ABC is looking to Viola Davis for its next great family comedy. The network is teaming with the How to Get Away With Murder star to develop single-camera comedy The Zipcoders, The Hollywood Reporter has learned. Based on an original idea, The Zipcoders is a comedy about a divorced mother of three in 1968 who moves her family to the east side of Austin, Texas, soon after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., in an effort to be closer to her estranged sister. Once there, her teenage son forms a rock 'n' roll band to the utter bewilderment of friends, family and the community at large. The potential series is about the group of teen friends, who aspire to be in a rock band like The Beatles. The idea for The Zipcoders came from Davis and her JuVee Productions partner and husband, Julius Tennon, who were inspired to tell a story about a group of African-American teens with feathered hair and bell-bottoms in the middle of the Deep South. In came Marshall Todd (Barbershop), who sparked to the idea and will pen the script. After finding parallels to relevant issues today — political, racial and musical — he created a family show around the unique rock group and pitched it to ABC Studios and ABC. Todd will also be credited as an exec producer on the comedy. "This project gives me the opportunity to tell a story that, while specific to the African-American experience, doesn't travel in the usual tropes," Todd said. "As a parent, I was inspired to tell a story from the dual perspective of parents and children in a world where the rules are constantly changing. Music has always been a passion of mine, and to be able to use it to inform this particular narrative was a provocative challenge. I have found in Viola and the squad at JuVee the perfect co-conspirators dedicated to telling the types of stories that entertain while contributing to the larger cultural conversation." Todd's credits include co-writing Barbershop and his spec screenplay One Nation. He did a rewrite on Bad Boys 2. He's also developing feature D-Town. He's repped by Gersh, Principato Young and Mark Temple. "In the tradition of ABC's Fresh Off the Boat and Black-ish, The Zipcoders offers a compelling and comical take on a family dealing with rapidly changing cultural attitudes," said JuVee head of TV Andrew Wang, who will also exec produce. "This is a show about following your own path, and it's a love letter to all the musical and artistic trailblazers who dared to be different and shifted the paradigm." The Zipcoders marks JuVee Productions' second sale this development season via their overall deal with Murder producers ABC Studios. The duo also set up Headgames at ABC. The company is repped by CAA. "The Zipcoders is near and dear to my heart. Viola and I love what Marshall Todd put on the page — the world, the characters and a fun-loving take on music, relationships, dreams and family," Tennon said. "Over our conference room door is etched 'Dream Big. Dream Fierce,' and this show really underlines that ethos." Family comedies continue to be in high demand this development season as broadcast networks look for more inclusive fare to reflect parts of society that are not being depicted on the small screen. For ABC's part, the Disney-owned network has found success with shows such as Fresh Off the Boat, Black-ish and, most recently, Speechless. Source: Hollywood Reporter.com
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Dwayne Johnson "Ballers" on HBO $400,000 per episode Julia Louis-Dreyfus "Veep" on HBO $250,000 per episode Sofia Vegara "Modern Family" on ABC $250,000 per episode Anthony Anderson "Black-ish" on ABC $100,000 per episode Tracee Ellis Ross "Black-ish" on ABC $80,000 per episode Gina Rodriguez "Jane the Virgin" on The CW $60,000 per episode Kevin Spacey "House of Cards" on Netflix $500,000 per episode Kiefer Sutherland "Designated Survivor" on ABC $300,000 per episode Hugh Laurie "Chance" on Hulu $275,000 per episode Viola Davis "How to Get Away With Murder" on ABC $250,000 per episode Kerry Washington "Scandal" on ABC $250,000 per episode Taraji P. Henson "Empire" on Fox $175,000 per episode Terrence Howard "Empire" on Fox $175,000 per episode Lyon Sons "Empire" on Fox $20,000 per episode Judy Sheindlin "Judge Judy" on Syndication $47,000,000 per year Matt Lauer "Today" on NBC $25,000,000 per year Ellen DeGeneres "Ellen" on Syndication $20,000,000 per year Bill O'Reilly "The O'Reilly Factor" on FNC $20,000,000 per year Kelly Ripa "Live with Kelly" on Syndication $20,000,000 per year Miley Cyrus "The Voice" on NBC $15,000,000 per year Adam Levine "The Voice" on NBC $15,000,000 per year Jimmy Fallon "The Tonight Show" on NBC $15,000,000 per year Jimmy Kimmel "Jimmy Kimmel Live" on ABC $15,000,000 per year Conan O'Brien "Conan" on TBS $12,000,000 per year Robin Roberts "Good Morning America" on ABC $14,000,000 per year Chelsea Handler "Chelsea" on Netflix $10,000,000 per year Steve Harvey "Celebrity Family Feud" on ABC $150,000 per episode FX is reloading its drama pipeline.
