Latest News Items (What is this?)
20:50 - Knightfall - First Look Poster
Thanks to Bazooka for the heads up.
00:40 - Multiracial Family Comedy in Development at NBC from a Superstore Writer
NBC has given a script plus penalty commitment to a single-camera multiracial, multi-generational family comedy from writer Lon Zimmet (NBC’s Superstore), producer Wendi Trilling and Aaron Kaplan’s Kapital Entertainment.
Loosely based on Zimmet’s brother-in-law and parents, the comedy chronicles what happens after a black law student’s fiancée accepts a temporary job transfer across the country and he has to survive living alone with his white, conservative future-in-laws. Zimmet executive produces with Trilling, Dana Honor and Kaplan. Universal TV is the studio.
Zimmet’s series credits also include Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and Happy Endings. He is repped by UTA and Rise Management.
This is one of several comedy sales for Kapital Entertainment this season, including Dan Kopelman’s single-camera comedy Me, Myself and I, which has a pilot production commitment at CBS, Dana Klein and Mark Feuerstein’s multi-camera 9J, 9K, AND 9L, also at CBS, and DJ Nash’s single-camera Losing it at ABC, both with penalty.
Source:
00:35 - The Mix Up - CBS Developing Interracial Family Comedy
CBS is ready to mix up its family comedy brand.
The network is teaming with The Michael J. Fox Show creator Sam Laybourne to develop a comedy based on his life as the father in an interracial family.
Titled The Mix Up, Laybourne is set to pen the script and exec produce the semi-autobiographical comedy that has received a hefty put-pilot commitment. The single-camera comedy hails from ABC Studios, where Laybourne is under an overall deal. The comedy marks a key off-network sale for ABC Studios at CBS.
The Mix Up comes as CBS heads into its fall lineup that has been criticized for its lack of diversity. The network's three new comedies — Kevin Can Wait, The Great Indoors and Man With a Plan — are all toplined by white men (Kevin James, Joel McHale and Matt LeBlanc, respectively).
Speaking with reporters in August, CBS president Glenn Geller admitted that his network had a diversity problem. "We need to do better," he said of the network's fall roster, which also features nearly an all-white roster of drama leads as well.
Source:
00:30 - White Famous - Jacob Ming-Trent Joins Showtime Comedy Pilot
Jacob Ming-Trent has been cast as a series regular opposite Jay Pharoah in Showtime’s half-hour comedy pilot White Famous, from Jamie Foxx and Californication creator Tom Kapinos.
White Famous centers on a talented, young African-American comedian (Pharoah) whose star is rising, forcing him to navigate the treacherous waters of maintaining his credibility as he begins to cross-over towards becoming “white famous.” Ming-Trent will play Ron Balls, Floyd’s (Pharoah) roommate who works as a postman.
Ming-Trent most recently recurred as Mose on AMC’s Feed the Beast. He previously had guest-starring roles on 30 Rock, Unforgettable and Law & Order: Criminal Intent. Film credits include A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Shrek the Musical.
Source:
13:15 - The Fall - Season 3 - Episode Titles and Synopsis
12:00 - Heathers - Pilot Ordered by TV Land
Thanks to RD for the heads up.
TV Land has ordered a pilot for an anthology series based on the motion picture “Heathers,” Variety has confirmed. The pilot will be directed by “Sleeping With Other People” filmmaker Leslye Headland.
Starring Winona Ryder and Christian Slater, “Heathers” was a cult hit that satirized the world of high school social cliques. Released in 1988, it was directed by Michael Lehmann and written by Daniel Waters. The pilot will reimagine the three popular girls at the center of the film. The movie told the story of high-school student Veronica (Ryder) and her relationship with three popular girls, all named Heather. No casting has yet been confirmed for the pilot.
The single-camera half hour is written by Jason Micallef (“Butter”) and executive produced by Tom Rosenberg and Gary Lucchesi of Lakeshore Entertainment. If picked up to series, the anthology would likely feature a new set of Heathers in a different setting each season.
Source:
02:40 - The Real O'Neals - Season 2 - Chef's Graham Elliot, Alexandra Guarnaschelli & Antonia Lofaso to Guest
Can The Real O'Neals' Kenny (Noah Galvin) whip up the perfect Thanksgiving meal for his family? A few professionals are going to have a few things to say about his attempt.
In the ABC comedy's holiday episode, airing later this fall, Kenny tries to make a holiday meal out of things he can find from his pantry. That leads to a fantasy sequence where chefs Graham Elliot (MasterChef/MasterChef Junior), Alexandra Guarnaschelli (America's Next Iron Chef) and Antonia Lofaso (Cutthroat Kitchen)—playing themselves—give their take on his spread, TV Insider has learned exclusively.
