely hope that is true (means better
television). The jury seems to be out though: Overnight
successes…..Schwartz, who at 27 created The O.C….Trey Parker and Matt Stone
created South Park while they were still in college.
I figured that’s where you were coming from. You didn’t do your homework. Josh Schwartz worked on other shows and wrote other pilots before THE OC. Parker and Stone made a short animated film, THE SPIRIT OF CHRISTMAS, that wowed the industry. That short film proved their skill as animators/writers/performers and they got a series… based on that short film. They weren’t car salesmen from Topeka with a really great idea for an animated TV series.
What must I have been thinking when I contacted
you? I mean…how on earth could a professional television writer really be
interested in what someone from outside the industry has to offer?
". CSI, the No. 1 show was created by relative newcomer, Anthony
E. Zuiker…. CBS hired experienced writer-producers Carol Mendelsohn and Ann
Donahue to run the show…"
Again, you aren’t doing your homework. Zuiker didn’t sell his idea by emailing producers with a come-on saying he had a great idea for a show and he just needed someone with "industry credibility" to sell it for him. He wrote a script. From the CSI Files Website:
Zuiker himself got his start when childhood friend Dustin Lee Abraham, now a CSI scribe but then an actor, would get Zuiker to
write him monologues for auditions. "I wrote a speech about a man, mentally
retarded, watching his wife give birth. He’s a degenerate gambler, and he went
into an announcing [mode, a play by play]," Zuiker says of the monologue that
got him attention in Hollywood. The speech was turned into a movie, The
Runner, which was made for seven million dollars. It turned out to be
Zuiker’s gateway to Hollywood.
You’re wowed by what you think are strike-it-big-in-Hollywood-quick stories that really aren’t. Stop looking for a short-cut. The best way to sell a series is to write some great scripts. Don’t look for someone with "industry credibility," earn some of your own instead.
It’s about time STAR TREK was cancelled, or so says bestselling science fiction author Orson Scott Card in the Los Angeles Times. He was no fan of the original series, either.
The original "Star Trek," created by Gene Roddenberry, was, with a few
exceptions, bad in every way that a science fiction television show
could be bad.
Yikes, is he in for it from "The Fen. " And he takes a shot at them, too.
And then the madness really got underway. They started making
costumes and wearing pointy ears. They wrote messages in Klingon, they
wrote their own stories about the characters, filling in what was left
out — including, in one truly specialized subgenre, the "Kirk-Spock"
stories in which their relationship was not as platonic and emotionless
as the TV show depicted it.
He’s certainly one author who isn’t afraid to express a controversial opinion that could, uh, alienate his readers.