Category: TV Writing Deals

Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 8/15/13

Latest News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are

  • Sylvia Day’s romance novel series Crossfire has been optioned by Lionsgate for a TV series. So if that’s your kind of thing, time to have your agent get to working for you. (And don’t forget to tell us when you get the development gig so we can go viral by breaking the news.)
  • Chris Alberghini & Mike Chessler (90210 reboot) are the new showrunners of MTV’s AWKWARD, which was renewed last week. (Hmm, if we’d posted this news then would we have been a viral sensation? Guess that would depend on whether anybody cares about MTV anymore.)
  • Speaking of AWKWARD, creator and ex-showrunner Lauren Iumgerich has made a deal with Warner Brothers TV to develop a new comedy series for the studio. (Nothing is set up at a network yet, but from what we’ve heard about Lauren’s relationship with MTV we’re pretty darn sure that she’s happy as a clam to be in a new home.)
  • Karl Gajdusek & Shawn Ryan (LAST RESORT) are developing FREEDOM, an ABC drama pilot about a group of genius rebels out to save the U.S. (This sounds so ’70s to us that we don’t know whether to look forward to the show or just…cringe.)
  • Kevin Wade (BLUEBLOODS) has a new overall deal with CBS TV Studios, where he’ll continue to run BLUEBLOODS and develop new primetime drama. (We’ve been sitting for half an hour trying to think of something funny to say about this deal but we ain’t got nuthin’. Damn BLUEBLOODS is just too dull to even make fun of.)
  • Dana Calvo (MADE IN JERSEY) is writing an untitled ABC drama pilot about an eccentric detective and his “methodical female Partner” who work cases in Miami. (Actually, the announcement notes that “they solve cases that only seem to happen in the neon wilds of  one of America’s most eclectic and vibrant cities,” which made us think, “Oh, MIAMI VICE.” Which in turn pushed that ’70s button again so excuse us while we slip into cringe mode early, just to be safe.)

Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 8/12/13

Latest News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are

  • Dan Kopelman (RULES OF ENGAGEMENT) is writing the pilot for an untitled Nickelodeon comedy about a 12 year old Army brat. (Although the majority of sites that report on this kind of thing bury his name and concentrate on the fact that one of the producers is the star of another upcoming Nick series. Notice that we aren’t naming her. Take that, big stars!)
  • Jack Moore (newb!) has landed a gig on Fox’s new sitcom US & THEM. (And he did it via his Twitter feed @seinfeldtoday, which features loglines for nonexistent contemporary episodes of the old SEINFELD series. Why didn’t you think of that? Huh?)
  • Nahnatchka Khan  & Corey Nickerson (DON’T TRUST THE B— IN APT 23)  are writing the pilot for FATRICK, a Fox Network sitcom about, no, you’re wrong, not a fat guy but a former fat guy. Ha! (See how they did that? Pulled the big set-up switcheroo, we man? That’s the kind of thing that makes you rich even if your last series bombed.)
  • Todd Holland (TWIN PEAKS) is writing an untitled science fiction project about an immortal bounty hunter to NBC. (Because THE HIGHLANDER feature film reboot is doing so well. Oh, wait, hasn’t it been abandoned? )

Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 8/9/13

Latest News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are

  • Cindy Chupack (SEX AND THE CITY) is writing the pilot for THE LONGEST DATE, a Fox Network sitcom based on her upcoming memoir The Longest Date: Life as a Wife. (Hey, LB, if they’re going as far back as SATC for writer type people, maybe they’ll get to you and your generation soon!)
  • David Magee (LIFE OF PI) has written the pilot for an ABC drama series to be called TRAVELERS, about – what else? – a family that travels through time. (We confess that we’re looking forward to this one, but primarily because we want to see what a Magee script is like without CGI tigers et al.)
  • Further news on the David Magee (LIFE OF PI) front: Turns out he’s also adapting LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN for Fox and a comedy called AMERICAN GIRLS ON VACATION for Showtime.  (In case you’ve been wondering why, amid the plethora of networks that can give us gigs most of us never get one. It’s because of dudes like David, not because we suck or have been blacklisted. Whew.)
  • Janine Sherman Barrois (CRIMINAL MINDS) has a fresh new overall deal with ABC Studios, under which she’ll continue as E.P. of CRIMINAL MINDS while developing other bone-chilling stuff. (Wait, she also writes comedy, having working on THE JAMIE FOXX SHOW. Don’tcha hate when other people are way multi-faceted?)

Yule Caise is the 2013 Fox Writers Intensive Fellow

Yule CaiseThe announcement appeared – where else? – on Yule’s Facebook page as his friends swarmed it with every article ever written on the subject and the kind of sincere congratulations we thought existed only in our fantasies. While we don’t know Yule, he’s obviously a hell of a good guy and we’re happy as can be for him.

Go, writers!

Fox Picks Yule Caise for Writers Program
by Shalini Dore

Yule Caise Announcement Capture

Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 8/7/13

Latest News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are

  • Marti Noxon (MAD MEN) & Sarah Gertrude Shapiro (SEQUIN RAZE) have co-written the pilot for UNREAL, based on Sarah’s prizewinning short film original (SEQUIN RAZE) for Lifetime, which just greenlighted the pilot. (Hey, there’s a way to get your new self an Old Media TV gig: Create something that can be interpreted as tried and true. See what winning a prize can do?)
  • Dustin Lance Black (MILK) is writing an 8-hour miniseries about the history of the gay rights movement for ABC. (To which we can only add: It’s about time!)
  • FX is developing a limited series cleverly called THE UNTITLED JOHN BROWN PROJECT about, we imagine, John Brown’s abolitionist raid in Virginia, which is usually identified as the event that started the Civil War. It’s based on Tony Horwitz’ book, Midnight Rising, and no writers are attached tothe project yet. (Iconoclasts that we tell ourselves we are, we’re wondering if John Brown’s action really was the cause of the war. After all, governments – and history – have kinda twisted the truth a little about the beginnings of other wars, haven’t they? Wouldn’t it be cool if that’s what this project really was about?)
  • Jonathan Lisco (SOUTHLAND) will be showrunner of AMC’s upcoming series HALT & CATCH FIRE as part of this new overall deal with the network. (AMC is the new TNT. Ahh.)