Source:
02:30 - MOVIES: Live By Night - Trailer feat Ben Affleck
02:20 - Westworld - The Reasons Behind Production Shutting Down Revealed; 5 Seasons Mapped Out
HBO’s upcoming Westworld stirred up worrisome reports when the production temporarily shut down last January in order to give showrunners Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy more time to work on the final episodes of the season.
Previous statements from producers have been clear about their reason for the hiatus. “The show is complicated and ambitious,” Joy told EW months ago. “For the first half of the series we were writing while in production and we needed the time to catch up on scripts. Taking that time allowed us to really finesse all the storylines we set up – deepening character arcs and delving further into the series’ larger mythological questions.” Joy more recently added to us that, “It’s a really complex interlocking story. We knew where we wanted to go and we knew exactly how the season ended where the kind of character arcs ended, but weaving those scripts and writing the dialogue for all these brilliant actors, it takes time.”
But there was a little more to the behind-the-scenes creative challenge that was being solved. The Westworld team was determined to address another pressing issue during their break, as well. It turns out, producers wanted to firm up their master plan for the entire series – all the way to the show’s eventual finale – and lay that groundwork in the first season. That should be quite reassuring to fans of complex, mythology-driven TV shows, which have a spotty record of longterm narrative coherence.
“It wasn’t about getting the first 10 [episodes] done, it was about mapping out what the next 5 or 6 years are going to be,” Westworld actor James Marsden says. “We wanted everything in line so that when the very last episode airs and we have our show finale, five or seven years down the line, we knew how it was going to end the first season – that’s the way Jonah and [executive producer J.J. Abrams] operate. They’re making sure all the ducks are in the row. And it’s a testament to Jonah and Lisa and HBO that we got them right, especially the last three scripts. They could have rushed them and get spread too thin. They got them right, and when they were right, we went and shot them.”
Which isn’t to say the producers didn’t have some clear ideas about where the show was going from the very beginning. Nolan says they told HBO a rough plan for the first three or four seasons when they pitched the show. “I always feel like you want to have a sense,” Nolan says.
The Westworld team frequently makes production comparisons to HBO’s Game of Thrones (fun fact: composer Ramin Djawadi scores both shows), and Nolan noted the veteran fantasy hit had one major world-building advantage that they didn’t have – George R.R. Martin’s incredibly detailed books. While Westworld is based on a 1973 movie by Michael Crichton, the Jurassic Park author never wrote a Westworld novel. “We would joke that don’t have George, we don’t have the novels,” Nolan says. “We have a fantastic original film, but that’s a little under two hours of storytelling. So our joke was we have to write the ‘novels’ first, and then adapt them and then go shoot them.”
The Dark Knight writer also gave a tease about what future Westworld seasons would look like – or rather, wouldn’t look like. “We didn’t want to have a story that repeated itself [each year],” he says. “We didn’t want the Fantasy Island version of this [where new guests arrive at the park every season]. We wanted a big story. We wanted the story of the origin of a new species and how that would play out in its complexity.”
So the big takeaway, several castmembers and producers tell us, is that making Westworld was highly difficult, but for all the right reasons. “The greatest work never comes easy and, in my opinion, that’s what we were dealing with,” Marsden says. “This show is very ambitious and grand in scale and in themes and very expensive with a giant cast. And bigger than all of that is what this show wants to say.”
Source:
02:10 - 99 Problems - Hybrid Comedy from Raising Hope Creator in Development at CBS
CBS is developing 99 Problems, a hybrid comedy from My Name Is Earl, Raising Hope and The Millers creator Greg Garcia and his CBS TV Studios-based Amigos de Garcia Productions.
Written by Austen Earl, 99 Problems revolves around three very different couples from different backgrounds who all have a child in the same first-grade class and are exposed to the same inciting problem each week — which affects them in different ways. Earl executive produces with Amigos de Garcia’s Garcia and Alix Jaffe. CBS TV Studios is the studio.
Source:
21:55 - NBC Boosts Digital Stacking Rights for Fall Shows, Will Stream The Good Place for Free
NBC says has secured “stacking rights” to 90% of its fall TV show lineup, including “The Voice,” “Saturday Night Live” and “Superstore,” and will offer the five most recent episodes for free on its website and mobile apps — as well as full seasons to subscribers of participating pay-TV providers.
In addition, the Peacock will offer the entire season of freshman comedy “The Good Place” for free, without requiring pay-TV authentication; it’s the only show NBC owns full rights to. “The Good Place,” created by Mike Schur (“Brooklyn Nine-Nine,” “Parks and Recreation”), stars Kristen Bell as a woman who unexpectedly discovers she’s dead and Ted Danson as the architect of the afterlife she now finds herself in. It premieres Sept. 19 on NBC.
