Nellie Andreeva

Six years after originally developing Rodney Rothman’s Early Bird: A Memoir of Premature Retirement as a comedy series, NBC is taking another stab at a comedy series adaptation of the book by the former Late Show with David Letterman head writer, which chronicled his experiences living with retirees in Florida. The network is currently redeveloping the project as a single-camera comedy about a young guy who moves into a retirement community. NBC has already hired a casting director and intends to shoot a pilot but will make a formal decision after it sees Rothman’s new script, which is now being written. UMS and 3 Arts, which also produced the first NBC adaptation, are producing. The first incarnation of the project got to a pilot stage in 2005. The single-camera pilot was directed by Paul Feig and starred Timm Sharp as a writer who was fired from his dream TV writing job and finds himself chilling out at a retirement village where he loves the laid-back lifestyle. TV Land’s similarly themed multi-camera sitcom Retired at 35 premieres on January 19.

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