TVWriter™ has been trying to keep our visitors posted on what new pilots have been ordered into production by the various networks/cable channels/web video sites. We’ve even gone so far as to put a hold on one of our favorite posting categories, TV Writing Deals, replacing it with one called TV Writing to Production Deals. (AKA Survival of the Fittest Dept.)
We admit, though, that this hasn’t been working out very well. And not just because the name TV Writing to Production Deals is so incredibly, insipidly awkward. (Our most recent post of this type was earlier today, just a couple of posts down from this one.)
Mostly, our problem has been that it’s been very, very difficult to keep track of who’s who and what’s what due to sloppy press releases and even sloppier reporting in the showbiz trades. Sometimes the word “pilot” seems to mean production. Other times is clearly means “pilot script.” Other times – well, we simply can’t tell.
Today, however, we found Pilot Reporting Nirvana, a web page by The Hollywood Reporter that lists all the pilots that have been authorized by the five broadcast networks, plus who wrote them, who’s running them, and, wherever possible, who’s starring.
So we’re done messing around, at least until the smoke clears a little, and instead we present:
TV Pilots 2013: The Complete Guide
by Lesley Goldberg
Following a development season high on semi-autobiograpical fare, pilot season has continued that trend with at least four of the early projects based on the lives of its creators. Elsewhere, established showrunners including Chuck Lorre (Two and a Half Men, The Big Bang Theory, Mike & Molly) and Joss Whedon (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly) are returning to the pilot pool with a single-mom comedy at CBS and an adaptation of Marvel’s S.H.I.E.L.D., respectively. Meanwhile, The CW and CBS are looking to launch spinoffs of established series The Vampire Diaries and NCIS: LA, respectively, while NBC is turning to Parenthood‘s Jason Katims to reboot the 2002 Hugh Grant movie About a Boy. For its part, Fox is looking to Parks and Recreation duo Mike Schur and Dan Goor to spice up its comedy offerings with a cop sitcom starring Andy Samburg.
These are a few of the highlights of Pilot Season 2013d, where ABC, CBS, NBC, ABC and The CW sift through the numerous development projects and move forward in a bid to find the next breakout comedies and dramas. Here’s a look at the pilots in contention for the 2012-13 television season, which The Hollywood Reporter will be updating throughout pilot and casting season, so be sure to bookmark the page and come back for the latest news.
(Note: Not included here are projects that already have landed series commitments and are set for summer, including CBS’ adaptation ofStephen King‘s Under the Dome, among others.)
ABC
COMEDY
How the Hell Am I Normal? (previously How the F Am I Normal)
Logline: A dysfunctional Wonder Years set in the simpler times of the 1980s, inspired byAdam F. Goldberg‘s childhood.
Cast: Wendi McLendon-Covey
Team: W/EP Adam F. Goldberg (Breaking In); EP Doug Robinson, EP/D Seth Gordon
Studio: Sony Pictures Television, Happy Madison
Format: Single-camera
Location: Los AngelesMixology
Logline: A high-concept single-camera comedy from the writers behind The Hangover set in the world of a sexy Manhattan bar chronicling the exploits of singles in search of love — all over the course of one night.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Jon Lucas, Scott Moore (The Hangover)
Studio: ABC Studios
Format: Single-camera
Location:Pulling
Logline: The story of three dysfunctional women in their 30s living their lives the way they want, even if society tells them they should have it all figured out by this point.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Lee Eisenberg, Gene Stupnitsky (Bad Teacher); EP Aaron Kaplan, Sharon Horgan, Dennis Kelly
Studio: ABC Studios, Kaplan Entertainment
Format: Single-camera
Location:Spy
Logline: Based on the British series of the same name, a well-intentioned father of a highly intelligent and verbal son, who also happens to be his complete opposite, inadvertently takes a job at the secret service in order to prove himself a worthy father.
Cast: Rob Corddry
Team: W/EP Simeon Goulden; EP Jimmy Mulville, Helen Williams
Studio: ABC Studios, Hat Trick Productions
Format: Single-camera
Location:Super Fun Night (rolled from CBS last year)
Logline: Revolves around three nerdy female friends, including Pitch mPerfect‘s Rebel Wilson, on a “funcomfortable” quest to have “super fun” every Friday night.
Cast: Rebel Wilson, Kelen Coleman, Kevin Bishop, Lauren Ash, Liza Lapira
Team: W/Co-EP Rebel Wilson; EP Conan O’Brien, David Kissinger, Jeff Ross, EP/D John Riggi
Studio: Warner Bros. Television, Conaco Productions
Format: Single-camera
Location: Los AngelesTrophy Wife
Logline: A reformed party girl finds herself with an instant family when she falls in love with a man who has three manipulative children and two judgmental ex-wives.
Cast: Bradley Whitford, Malin Akerman, Marcia Gay Harden, Michaela Watkins, Natalie Morales, Ryan Lee
Team: W/EP Emily Halpern (Private Practice), Sarah Haskins; EP Gene Stupnitsky, Lee Eisenberg; D Jason Moore
Studio: ABC Studios
Format: Single-camera
Location: Los AngelesThe untitled Cullens project
Logline: When Terry Gannon, a recently divorced, single mother, temporarily moves in with her estranged father (James Caan), a beer swilling former baseball player, she reluctantly starts coaching her son’s underdog little league team and is drawn back into the world of sports she vowed to leave behind.
Cast: James Caan
Team: W/EP Mark Cullen, Robb Cullen (Las Vegas); EP Aaron Kaplan
Studio: 20th Television, Kaplan Entertainment
Format: Single-camera
Location:DRAMA
Betrayal
Logline: A beautiful but unhappily married female photographer begins a torrid affair with a lawyer for a powerful family. When he turns out to be defending a murder suspect who is being prosecuted by her husband, the relationship and the case begin a spiraling series of betrayals with cataclysmic results for everyone involved.
Cast:
Team: W/EP David Zabel (ER); EP Rob Golenberg, Alon Aranya
Studio: ABC Studios
Location:Doubt
Logline: A former cop who’s now a cunning but charming low-rent lawyer uses his street smarts to work the system for his
clients while battling his own demons and wooing his ex-wife.
Cast:
Team: W/EP David Shore (House)
Studio: Sony Pictures Television
Location:Influence
Logline: Provocative workplace ensemble centered on the complicated relationship between two brothers who head a unique agency designed to attack their clients’ problems using the real science of human motivation and manipulation.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Kyle Killen (Awake)
Studio: 20th Television
Location:Killer Women
Logline: It’s hard to fit in when you’re the only woman in the notoriously male Texas Rangers, but that doesn’t stop Molly Parker — our ballsy, beautiful badass who knows how to get to the truth and isn’t afraid to ruffle a few feathers on her way there. Based on the Argentine series Mujeres Asesinas.
Cast:
Team: W Hannah Shakespeare (The Raven); EP Sofia Vergara, Martin Campbell
Studio: ABC Studios, Electus, Latin World Entertainment
Location:The Returned
Logline: What happens when the people you have mourned and buried suddenly appear on your doorstep as if not a day’s gone by? The lives of the people of Aurora Arcadia are forever changed when their deceased loved ones return.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Aaron Zelman (Criminal Minds)
Studio: ABC Studios, Brillstein Entertainment, Plan B
Location:S.H.I.E.L.D.
Logline: Based on Marvel Comics’ secret intelligence organization that has appeared in countless titles including Iron Man, Captain America and The Ultimates since being introduced in the 1960s. The military law-enforcement agency’s moniker stands for Strategic Hazard Intervention Espionage Logistic Directorate, which also has evolved over time in the comics.
Cast: Ming-Na, Clark Gregg, Brett Dalton, Elizabeth Henstridge,Ian De Caestecker, Chloe Bennet
Team: W/EP/D Joss Whedon; W/EP Jed Whedon, Maurissa Tancharoen, EP Jeffrey Bell, Jeph Loeb,
Studio: ABC Studios, Marvel TV
Location: Los AngelesVenice
Logline: A soap about the haves and the have-not’s of California’s most seductive city, Venice. The drama will focus on two rival families and a forbidden and dangerous romance emerging between them as the two families battle for control of Venice.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Byron Balasco (Without a Trace); McG, Peter Johnson; D McG
Studio: Warner Bros. Television, Wonderland Sound and Vision
Location:CBS
COMEDY
Bad Teacher
Logline: Based on the film, a sexy, foul-mouthed divorcee becomes a teacher to find her next husband.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Hilary Winston (Community); EP Lee Eisenberg, Gene Stupinsky (the original Bad Teacher screenwriters), Sam Hansen, Jimmy Miller
Studio: Sony Pictures Television, Mosiac
Format: Single-camera
Location:Ex-Men
Logline: A young guy (Chris Smith) who finds camaraderie living among the more experienced guys he meets in a short-term rental complex.
Cast: Chris Smith, Kal Penn, Jerry O’Connell, Tony Shalhoub, Rebecca Brooks
Team: W/EP/D Rob Greenberg (How I Met Your Mother); EP Eric and Kim Tannenbaum
Studio: CBS Television, Tannenbaum Co.