For pay-TV subs, this season NBC will offer the 25 most recent episodes of “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” and daytime drama “Days of Our Lives,” up from the five previously. Other shows for which NBC has full stacking rights (offering five free and entire seasons authenticated) include “Blindspot,” Dick Wolf’s “Chicago Fire,” “Chicago Med” and “Chicago P.D.,” and new shows including dramas “This Is Us” and sci-fi thriller “Timeless.”
During the broadcast upfronts this spring, NBC Entertainment chairman Bob Greenblatt highlighted the network’s push to acquire stacking rights. “We’ve been able to work through successfully with the various studios on getting those stacking rights as we move forward,” he said. “It’s kind of the order of the day. The studios know it.”
Meanwhile, ahead of the fall TV premieres, NBC this week released an updated and redesigned app for Apple iOS devices, its fourth major version.
The new NBC app for iOS now includes support for Google’s Chromecast, to “cast” video from mobile device to the TV, along with Apple’s AirPlay in conjunction with an Apple TV box.
NBC’s iOS app version 4.0 also sports a nifty split-view screen for the iPad. That lets users multitask to use two apps simultaneously, so you can watch a show and chat with friends at the same time. In addition, the app allows users to share episodes across social networks, and includes a 10-second-rewind button.
Also new: The NBC mobile app for iOS now works in both portrait and landscape orientation, the first broadcast network app to offer this feature.
Source:
21:50 - Law and Order: SVU - Season 18 - Anthony Edwards to Guest
Law & Order: SVU is gearing up for an ER reunion.
Anthony Edwards, who shared the screen with series star Mariska Hargitay on the NBC medical drama, is set to guest-star on an upcoming episode of her series, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.
No word yet on who Edwards will play on Law & Order: SVU, which kicks off its 18th season on Sept. 21. Edwards and Hargitay previously played love interests in the fourth season of ER, when Hargitay recurred as nurse Cynthia Hooper.
Source:
21:45 - MOVIES: Ouija: Origin of Evil - Trailer 2
21:45 - MOVIES: Collateral Beauty - Trailer feat Will Smith, Edward Norton, Keira Knightley
09:00 - Tom Burke Cast as Cormoran Strike in J.K. Rowling’s Crime Novel TV Adaptation for BBC One
Three event dramas, based on J.K. Rowling’s crime novels written under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith, set for autumn shoot in London.
British actor Tom Burke has been cast to star as Cormoran Strike in a major new TV series for BBC One.
The Strike Series is based on J.K. Rowling’s bestselling crime novels, written under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith. The Cuckoo’s Calling (3x60 minutes), The Silkworm (2x60 minutes) and Career Of Evil (2x60 minutes) will be produced as three separate event dramas and are set to begin shooting this autumn in London. The casting announcement was made today by BBC One and J.K. Rowling’s production company Brontë Film & TV.
Burke, who most recently starred in BBC’s epic War And Peace as Fedor Dolokhov and in The Musketeers as Athos, will play Strike, a war veteran turned private detective operating out of a tiny office in London’s Denmark Street. Though he’s wounded both physically and psychologically, Strike’s unique insight and his background as an SIB Investigator prove crucial in solving three complex cases which have eluded the police.
"I'm overjoyed to be immersing myself in the role of Cormoran Strike, who is as complex as he is larger than life,“ says Burke. "I know I’m joining an extraordinary team of people on a series that for me is peppered with moments of real emotional depth and meticulously grounded in the page-turning momentum of these novels. Cormoran’s world is rich and raw.”
“I'm thrilled about the casting of Tom Burke, a massively talented actor who'll bring the character to perfect life,” says J. K. Rowling. “Cormoran Strike is pure joy to write and I can't wait to see Tom play him.”
J.K. Rowling (Fantastic Beasts And Where to Find Them, The Casual Vacancy), Neil Blair (Fantastic Beasts And Where to Find Them, The Casual Vacancy), Ruth Kenley-Letts (The Casual Vacancy, The Hour) and Elizabeth Kilgarriff (for the BBC) will executive produce based on scripts by Ben Richards (The Tunnel, Sabotage, Spooks) who will write The Cuckoo’s Calling and The Silkworm, and Tom Edge (The Last Dragon Slayer, Lovesick) who will write Career of Evil. Michael Keillor (Line Of Duty, Critical) will direct The Cuckoo’s Calling, and Jackie Larkin (Stella Days, Kings) will produce.
