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It may be just a funny feeling, but the long-awaited full-blown comedy comeback may finally happen next fall judging by this year’s crop of primetime pilots. I haven’t seen a development season with so many strong comedy contenders at the broadcast networks in years. NBC already picked Outsourced, with Perfect Couples, Paul Reiser’s Next and This Little Piggy also getting solid response. CBS’ has what appears like another slam-dunk from Chuck Lorre in Mike & Molly, with Bleep My Dad Said, Team Spitz, True Love and Livin’ on a Prayer all buzzed about. At Fox, Traffic Light, Keep Hope Alive and Wilde Kingdom are going strong, possibly joined by the Christian Slater starrer Security, and the untitled couples pilot wowed them at ABC, which is high on Mr. Sunshine, with Wright vs. Wrong and Happy Endings also in contention. What is even more remarkable is that a lot of the frontrunners feel different from the tried-and-true broadcast comedy fare, like a workplace comedy set in India (Outsourced), a comedy about an overweight couple (Mike & Molly), a show based on a Twitter feed (Bleep) and an Israeli transplant (Traffic Light).
A big comedy comeback also has history on its side. They say turnarounds in the genre are always triggered by family comedy, which blows the doors down for the rest to follow. In the 1980s when comedy was declared dead too, it was NBC’s The Cosby Show that brought the genre back to its glory. This time around, it was ABC’s breakout family comedy Modern Family that seems to have energized comedy creators and executives, fueling the current resurgence.
As for serious drama, it seems to be struggling outside of AMC and FX. The biggest new hourlong show on the broadcast nets this season is the musical dramedy Glee. Of the three hourlong new series picked up by NBC so far, only the serialized The Event fits the serious drama description. It’s joined by romantic dramedy Love Bites and popcorn spy show Undercovers. Fun procedurals are in fashion with CBS’ Hawaii Five-O, Fox’s Breakout Kings and NBC’s Rockford Files.
TV Editor Nellie Andreeva - tip her here.
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Jeff Gaspin is turning NBC into USA and I think that’s a great move!! This is the man that helped shows like Burn Notice blossom.
True Love is the stuff. Hope that show gets picked up.
I constantly see comments on this blog talking about how great True Love is. Are these people Tarses shills? I can’t see how anyone who actually read that script thought it was anything other than a heaping pile of crap that went to pilot because it was written by a Tarses. Sorry for being crass, but this “true love is so great” b.s. is irritating.
Bitter much? That script was great.
Bitter much, “writer”? True love was a great script and the pilot turned out great.
“I can’t see how anyone who actually read that script thought it was anything other than a heaping pile of crap that went to pilot because it was written by a Tarses.”
Don’t be jealous Writer. Just because you can’t get work doesn’t mean you can’t be happy for those who do. And if you truly believe that the “Tarses” name is such a door-opener in Hollywood, then change your name to Tarses. I’d like to see how far you get with that name.
Maybe you’ll learn that talent still carries some weight in this town.
After the pilots I sat through this week, i’d say talent doesn’t carry as much weight as name in this town. A five year old on a sugar high is more creative than most of the pilots I saw. Won’t say what network.
Think about it: the hottest children’s television show around is iCarly. ICarly is just an updated kid version of the Mary Tyler Moore Show.
If tweens love the iKidMaryTylerMooreShow, it seems as if, when they get a little older, they’ll probably like the iMaryTylerMooreShow, and the iRhoda, too.
Honestly, Outsourced looks to be DOA otherwise there could be a possible comeback. The people want family comedies; not a overseas thing from India, one about two fat people, or one about a traffic cop worker who happens to be jewish. The only reason why people warmed to Cheers is because it is a family comedy at heart. NewsRadio, Taxi, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, and The Drew Carey Show all worked because they followed the same formula as Cheers. NBC’s current workplace comedies don’t work because they remind people of work, and they manage to sap all the energy out of the viewer trying to find the comedy.
I’ve said this over and over again and yet no one seems to be listening. NBC’s niche comedies are not working. Hipsters love them, but other people aren’t watching them. TV shows about work only seem to work with people who don’t actually have jobs.
That kind of attitude is the reason why we are heading towards Idiocracy. More bland and predicable comedies! Less smart and witty comedies! Yeah, that’s a great idea. *shakes head*
Perhaps, however creative you feel these shows are (even though they are all variations of the same show from the SNL cabal), they are not getting the eyeballs. These shows (with the exception of the Office) belong on cable, not network television.
How is Glee the top hour long scripted show given that NCIS: Los Angeles and The Good Wife both draw in more total viewers? Or is the 18-49 demo the only thing that matters?
18-49 is the only thing that matters. Even if viewers did matter, as of late ‘Glee’ is right up there with ‘The Good Wife’, which would actually be a bubble show based on its 18-49 had it not been renewed.
What about The Strip and Beach Lane, though? I fail to see how a show by Paul Reiser can beat out shows by Tom Lennon/Ben Garant and Paul Simms. I thought NBC was about intelligent comedy?
Shows by Lennon/Garant and Simms seem like much better fits with the amazing comedies NBC is currently airing on Thursdays. Why would NBC want to dilute its comedic brand with the lackluster titles you listed above? Perfect Couples and This Little Piggy feel like titles that ABC would have picked up pre-2009. That is not a good thing.
Most of these comedies seem destined to fail. A nearly all Indian cast in an “outsourcing comedy?” That’s something so stupid only a TV exec would green-light it. Particularly in this economy.
I must have missed where “Rockford Files” is a procedural. Hint: get someone who knows a bit about TV.
Nearly all these shows are destined to fail. Whoever stars in Rockford won’t be James Garner. Roy Huggins and Steven J. Cannell won’t be writing the episodes. Mike Post won’t do the score. It will be inferior in every way to the original. AND FAIL.
What the hell does Steve Carrell know about private eye shows? Heck Huggins had a FAILURE with the Outsider, starring Darren McGavin, that allowed him with Cannell to rework elements that kept the first show from being a success. Carrell knows smug, yuppie sneering, which is exactly the kind of guy that was the target of the title character in the series.
Hawaii Five O? Whoever stars in it won’t be Jack Lord. So that’s another show that fails in comparison to the original which is available on DVD (and probably Hulu or something).
Christian Slater? Isn’t he 0-2 in series now? Won’t this make him 0-3? Paul Rieser? Hint: it’s not the early 1990′s any more.
I don’t see a break-out concept, I don’t see stuff for the missing audience (men), I don’t see a fat couple catching on. I don’t see really funny men and women backed by talented writers other than Lorre, maybe, but whose going to star in his stuff.
A show based on Twitter feeds? Really?
The reason “no one knows anything” is because they’re so decadent and socially removed from the audience, they’re like Peter Fonda in “the Limey.” That guy. Where a Twitter feed seems as good an idea as anything else for a show.
Right. It’s just about a Twitter feed.
If you don’t see the potential brilliance of a sit-com starring Shatner as a curmudgeonly old dad, you’re dead inside.
The Shat + Sit-com = possible new classic
(It may suck, but I’m not writing it off like “I hate Hollywood” Whiskey.
Please do us a favor and try to at least express your racism in a slightly less obvious way.
Please do us a favor and try to at least express your pissy liberal hostility in a slightly less obvious way.
Um… Jeff Gaspin had nada to do with Burn Notice. Not one thing.
Hats off to him for not being Ben Silverman. But he also didn’t cure polio, land on the moon, or give you away at your wedding. There are many things he had nothing to do with, and Burn Notice is one of them. That show is on the air because a junior exec named Alex Sepiol pushed for it, and Bonnie Hammer’s marketing people liked the idea.
Apparently you’re wrong about that.
http://behindthescreensblog.com/2009/08/05/nbc-does-the-right-thing-bs-out-gaspin-in/
“In 2007 Gaspin was made head of NBC’s cable division. Here again he was successful helping develop shows like BURN NOTICE and ROYAL PAINS the top two sc’ripted shows on Cable right now. He has increased viewing and profit for all the major cable brands and helped increase the cable division with acquisitions of Oxygen and The Weather Channel.
No. He’s not wrong about that.
This make come as a huge shock to somebody who reads about TV instead of making it… but the Hollywood press rarely has any idea who does what. Gaspin was big big picture and probably never heard about Burn Notice until he was nodding his head at a one-sheet they showed him. If you want to credit him for that show, go ahead. But you’d be wrong.
Gaspin also launched Queer Eye for The Straight Guy even though other execs at Bravo were skeptical about it. That’s according to multiple sources.
It’s settled then. A high ranking exec who had the temerity to launch a much talked about, not-terribly-profitable reality show on Bravo is clearly the savior of network television. Gaspin for president.
I think Nellie’s right. Comedies are making a great come back this year. I’ve read some outstanding things about Outsourced. Those naysayers having a knee-jerk reaction about NBC’s development season need to realize that the network is now run by Jeff Gaspin, who helped Burn Notice on USA. NBC is in good hands. Now, if they would only fire Jeff Zucker.
But let’s say I am your boss and I come into your office along with all your employees and tell you that you have 30 minutes to pack up and get the hell out with just two weeks of severance pay because your job is being shipped overseas, and I am the lucky one that has to go over there to train the replacements on how to do your job before I get outsourced. Trust me when I say that Outsourced shouldn’t have made it past the pitch meeting.
with them having picked up outsourced it’s apparently they are changing their lineups. you still have perfect couples awaiting to be screened and paul reiser’s comedy which from what ive heard is a given. perfect couples at this point is a second tier show that might be saved for a replacement or summer.
the comedy pilot with funniest premise and cast is Wright V. Wrong
excited to see paul reiser’s return to prime time. big fan of my two dads, and bye bye love! go NEXT…. also excited to see ben silverman’s return to the bar – that should be equally, if not more interesting.
william b. williams said it–NBC is supposedly about “intelligent comedy.” i was just saying on the other thread (about the NBC/Twitter thing), i saw “the strip” at UCB and it’s a smart sitcom, not a stupid one like “2 1/2 men”, i don’t know why they would put on some insipid crap about relationships (or paul reiser, he’s so old now!) when they could have a different, new kind of sitcom from lennon/garant?
They are considering “This Little Piggy” according to the Hollywood Reporter which has more mass appeal. I thought they weren’t picking up Little Piggy? What happened?
http://livefeed.hollywoodreporter.com/2010/05/pilot-update-top-contenders-for-fall-.html#more
Now can have Angela Bromstad fired from her position? These moves are totally idiotic!
Angela Bromstad is not Ben Silverman thank god.
Enough with the Lennon and Garant worship. Yes, they are nice guys. Reno 911 (the tv series) can be funny and Night at the Museum was a big hit. But The Pacifier, Herbie the Love Bug, Balls of Fury… It’s not like they are in the Pantheon of comedy.
anybody hear anything about Adam Carolla’s comedy pilot?