Format: Single-camera
Location: Los AngelesFriends With Better Lives
Logline: A group of thirtysomething friends who each think the other has it better.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Dana Klein (Friends); EP Aaron Kaplan
Studio: 20th Television, Kapital Entertainment
Format: Multicamera
Location:Mom
Logline: Revolves around a newly sober single mom (Scary Movie‘s Anna Faris) who tries to pull her life together in Napa Valley.
Cast: Anna Faris, Allison Janney
Team: W/EP Chuck Lorre, Eddie Gorodetsky, Gemma Baker (Two and a Half Men)
Studio: Warner Bros. Television, Chuck Lorre Productions
Format: Multicamera
Location: Los AngelesThe McCarthys
Logline: A family comedy about a loud, sports-crazed Boston clan.
Cast:
Team: W/co-EP Brian Gallivan (Are You There, Chelsea?); EP Will Gluck
Studio: Sony Pictures Television, Olive Bridge
Format: Single-camera
Location: Los AngelesSuper Clyde
Logline: Centers on a meek, unassuming fast food worker decides to become a super hero.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Greg Garcia (Raising Hope)
Studio: CBS Television Studios
Format: Single-camera
Location: Los AngelesUnauthorized Greg Garcia project
Logline: A recently divorced man’s life is complicated when his parents decide to move in with him.
Team: W/EP Greg Garcia (Raising Hope)
Studio: CBS Television Studios
Format: Multicamera
Location: Los Angeles
Untitled Jim Gaffigan comedy
Logline: The semi-autobiographical comedy revolves around Gaffigan as a happily married and harried New York City father of five — as he is in real life.
Cast: Jim Gaffigan
Team: W Jim Gaffigan, Peter Tolan (Rescue Me); EP Michael Wimer, Alex Murray
Studio: Sony Pictures Television, Fedora Entertainment
Format: Single-camera
Location: New YorkDRAMA
The Advocates
Logline: A female lawyer and a male ex-con team as “victim advocates,” going to the very edge of the law to right wrongs and fight for the underdog.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Bruno Heller (The Mentalist)
Studio: Warner Bros. Television
Location:Backstrom
Logline: Based on the Swedish book series about an overweight, offensive, irascible detective as he tries, and fails, to change his self-destructive behavior.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Hart Hanson; EP Leif G.W. Persson, Niclas Salomonsson
Studio: 20th Television
Location:Beverly Hills Cop
Logline: Continuation of the movie franchise, centered around Axel Foley’s police officer son, who takes down the criminal elements of the rich and famous in Beverly Hills.
Cast: Brandon T. Jackson, Eddie Murphy
Team: W/EP Shawn Ryan; EP Eddie Murphy, Marney Hochman
Studio: Sony Pictures Television
Location:Hostages
Logline: Follows Ellen (Toni Collette), a Washington, D.C., surgeon who is thrown into a political conspiracy after being chosen to operate on the president of the United States. Her family is taken hostage, and it’s her responsibility to save their lives. It is based on an Israeli format by Alon Aranya, Rotem Shamir and Chayim Sharir that was never produced.
Cast: Toni Collette
Team: W/EP/DJeffrey Nachmanoff (The Day After Tomorrow) EP Jerry Bruckheimer, Jonathan Littman, Omri Givon, Rotem Shamir and Chayim Sharir; Co-EP: KristieAnne Reed, Alon Aranya
Studio: Warner Bros. Television, Jerry Bruckheimer Television
Location:NCIS: L.A. spinoff (back-door pilot)
Logline: The back-door pilot will air as part of NCIS: L.A. and follow a mobile team of agents who are forced to live and work together as they crisscross the country solving crimes.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Shane Brennan (NCIS: LA)
Studio: CBS Television Studios, Shane Brennan Productions
Location: Los AngelesThe Ordained
Logline: The son of a Kennedy-esque family leaves the priesthood and becomes a lawyer to prevent his politician sister from being assassinated.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Lisa Takeuchi Cullen; EP Frank Marshall, Larry Shuman, A.B. Fischer; co-EP Robert Zotnowski
Studio: CBS Television Studios
Location:The Surgeon General
Logline: A medical show centered on America’s doctor: the surgeon general of the United States.
Cast:
Team: W/EP Samuel Baum (Lie to Me)
Studio: CBS Television Studios
Location:
Yes, we know this list doesn’t include cable and web video sites. But we’re looking, we’re looking – and if you have a place to send us, by all means let us know. (We’ll even give ya credit, so whaddaya say?
P.S. Another admission: Boy are we sad to see the two pix we were using to illustrate what we called the Survival of the Fittest Dept. go. Gotta come up with another use for them…soon!