“Tom Burke has all the talent, depth and versatility needed to take on the mantle of Cormoran Strike,” says Executive Producer Ruth Kenley-Letts. “He’ll bring his own particular wisdom, charisma and emotional complexity to the part. We couldn’t be more thrilled to be working with him.”
Charlotte Moore, Director of BBC Content and Ben Stephenson, former Controller BBC Drama Commissioning, originally ordered the show.
Lucy Richer, BBC Acting Controller of Drama, says: “Tom Burke is the perfect person to bring to life the lead character of Cormoran Strike from these investigative crime stories which are the work of a master storyteller. Readers have fallen for Strike and I think the television audience will too.”
This marks a continuation of the BBC’s relationship with Brontë Film and TV and J.K. Rowling. Brontë Film & TV produced J.K. Rowling’s The Casual Vacancy, a three-part serial, which aired on BBC One in 2015.
The Cuckoo’s Calling was published to critical acclaim in 2013 and went on to be a global bestseller, followed in 2014 by The Silkworm and Career Of Evil in 2015. All three books were number one Sunday Times bestsellers in both hardback and paperback and Little, Brown has sold in total over four million copies worldwide across all editions.
Cormoran Strike is one of the most memorable and distinctive detectives in crime fiction today and Robert Galbraith is among the genre’s most celebrated writers, shortlisted for the prestigious CWA Gold Dagger in 2015 and the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year in 2016.
Source:
05:00 - Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life - Read a Script Page from the Netflix Revival
05:00 - MOVIES: Booster Gold - Greg Berlanti Reveals Movie Won’t Be Set in DC Cinematic Universe
Back in May, superhero fans displeased with the DC cinematic universe's sludge-heavy darkness saw a ray of light when the world learned a Booster Gold movie was in development. The character is a humorous DC Comics mainstay, a cocky gent from the future who steals some high-tech equipment, travels back in time, and seeks fame and fortune as a superhero in the present. What's more, the potential film was being developed and possibly directed by Greg Berlanti, the super-producer behind sunny DC TV properties like The Flash and Supergirl. But as Vulture learned during our talk with Berlanti, it looks like Ol' Boosty won't be inhabiting the same shared universe as Batfleck and the murderous Henry Cavill Superman.
"As of right now we have no connective tissue to those worlds," Berlanti said when asked if the movie would be part of the DC Extended Universe that already includes Man of Steel, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, and Suicide Squad (with Wonder Woman and Justice League following in 2017). "It'd be a separate thing." He also said the project emerged from a long-dead Booster Gold TV show idea he was working on with longtime producing collaborator Andrew Kreisberg that "never got off the ground." After it bit the dust, Berlanti and Kreisberg got into talks with DC Entertainment president and chief creative officer (and reported new film co-chief) Geoff Johns, and the topic of the producing duo doing a movie came up.
Source:
05:00 - MOVIES: A Wrinkle in Time - Reese Witherspoon and Mindy Kaling in Negotiations to Join Disney Adaptation
Reese Witherspoon and Mindy Kaling are in negotiations to star in A Wrinkle in Time, Ava DuVernay and Disney’s adaptation of Madeleine L’Engle’s classic children’s book.
The Newbery Medal-winning book centers on a young girl who finds herself on an interplanetary journey with a schoolmate and her younger brother to locate her missing father, a scientist. They are aided on their quest by a trio of supernatural beings, Mrs. Whatsit, Mrs. Who and Mrs. Which.
Witherspoon will play Mrs. Whatsit, a former celestial being who looks like a grandmotherly hobo, and Kaling will play the literature-quoting Mrs. Who. The duo will join Oprah Winfrey, who is already on board to play Mrs. Which.
DuVernay is directing the project, which has a script by Frozen writer and co-director Jennifer Lee. Jim Whitaker is producing with Catherine Hand. Tendo Nagenda and Jessica Virtue are overseeing for the studio.
A November start in Los Angeles is scheduled.
Source:
05:00 - Nashville - Season 5 - Looking to Add Major New Character
Nashville may have started production on its new season, but the CMT series is looking to add a major new character.
The network has put out a nationwide casting notice for the character of Clay, described as a 21-to-26-year-old African American musician in his mid-20s who is destined for great things: “He is a creative, self-aware, highly motivated young man who suffers intense mood swings, but is nonetheless charming and outgoing. His musical style is eclectic, with modern elements but also nods to roots black music, bluegrass, and even classic country.”
EW has learned that Clay is going to play an important role in season 5 and that new showrunners Marshall Herskovitz and Ed Zwick are scripting Nashville’s storylines toward a return to the show’s musical roots.
Source:
