Supergirl and the Four-Timers' Club

It's Supergirl!
Coming soon to CBS

So much has been made in seasons past of mega-successful TV producers who juggle multiple shows on the air, and all the moving parts that must entail.  The feat is made all the more impressive when you note how producers like Dick Wolf and Shonda Rhimes preside over programs that also happen to be among the best in their genres.

Super-successful Shonda Rhimes

Next season, both producers will probably keep their records in tact, with four definite shows for Wolf (granddaddy Law & Order:  SVU plus Chicago Fire and its now two spinoffs, Chicago P.D. and the new Chicago Medical) and probably four for Rhimes (the grandmommy Grey's Anatomy, plus mega-hot Scandal and How to Get Away with Murder and ABC's likely pickup of a new drama, The Catch.)

Prolific producer Dick Wolf

But while those producers have sold their wares all to one network (Wolf at NBC, Rhimes at ABC, and, let's not forget that before this season's finale of Two and a Half Men, Chuck Lorre had four shows at CBS), undoubtedly leveraging one's popularity to gain pickup for another, yet another megasuccessful producer has emerged, with shows all over the broadcast dial.

Four-timer (and counting) Greg Berlanti

As of Fall 2015, Greg Berlanti will also have at least four shows on the air, with the CW's Arrow and The Flash, NBC's recently picked up suspenser Blindspot, and now CBS' announcement that it has picked up Supergirl to series.  Will NBC break the tie by maintaining a fifth Berlanti series on its airwaves, the on-the-bubble Mysteries of Laura, next season?  We'll find out this coming Monday, May 11, when all things peacock will be revealed.

In the meanwhile, news is just coming out today about Supergirl as CBS' first new series pickup.  That the story broke today is already an impressive feat, considering how secretive CBS normally is about its upfront news; in fact, journalists have nicknamed the secrecy surrounding the network's last-minute programming war room each May "Les Moonves' Cone of Silence."  But with a producer like Berlanti who has clout, he can ask for an early deadline for the decision.

Supergirl stars Melissa Benoist in the title role of Kara Danvers/Kara Zor-El, cousin of Superman; the show's pilot, written by Berlanti, Ali Adler and Andrew Kreisberg, starts with Kara at age 24, deciding to embrace her superhuman abilities and becoming a hero.  The impressive cast also contains Calista Flockhart, as Kara's tough boss, Cat Grant; Mehcad Brooks as love interest Jimmy Olsen; Chyler Leigh as Kara's doctor sister, Alex Danvers; David Harewood as supervillain Hank Henshaw aka Cyborg Superman; and Laura Benanti in a recurring role as Kara's birth mother, Alura Zor-El.  All that, plus the news that broke a few months back that this adaptation will bring back some faces familiar to Superman fans, with Helen Slater (big-screen Supergirl) and Dean Cain (Lois & Clark:  The New Adventures of Superman) cast in "secret roles."

No word yet from CBS as to whether the show will debut in Fall 2015, or "midseason" (even though CBS President Nina Tassler has officially banished that word), or in what time slot.  That news will come on Wednesday, May 13, as CBS rolls out its upfront presentation at New York's Carnegie Hall.  Stay tuned!

Meet Madam Secretary

When Téa Leoni first read the pilot script for Madam Secretary, from renowned show creator Barbara Hall (Joan of Arcadia), “I knew right away who this woman was going to be.” In contemplating taking on her first regular dramatic series, Leoni admits that three role models immediately came to mind: Hillary Clinton, Madeleine Albright, and Condoleezza Rice.  So as an actress, “I’m in a great position, where I can steal from those women, and the show can imagine more.”

To that point, Leoni explains that Madam Secretary will show not only the high-stakes working world of brand-new Secretary of State Elizabeth McCord -- amid an administration boasting Keith Carradine as the president, and Emmy winner Zeljko Ivanek, multiple Emmy/Tony winner Bebe Neuwirth and Tony winner Patina Miller among his staff -- but the other half of her life as well, with husband Henry (Tim Daly) and two kids.

The highly-sought actress reveals she was already a big fan of the similarly multi-faceted The Good Wife (and indeed CBS' President Nina Tassler and the network's scheduling guru Kelly Kahl both joke that Madam Secretary is perfectly positioned among its new Sunday night neighbors, because "the show looks like what would happen if 60 Minutes and The Good Wife had a baby.")  With Julianna Margulies’ Alicia Florrick now following Leoni's Elizabeth McCord, the 48-year-old actress is excited that “we have strong, complex and dynamic women on television.”  So while in real life, Leoni hopes that Mrs. Clinton will leverage her years of experience into a presidential bid in 2016, for now, regarding her character, a former professor and CIA analyst, “This is the woman I want to see in office.”

Madam Secretary

CBS

Sundays at 8PM

beginning September 21

Two and a Half Married Men

At the Television Critics Association convention last week, CBS President Nina Tassler was excited to make an announcement about the storyline for the twelfth and final, 13-episode season of Two and a Half Men.  After surviving a near-death experience, Walden (Ashton Kutcher) becomes determined to raise a child.  But as a single man, his chances for an adoption getting approved seem slim – so he and Alan (Jon Cryer) stage a sham gay marriage.

On Thursday night, at CBS’ star-studded TCA party at West Hollywood’s Pacific Design Center, I caught up with the show’s executive producer Chuck Lorre, and asked about the inspiration for the storyline.  Chuck is always a fun and candid interviewee, and here he gives some honest assessments of where the long-running show has been, and where it hopes to end up.

Must-Hear TV:  What inspired the gay storyline for Two and a Half Men’s final season?

Chuck Lorre:  It was a brilliant idea that was proposed by Jim Patterson and Don Reo, who are the head writers on the show.  I thought it was both very funny and very heartwearming, that these guys would go to such great lengths to take a kid out of the foster system and give him a home.  Yes, there’s some subterfuge involved in doing that, gaming the system.  But the intention is to give a child a home, and it brings the series back full circle, to where it’s about two men trying to teach a young boy how to become a man.

MHTV:  Any chance the concept could go so well, it could become a spinoff?

Lorre:  I have no idea.  I just fell in love with it the minute they said it.  And I hope it breathes life into the show.  This is the end of Two and a Half Men this season.  But whether this concept goes beyond that, I have no idea.

MHTV:  Whose idea to get married?

Lorre:  It’s Walden’s. 

MHTV:  Does Alan think he’s crazy?

Lorre:  Alan doesn’t want to sign a pre-nup.  He’s no fool.  The guy’s a billionaire!

MHTV:  Wasn’t Alan’s dream always to marry a billionaire?

Lorre:  Yes.  And now, there are issues of money, and a joint checking account.  And hopefully we can play this for comedy.  Their basic intention, I think, is wonderful.  They want to have a child.  And sexuality is irrelevant.  If you’re taking care of a child, who cares what you do in the privacy of your bedroom.  Isn’t that the whole point?

MHTV:   Or what you don’t do.   You have played with the gay subtext over the years.

Lorre:  Oh absolutely.  We have dominated the cheap laughs in that arena.  I know what the show is.  The show is what it is.  But it’s been hilariously good fun to do it.

MHTV:  Does this marriage and fatherhood preclude the guys from ending up in happily-ever-after relationships with women by the end of the show?

Lorre:  I think their romantic travails will go forward.  It’s a TV series, not a movie.  Their lives go on.  They’re going to be cheating spouses.

MHTV:  Like green card spouses “cheat” on each other?

Lorre:  Yes.  There’s no effort here in our last and final season to try to reach for any dignity.  It’s too late for that.

MHTV:  Has the child been cast?  How old is he?

Lorre:  We have not cast the child yet.  But we’re looking.  Probably between 5 and 10 years old. 

MHTV:  Definitely a boy?

Lorre:  We’re thinking a boy right now.  Because that was the essence of the whole idea in the beginning.  These two very different men raising a young boy, and trying to have an impact on his maturation.  And really the combination of the two of them was the best parent.  

MHTV:  When a show touches on LGBT themes in a comic way like this, there’s a potential for blowback.  Do you anticipate people having a problem with the storyline?

Lorre:  I hope there’s none.  The show has always caused controversy.  There’s no intention to insult or diminish anyone.  The intention is to create laughter.  That’s it.  Create laughter, and if it’s got a heartbeat in there somewhere, that would be nice, too.

MHTV:  Are you hoping to bring back any characters for the final season who were part of the show earlier?  Might we see Charlie or Charlie’s ghost?

Lorre:  We haven’t discussed that.  We were really focused on finding a storyline that puts Jon and Ashton front and center in a really interesting, hopefully funny and provocative story.  That was our priority going in in this last year.  What’s the storyline that puts these two guys right in the middle of it?  So outside characters will come in as they do, but that’s the focus right now.

MHTV:  It’s a storyline that has generated the most interest in the show in years.

Lorre:  Yes – in year twelve!

MHTV:  You’re like the SVU of comedy!  And the gay marriage storyline couldn’t be more timely.

Lorre:  Yeah, it’s timely, and again, it has a heartbeat.  Ashton Kutcher himself is a man with a huge heart – he’s very engaged in social welfare, and puts a lot of time and money into making things better.  And getting a little of that spirit in the show – rather than having him do what the show used to be – has been a journey.  This seems like the next logical step.  Not romance, not sex, but raising a child.  We had enough sex on this show.

MHTV:  Really?  There’s sex?  There are sex jokes?  I didn’t catch those.

Lorre:  I think adding any more sexual jokes on this show could actually be a misdemeanor of some sort.

Two and a Half Men

CBS

Returns Thursday, October 30

9 PM

Fall Preview: CBS' Hostages

Hostages

Mondays at 10 PM Eastern/9 PM Central,

Premiering September 23

With its similarly intense mix of political intrigue and personal drama, Hostages is obviously harboring hopes of becoming the next Homeland.  After all, the two series have more in common than merely the cleverness of their blonde heroines; both action thrillers have origins in Israel, which is fast becoming fertile ground for growing America’s future TV hits.

Showtime’s series, adapted from the Israeli Hatufim, captured critical raves and swept the Emmy Awards in 2012.  Now, CBS’ high-concept Hostages, based on a previously unproduced script out of Tel Aviv, has nabbed both a top-notch cast and one of TV’s highest-profile launching pads for a drama, the network’s Mondays at 10.

Hostages stars Toni Collette in the juicy lead role of Ellen Sanders, a Washington, DC surgeon whose family is taken captive by team of rogue FBI agents on the eve of her operation on the President of the United States.  Commanded to kill her political patient, Sanders is tested in her resolve as a medical professional, as a wife and mother, and as a patriotic citizen.  The scope of the story, says producer Alon Aranya, who teamed with writer Jeffrey Nachmanoff to tailor the original script for an American audience, reaches beyond that of the typical television procedural.  The intricately-plotted, surprise-rigged Hostages “will be like a feature film designed for TV.”

In another way that Hostages will be notable for the network, the series will, following its September premiere, run for 15 straight episodes with few repeats or interruptions, before ceding its timeslot in early 2014 to another hotly anticipated drama. (Intelligence, which stars Lost’s Josh Holloway as a government intelligence operative whose brain has been implanted with a supercomputer microchip and CSI’s Marg Helgenberger as his agency boss, is scheduled to debut February 24.)  Such shorter seasons have long been the norm on cable, but as network president Nina Tassler explains, this is a first for CBS:  “We’re normally in the 22-episode business, because our fans don’t want less of their favorite shows – they want more.”  But Tassler and her team were soon won over by the Hostages producers’ detailed plans for a nailbiting first season, which she describes as “fifteen really terrific episodes, jampacked with big events and plot twists.”

