Month: August 2017

500 Scripted TV Series Rocking On-Air This Season

That we’re living in The Year of Peak TV is indisputable, but we here at TVWriter™ do have a question: Is the fact that all these shows exist and are in need of writers (whether they realize it or not) the good news? Or is it the bad?

Scripted Series Tally Brings Viewers and Networks Another Record Year
by Michael Schneider

Peak TV still hasn’t peaked. According to FX Networks chief John Landgraf, as of August there have been 342 scripted programs via broadcast, cable, and streaming services this year – up from 325 at this time last year.

That puts the year’s tally racing toward a landmark 500 scripted shows in 2017, up from 455 in 2016. (There were 216 series in 2010, so the number has already doubled.) read article

Allie Theiss: Daniel Thomsen’s Approach to TV Writing Success – Part 1

by Allie Theiss

Writer Daniel Thomsen has been at the top of TVWriter™’s radar for a long time and has worked on some of this  minion’s favorite shows (TIME AFTER TIME, WESTWORLD, ONCE UPON A TIME, among many others). I’m delighted to have had the chance to talk to him about his enviable career.

When did you realize that you wanted to be a writer?

I grew up during the 1990s, in the rural rustbelt, before there was much attention given to writers in television. I was a passionate STAR TREK fan, but all that meant was I watched every new episode of TNG and DS9. It fed my storytelling imagination, but I didn’t pay attention to the names of the writers or anything like that. It just never occurred to me that I could write stories to make a living. That wasn’t my world. read article

Larry Brody’s Poetry: ‘Everyone’s a Hero’

 by Larry Brody

NOTE FROM LB

I used to think that I’ve had to learn way too many lessons the hard way. Then I realized: So has everyone else:

Everyone’s A Hero

I wanted to be a hero, and searched from cause to cause. read article

TVWriter™ Don’t-Miss Posts of the Week – August 14, 2017

Time for TVWriter™’s  Monday look at our 5 most popular blog posts of the week ending yesterday. They are, in order:

Web Series: ‘Stupid Idiots’ read article

Herbie J Pilato Hangs with the Big Dogs

The big time definitely agrees with Herbie J!

That’s TVWriter™ Contributing Editor Emeritus Herbie J Pilato on the right, hanging with Joel Eisenberg and Lloyd Schwartz at a speaking engagement last week in Valencia, CA.

Mr. Eisenberg is the executive producer of Herbie J’s new Classic TV series, Then Again with Herbie J Pilato on Decades TV. Mr. Schwartz is a Classic TV classic himself – writer-producer of The Brady Bunch and Gilligan’s Island.

Wouldn’t it be cool if those three could get together and create a new series of their own? Pilato’s Island, anybody? read article