Tag: TV writing deals

Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 1/21/13

Latest News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are

  • Jim Gaffigan (WELCOME TO NEW YORK) & Peter Tolan (RESCUE ME) are co-writing an untitled CBS sitcom about “a happily married and harried NYC father of five.” (In other words, it’s about Gaffigan, who also will star. How come nobody ever wants to do a series about us and let us star?)
  • Mark Goffman (THE WEST WING) will write I AM VICTOR, based on the book by Jo Nesbo about an attorney who is remarkably similar to Dr. House of, um, HOUSE fame. (In other words, HOUSE executive producer Katie Jacobs will be in charge of the show. How come nobody ever wants to hire me to do a series where I rip myself off and produce?)
  • John Logan (SKYFALL) is writing Showtime’s PENNY DREADFUL, a period “psychosexual horror” show featuring the characters of Dr. Frankenstein, Dorian Gray, Dr. Van Helsing and others in Victorian London. The show already has a series commitment. (How come nobody ever wants to give me a series commitment? Not even for that idea I had featuring The Wizard of Oz, Tom Sayer, and Jane Eyre in pre WWI Berlin?)
  • Joe Port & Joe Wiseman’s (Joe Wiseman was an early student of Our Fearsome Leader, LB, Joe Port, um, wasn’t) script, JOE, JOE AND JANE, a sitcom about a writer constantly having to attend to the needs of his wife and his co-author and based on the writers’ lives, has been given the go-ahead into produced pilot by NBC. (How come nobody wants to give the go-ahead into produced pilot to me for my life story of constantly having to attend to the needs of my left hand and right foot? Damn!)

Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 1/17/13

Latest News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are

  • Eric Amadio (SHADOWS & LIES) is writing the pilot for Starz drama OFF SEASON, a drama about a pro football team and its young coach. (Of course the coach is young. No network wants an audience in the demo that NFL coaches actually belong to.)
  • David Graziano, (AWAKE, LIE TO ME) has written the pilot for NBC’s BLOODLINE, a contemporary thriller about a young girl trapped in the middle of two warring families of killers-for-hire. (NBC gives a much longer description, but we didn’t want to bore you the way we were when we read it.)
  • Katherine Lindberg & Ted Cyr (newbies, hurrah!) have written the time travel drama TOMORROW for ABC. (Think LOOPER combined with LOOPER with a dash of LOOPER thrown in. Except that the hero’s in the FBI so he’s a good guy not a hit man. Got it?)
  • Jon Lucas & Scott Moore (THE HANGOVER) will write MIXOLOGY, a sitcom, for ABC. (Says here it’s about a sexy Manhattan bar and chronicles the humorous adventures of singles looking for love, with each episode taking place in one night. Which part of the premise do you think will get tossed out first? Maybe we should have a contest…)
  • Dan Goor & Mike Schur (PARKS AND RECREATION) are creating/writing an untitled Fox comedy about “a diverse group of detectives at a New York precinct.” (The press release description reminds us of the classic series BARNEY MILLER, created by Ted Flicker, but we’re afraid to get our hopes up.)
  • Hey, y’all, BONES has been picked up for another full season! (Meaning that staffers on that show are gonna get even richer. Yeah! – well c’mon, you didn’t think TV was about creativity, didja?)

Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 1/13/13

Latest News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are

  •  Shepard Boucher (MEN AT WORK) has written an unnamed comedy pilot for Fox TV which is being shopped around with Sarah Michelle Gellar attached as the star. (Wonder if Boucher has been paid anything yet because normally companies only spend a network’s money and not their own.)
  • Emily Spivey, creator of NBC’s sitcom UP ALL NIGHT has left the show. (No replacement has been named, so get those credit lists and spec sitcoms ready, gang.)
  • Cher (yeah, that Cher) & Ron Zimmerman (CHARLES IN CHARGE) are teaming up to write a pilot for Logo about life in ’60s Hollywood. (Yes, he’s her BF. But she’s really going to do a lot of writing on this project. Rilly.)
  • Liz Heldens & Peter Elkoff (both from DECEPTION) are writing/running CAMP, a drama about , well, summer camp. (The press release calls it a drama but also compares the show to MEATBALLS and DAZED AND CONFUSED, which means that somebody else here must also be pretty damn dazed and confused, don’tcha think?)
  • Agnes Nixon (ALL MY CHILDREN & ONE LIFE TO LIVE creator) is aboard for The Online Network’s web series versions of both shows as a consultant. (Which means the shows might actually get made after all. Maybe. Um, on second thought it probably doesn’t mean anything at all. Sorry.)

Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 1/8/13

Latest News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are

  •  Ben Wexler (COMMUNITY) is writing the pilot for BOB’S NEW HEART SHOW, a medical comedy at Fox. (Produced by Conan O’Brian and paying tribute to Bob Newhart, who isn’t connected to the show in any way.)
  • Killing Kennedy: The End of Camelot, a book by none other than Bill O’Reilly (well, maybe there was or will be another writer but no one’s coming out with the names), is being turned into a Ridley Scott directed TV movie on the National Geographic Channel. (We’re guessing this deal wasn’t made because of O’Reilly’s writing, but who knows?)
  • Megan Ganze (COMMUNITY) has looked into the future and officially left the show that scares NBC so much that the network is afraid to schedule it and taken a writing gig on MODERN FAMILY. (And she announced it on Reddit, proving that she’s not only richer than we are but cooler as well.)
  • William Monahan (Oscar winner for THE DEPARTED), is writing the pilot for Starz’ drama series CRIME, described in the press release as “a study of criminal enterprises and scandal across 1960s Britain. (He’s adapting a screenplay by Vanessa Sadler and says “It’s very, very funny.” We aren’t sure if he’s talking about her version or his there, but we’ll see because Starz always shoots and airs its series pilots – mainly because, according to their Big Boss, Chris Albrecht,  they can’t afford not to.)
  • Ryan Murphy (GLEE, AMERICAN HORROR STORY) is adapting Larry Kramer’s play, THE NORMAL HEART into a TV movie for HBO. (It’s about a paraplegic physician in the ’80s working with AIDS patients, so we now one thing for sure: Watching this ain’t a’gonna make us feel good.)

Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 12/31/12

This Year’s Last News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are
  • Bryan Singer (HOUSE, X-MEN) is developing yet another version of THE TWILIGHT ZONE, this one for CBS TV Studios. (Not to be confused with CBS Network because, who knows, Leslie Moonves might turn it down and ya gotta keep your options open, right?)
  • Kristen Schall (THE DAILY SHOW), Garry Trudeau (DOONESBURY comic strip), and the team of Kevin Sussman & John Ross Bowie (THE BIG BANG THEORY) are among the writers working on pilots for Amazon Studios. (Not to be confused with all the new writers Amazon originally reached out to because newbies might not be, you know, predictable enough, right?)
  • Paul Attanasio (HOUSE, DONNIE BRASCO) has written the pilot for Showtime’s THE VATICAN, a thriller cashing in on THE DAVINCI CODE which will be directed by Ridley Scott. (Because, God knows, TV isn’t exactly embarrassed by jumping on a bandwagon, no matter how too little, too late the TV effort may be.
  • A writer to be named shortly will be writing a pilot for a CW series about a medieval noblewoman who enlist Robin Hood’s aid in rescuing her serf boyfriend from the Normans. (Because the Gerards and the Roberts and the Jonathans et al aren’t nearly as exciting to teens – OK, just think about that awhile, c’mon.)
  • Speaking of new writers, Grant Dekernion (former writers’ assistant on EASTBOUND & DOWN) has written the pilot for CHOSEN, an animated comedy about a rapper who wants to redeem himself while also dominating the world. (Yay! Not only do we finally get to report on a new writer getting a chance, it turns out that his series idea is actually realistic – well, except maybe for that “redeem himself” part. We’ll see.)

Ah, what better way to close out the year than with a report about writers who have made/are making it? They were once beginners also, so never forget: YOU CAN DO IT TOO!

Happy New Year from TVWriter™!