The twists were what lured actors like Collette, who remembers that “when I read the pilot script, it was unlike any other show.  I loved that I didn’t know what was happening -- although I thought I did.  It really was a page-turner, where I couldn’t put it down.”  Collette is joined by Tate Donovan as Ellen’s less successful – and less-than-faithful – husband Brian, Dylan McDermott as Duncan Carlisle, the erstwhile Fed turned conspirator and kidnapper, and James Naughton as the President targeted for assassination.

But both Hostages’ producer and leading lady warn not to blindly accept these simplified descriptions of the show’s characters.  “The show is a conspiracy thriller – and as such, all is not what it seems.  There’s always another layer,” Aranya teases.

“People keep asking Dylan, ‘How is it to play the bad guy?’” Collette adds.  “But he may not be entirely bad.  All of these characters have their reasons for doing what they do.  And those reasons will slowly be revealed.”

CBS Goes Gayer

Last week, the gay media watchdog group GLAAD issued its annual report card, where it grades TV networks on their representation -- or lack thereof -- of LGBT characters. As in the past, in GLAAD's estimation, CBS flunked out.

This morning, at the very start of the two-week Television Critics of America press tour in Beverly Hills, CBS President Nina Tassler was asked to address the failing grade.

The network, she said first of all, did have a few gay characters in some of their pilots for this fall, but none of those got picked up. And so, she says, "We're adding a few characters to this season because we're very disappointed in our track record so far. We know, and we will do better."

There will be at least three new gay characters on CBS this fall, Tassler pointed out. We will meet Alicia Florrick's gay brother in season 2 of The Good Wife. On Rules of Engagement this fall, we'll meet the lesbian from Jeff's softball team who will become the surrogate mother for Audrey and him. And on S#*! My Dad Says, Tim Bagley's gay DMV worker -- in my estimation, the best part of that show's pilot -- has become a series regular.

Stay tuned for more news coming out of the TCA, including spoilers from Desperate Housewives' upcoming season 7!

RIP Three Rivers 2009-2009

Live from the CBS Presentation at the Television Critics Association (TCA) conference in Pasadena comes the sad news of the fate of one of CBS' fall shows, the previously "on hiatus" Three Rivers.

When asked whether that euphemistic status really means "cancelled," CBS President Nina Tassler spared no words as she earned a few laughs: yes. "I think we've all been doing this long enough to know what 'on hiatus' really means," she admitted.

But on the plus side, the Alex O'Loughlin-led series, set in a Pittsburgh organ transplant hospital, managed in its short life to save eight real lives, as it inspired people to sign up for organ donation. How many other series can say that?

NCIS Spinoff in the works

Legendary TV writer/creator Don Bellisario doesn't use the word spinoff when referring to his series NCIS, which was first introduced as a special episode of Bellisario's earlier show JAG.

But today at the TCA, CBS President Nina Tassler referred to a new NCIS "spinoff," which will be now introduced in exactly the same way:  as an episode of the ever-growing Tuesday night hit.  According to Tassler:

It's happening.  We're doing it... We've seen an outline.  We're in great shape, and we're just waiting to get the script, but we're going to cast, and we're going to shoot...

More to come...!

CBS uses a euphemism for the "C" word for Swingtown

This morning at the TCA convention in Los Angeles, CBS network president Nina Tassler inched a step further in saying goodbye to Swingtown, although she still never said the official word:  cancelled.  But that's not a cause for hope, fans.  It's gone.

One thing that we're really proud of is the execution of Swingtown.  It was a terrific show and, look, I'm happy to report it ended up on over a half dozen Top Ten lists from 2008.  So at the end of the day, I think the show was well-executed.  It was well-received.  The performances were great.  And in many regards it I think that show was also a victim of the [writers'] strike, but it was a risk, and we took it, and we're proud of it and certainly would take it again.

When asked to confirm whether that meant Swingtown might still have a shot at resurrection, Tassler shook her head no.

No.  We're not going back to Swingtown right now.

Sorry, swingers!  But if it's the '70s you want, there's always ABC's Life On Mars...

John Mayer Live on CBS?