The cable network, fresh off the decision to wrap Tyrant and set an end date for The Strain, is moving forward with John Singleton's 1980s-set cocaine drama Snowfall. FX announced Friday that it has handed out a 10-episode series order to Snowfall, with the series set to debut in 2017. The pickup comes nearly a year and a half the cable network picked up the drama to pilot. In that time, FX redeveloped the drama with the script undergoing rewrites that included some recastings on the pilot. The original was co-written by The Boyz n the Hood's Singleton and Eric Amadio. The new pilot was penned by Singleton, Amadio and Dave Andron, who boarded the project and will serve as showrunner. Singleton directed the original pilot, with the new version that ultimately led to the series order helmed by Belgian duo Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah (Image). The original Showrunner Charles Murray chose to bow out citing that his vision for the series didn't line up with the vision of the creators Lee Daniels and Tom Donaghy.
The series centers on three girls who form a band in Atlanta. It might have similarities to Daniels' hit show "Empire" but it differs in that it's told from the perspective of the artist rather than Music Executives. Following Murray's departure, his loss, Daniels has brought in Chuck Pratt, known for Desperate Housewives, to guide the ship. Queen Latifah is set to headline the series. Snoop Dogg will bring the party to the Democratic Party at the Democratic National Convention later this month.
The West Coast rap veteran will headline a "unity party" for Democratic donors on July 28 at Philadelphia's Electric Factory, the Senate Majority PAC announced Tuesday. Grammy Award-winning rock band Los Lobos also will perform. Snoop Dogg's political engagement comes a little over a year after he announced his Hillary Clinton co-sign. "You know I like to be politically correct, but sometimes I’m politically incorrect,” he said on Bravo's Watch What Happens Live in May 2015, a month after Clinton announced her bid for presidency. "But I’ll say that I would love to see a woman in office because I feel like we’re at that stage in life to where we need a perspective other than the male’s train of thought," the rapper continued. "And just to have a woman speaking from a global perspective as far as representing America, I’d love to see that. So I’ll be voting for Ms. Clinton." The 2016 Democratic National Convention is a four-day event set to run July 25-28 at the Wells Fargo Center Philadelphia. It will take place one week after the Republican National Convention, which is being held in Cleveland. Slumdog Millionaire alum Freida Pinto is headed for Showtime. Pinto has been cast as the female lead in the premium cable network's six-part miniseries Guerrilla, The Hollywood Reporter has learned. From exec producers John Ridley and Idris Elba (who co-stars), Guerrilla is described as a love story set against the backdrop of one of the most politically explosive times in U.K. history. It centers on politically active couple Jas and Marcus, whose relationship and values are tested when they liberate a political prisoner and form a radical underground cell in 1970s London. Their ultimate target becomes the Black Power Desk, a true-life, secretive counter-intelligence unit within Special Branch dedicated to crushing all forms of black activism. Pinto is set as Jas Mitra, while the role of Marcus has not yet been cast. Jas is a passionate and politically driven individual. As a member of a newly formed radical underground cell, Jas helps liberate a charismatic convict from prison in an effort to lead the street fight against social injustice in 1971 London. American Crime's Ridley will write, direct and executive produce the limited series. Elba (Luther, Beasts of No Nation) will co-star and serve as an executive producer through his Green Door Pictures. Ridley will write the majority of the episodes and will direct the first two episodes and the finale, with Emmy nominee Sam Miller (Luther) directing the remaining episodes. Also set to exec produce the series are Patrick Spence and Katie Swinden for Fifty Fathoms, Tracy Underwood for ABC Signature and Michael McDonald for Stearns Castle. Guerrilla will begin production in London late this summer, and will be a co-production between Fifty Fathoms and ABC Signature. The drama will air on both Showtime and Sky Atlantic. A premiere date has not yet been determined.
Pinto is best known for her leading role in Oscar winner Slumdog Millionaire. The former model was discovered by Danny Boyle, who cast her as Latika in Slumdog, for which she earned a BAFTA nomination for best supporting actress. Her credits include Jungle Book, Rise of the Planet of the Apes and the upcoming indie Love Sonia. She's repped by CAA, Gotham Group and Principal Entertainment. ABC rolled out its three-hour block of game shows on Sunday. Despite last year's successful launch of Celebrity Family Feud, it was the Michael Strahan-hosted $100,000 Pyramid that topped broadcast for night — even though it went head-to-head with HBO's finale of Game of Thrones. Pyramid, one of three nostalgic games ABC is banking on this summer, bowed with a 1.7 rating among adults 18-49 and nearly 8 million viewers. That made it the most-watched Big Four telecast of the evening, and it narrowly out-rated the three-way tie for runner-up in the key demographic. Neighboring ABC games Celebrity Family Feud (off 37 percent from last summer's exceptionally strong launch) and the launch of Match Game both averaged solid 1.5 ratings among adults 18-49. They tied the Sunday bow of Big Brother, which was off slightly from the 2015 time slot premiere. It's a promising start for ABC, which went all-in on the on revamped game shows after last summer's strong initial primetime run from the Steve Harvey-hosted Feud. Current Disney golden boy Strahan was recruited for Pyramid, and Alec Baldwin signed on for Match Game. The coming Sundays won't be quite so competitive with HBO's winningest line-up — Thrones, Silicon Valley, Veep — now off the air until 2017. Gearing up for Rio De Janeiro, NBC saw a solid performance from U.S. Olympic trials for diving (0.7 adults), swimming (1.0 adults) and gymnastics (1.4 adults). “Nashville” is going out with the old and in with the new. To celebrate the musical soap’s move from ABC to CMT, VIP Fan Auctions will be auctioning up items from the first four seasons. The “moving sale” is also designed as a thank you to #Nashies who stuck by the show and started the #BringBackNashville campaign. The auction begins on June 21. The auction will feature 270 items from “Nashville.” Each week, new items — including a wedding dress worn by Connie Britton’s Rayna James and a dress worn Hayden Panettiere’s Juliette Barnes in a “Conan” interview — will be featured on the official auction site, where they’ll remain for seven days. Fans can bid on items through July 26. The series will continue with Ed Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz as showrunners. “Nashville” Season 5 — produced by Lionsgate, ABC Studios and Opry Entertainment — will begin production shortly. Hulu will continue to make episodes available the day after air. ABC cancelled the series due to low ratings, with the show averaging 1.8 in the adults 18-49 demographic and 6.7 million viewers overall. “Nashville” garnered two Emmy nominations during its run – one for Britton as Lead Actress in a Drama series and one for Outstanding Original Music and Lyrics. Both Britton and Panettiere were nominated for Golden Globes. VIP Fan Auctions is currently holding auctions from “X-Files,” “Me Before You” and “Barbershop.” In the past they’ve held auctions from “Arrested Development,” “Castle,” “Heroes,” “Friday Night Lights” and “Fargo.” |