Tag: Samuel Baum

Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 11/26/13

Latest News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are

  • Michael Chiklis (yeppers, the actor guy) is looking for a co-writer to help him adapt the comic book he co-created, Pantheon for TV. If you’re into ancient Greek gods battling for the future of earth, have your people give Michael’s people a call. (Word to the wise: It’ll help considerably if you happen to be a current or recent TV showrunner that all the networks are falling over themselves to do business with cuz the PANTHEON TV series really, really, really wants to get on the air.)
  • Walter Mosley (yeppers, the hard-boiled novel guy) is co-writing a pilot based on his series of novels featuring Socrates Fortlow with Patrick Charles (BONES). This one’s for HBO and will star Laurence Fishburne as Fortlow.  (Hmm, we’re thinking that maybe with Patrick on board we’ll finally get to see a Mosley story that seems at least half as interesting as its P.R.  Cool.)
  • Samuel Baum (LIE TO ME) is rewriting HBO’s Bernie Madoff movie. (We always wonder about the reason for rewrites so we’re putting this out there for original writer John Burnham Schwartz: Why’d they shitcan you, dude? TVWriter™ will be mighty happy to tell your side of the story so let us know, okay?)
  • Bryan Shukoff & Kevin Chesley (THE HARD TIMES OF R.J. BERGER) have written the pilot for NBC’s TWO TO GO, a comedy about single guys and how they deal with their friends’ kids. (Cuz the Millennial audience really gives a crap about people with kids, don’tcha know?)
  • Shonda Rimes (GREY’S ANATOMY) has a deal to write a memoir about her early days as a writer and, we assume, human being for Simon & Schuster. (To which we can only add a very non-snarky, “Congratulations, Shonda. And, listen, we know how busy you are with a zillion projects and your life, so if you need a ghost writer just email TVWriter™ and ask for munchman, okay? Aw, c’mon, gang, you can’t blame us for trying…can you?)

Today’s TV Writing Deals Dept: 10/9/12

“Show me the writer who hasn’t sold out and I’ll show you the writer who hasn’t been asked yet.” Norman Mailer to Larry Brody, 1976

  • Marc Hyman (MEET THE FOCKERS) is writing a comedy pilot called TAMING OF THE SHREW for NBC, about a tyrannical woman CEO “and the office staff who try to tame her.” (Produced by Julia Roberts so, gee, think it’ll make the next schedule?)
  • Samuel Baum (LIE TO ME) has signed a development deal with CBS TV Studios and sold an untitled drama about a doctor who battles politics and business “to keep Americans healthy” to CBS. (In the ’70s LB was one of the story editors of a highly awarded series called MEDICAL STORY that did that same thing…and was cancelled after 13 episodes, so all we can say to Sam Baum is, “Look out!”)
  • Guillermo del Toro (a bunch of great feature film stuff as writer-director-producer) wants us all to know that his planned HULK TV series for ABC is still writerless. (In other words, the job is open, boys and girls. Get out there and hustle!)
  • Jay Scherick & David Ronn (SMURFS) have sold CBS a sitcom pilot about two very different brothers and their families having to share a house.  (We’re thinking MODERN FAMILY without the “modern,” and with a bunch of green-skinned little geeks, but who really knows?
  • Elizabeth Wright Shapiro (actress-writer with some kind of connections we know nothing about) is writing a sitcom about an Ivy League feminist who ends up living with two typical L.A. babes for CBS. (This one’s going to be produced by Elizabeth Banks, one of the co-stars of 30 ROCK, and her husband, in case you’re wondering how the deal came to be. Wonder if either of the two Elizabeths, or the husband, knows Guillermo del Toro…)