This morning at the TCA convention in Los Angeles, CBS President Nina Tassler confirmed that the network is indeed "pretty close to closing our deal" with singer John Mayer for a new musical/sketch/variety show.  Looks like NBC and Rosie Live! didn't kill the genre after all.

As of now, Tassler said, there will just be a pilot -- which could lead either to a further series of specials, or to a regular series.  "We're just going to shoot the pilot now, see what we have, and make a decision after that," confirmed the network prez.

What gives it such a Big Bang?

This past Monday, CBS' sitcoms Big Bang Theory and How I Met Your Mother scored record ratings.  For Big Bang, it was both the highest overall and adults 18-49 ratings ever.  For HIMYM, it was also the show's record best in the demo, and its second highest overall numbers ever.

And so one of the questions reporters asked CBS' President Nina Tassler at the TCA conference in Los Angeles this morning:  why do you think Big Bang Theory has taken off this season?  Is it a matter of scheduling, or has the show just gotten -- to borrow a phrase from HIMYM's Barney -- awesome?Tassler's theory:  it's all in the writing, yes, but particularly in the supporting characters.  "One of the things great showrunners do," she said, "is ensure that they fully dimensionalize the supporting characters.  And so there have been episodes with Koothrappali and Wolowitz this season that have been truly hysterical."  By opening up a show's story potential by enriching the lives of not just the leads but of all of its characters, a writer/showrunner like Chuck Lorre is constructing a template for a comedy whose comedy will hold up even "into its later seasons."

Sounds like CBS is high on Big Bang -- and they have every right to be.  The show, and another CBS newbie Gary Unmarried on Wednesday, are the sole new multicamera hits to be introduced on the Big 5 networks in years.  And this morning, when Tassler was asked about CBS' future plans and development, she repeatedly mentioned the network's pride in having successfully opened a new night of comedy on Wednesday, with Gary and a relocated The New Adventures of Old Christine.

More news from Tassler and CBS to come...

A Presidential "State of Comedy" Address

As the oft-told story goes, in the spring of 1983, people were saying the sitcom was dead. On NBC, freshman Family Ties was struggling, and another brand new comedy Cheers, ranked dead last in the Nielsen ratings. Then, in the fall of ‘84, The Cosby Show premiered and changed everything.

Now, to end network comedy’s current drought, comedy fans have been waiting for the next Cosby for over a decade. Although the sitcom had proliferated on TV in the ‘90s – to an extent, wearing out its welcome – trend after trend has chipped away at the number of half-hours on each network’s lineup. First there were the umpteen editions of Dateline, taking up valuable NBC real estate. Then game shows, like ABC’s eight-days-a-week Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. Then the continuing reality juggernaut (some would say “scourge”), starting in 2000 with CBS’ Survivor.

But these competing formats are not totally to blame; network comedy has all along been devouring itself. And this is why: if you, average aspiring writer, happen to have the world’s best idea for a new network comedy, you can’t just walk into NBC and slap it on Ben Silverman’s desk. No, in order to create one’s own sitcom, a would-be comedy writer must first make his or way through “the system.” That is, a writer must land an agent, then a highly-coveted, nearly non-existent starter’s (or “staff writer”) position on an existing sitcom, then be lucky enough to maintain steady employment so as to toil for years, working his or way up the ladder to the ultimate rung of “executive producer.” The trouble is, with so few comedies on the air, this career-path has become non-existent. There are no shows for one to work one’s way up on. The pipeline is blocked.

And thus with fewer “showrunner”-level writers available – and their continued unwillingness, despite their professions to the contrary, to look outside the pool of usual suspects – the networks have fewer choices when it comes to developing pilots, and fewer chances of hitting the great sitcom lottery by producing the next, game-changing Cosby.

It’s a downward spiral. And from what the networks’ presidents each told me last month at the Television Critics Association convention in Los Angeles, they obviously know it. I heard Fox’s Kevin Reilly and CBS’ Nina Tassler discuss The Great Comedy Question from the TCA stage, and cornered ABC’s Steve McPherson and NBC’s Ben Silverman at their respective networks’ parties. What is the state of network comedy today?, my fellow critics and I asked each of them. What are you doing to revive it? What are you looking for, and where are you going to find it?

The answers below may sound encouraging, but beware: we’ve heard some of this, particularly about opening the studio gates to untested talent, before. So believe this stuff when you see it – that is, when you finally find that screamingly funny sitcom showing up on your screen.

I’m so confident and excited about where we stand as the clear comedy leader in broadcast TV… I love our lineup on Thursday, with a night of sophisticated comedy with movie and TV stars that transcend the genre. …These are the best talents assembled. Our comedies rock. I’m very excited and I feel bullish about it. [And as for multi-camera comedy] , we’re aggressively looking for those as well. We’re developing it. We’re just trying to find the best talent to invest in and believe in their ideas.

[As for any further upcoming new comedies], Thursday night is still the home of the vast majority of our comedies, and that’s probably where we would target. But over time, I’m hoping that we get some traction and some hits and can open up new nights.

- Ben Silverman, Co-Chairman, NBC Entertainment and NBC Universal Television Studio

We’ve talked about [the dire state of comedy] every year. And I can’t even talk to the platitude of “it’s cyclical; it’s going to come back.” My observation is that a lot of confidence has left the creative space on a day-to-day basis. I see really talented people coming in very skittish, not knowing what to pitch, what will sell. I see executives trying to figure out where there is a nerve to hit…

We’re really going to mix it up this year. I’ll tell you one thing we’re doing, which sounds silly, but we’ve agreed in our comedy pitches we’re not going to take most of our pitches in our office. We’re going to go out and meet the writers on their own turf, and that could be at a restaurant. If they want to do it in their house, we’ll do it in their house -- anything that just gets it out of a sterile environment and try something different. …We’re going to try to … pay writers a little bit of money… and say, “You want to shoot something before you come in? Don’t sit on our couch and pitch us. Go shoot something and then pop it in the machine, even if it’s not for air.” We’ve got to do anything to mix it up.

We’ve got one project,… Boldly Going Nowhere for midseason that I think is going to be a great stake in the ground for the next generation of comedy for us. It’s one of the funniest scripts I’ve read in a long time. It’s single camera. It’s sort of The Office in space – petty jealousies and incompetencies on a long-term mission to wherever they’re going. …I feel like right now there’s opportunity for a lot of young voices to come up, and we’re not giving up… Our comedy brand has been a little anemic… for all of our success in the last batch of years, and we’re ready for our next Malcolm in the Middle.

- Kevin Reilly, President, Entertainment, Fox Broadcasting Company

I think comedy is not dead at all. I think comedy is alive and well -- it’s just that we’ve got to execute some good ones. [As for single-camera versus multi-camera format], I don’t think it’s the form that matters – I think it’s point of view and content and whether it’s good or not. [It may be in the more traditional, multi-camera format, but] you watch reruns of Seinfeld, because it’s a great show. Sitcoms aren’t failing because of the form, but because there haven’t been great ones that have worked.

We’re trying to find new things and voices from other places, whether it’s the book world or feature world or [elsewhere]. We’ve just got to keep looking. We’re lucky when we can put together a Don Todd with a Christina Applegate [on Samantha Who?] It doesn’t come along that often. Or for example take Chuck Lorre and Charlie Sheen – you’ve got to find these great combinations, and we’re looking for that.

I think that’s one of the challenges of the comedy world, that there isn’t the same bench strength …that there is in the drama world. So we’ve got to keep pounding the pavement and be open to new voices. We’ve got to be much more open to all different angles of getting the stuff. We’ll just keep looking… We’ll continue to develop year-round and announce [new shows] when it makes sense.

- Steve McPherson, President, ABC Entertainment

Certainly [with] our comedies, … look at the huge step we made this year in terms of building to a second night. Adding Worst Week to Monday nights certainly speaks to... the future of comedy at the network. So I think that we've been very, very calculated in building shows and adding shows that are certainly within the wheelhouse, but certainly expanding the brand.

- Nina Tassler, President, CBS Entertainment