In what amounts to the first case of the video website YouTube.com's resuscitating a canceled TV series, NBC is expected to announce today (Friday) that it will resurrect Nobody's Watching, which was canceled last year by The WB. Two weeks ago, the New York Times reported that a copy of the pilot had been downloaded more than 300,000 times since it was posted on YouTube.com in mid-June. Daily Variety reported today that NBC plans to fund a series of video clips featuring the characters from Watching that will also be posted on YouTube and on its own website. In an interview with the trade publication, Watching's producer, Bill Lawrence, praised NBC for being willing to take the risk of resurrecting a show that had already been discarded by another network because of the demand of Web viewers. "If network TV doesn't embrace the Internet as both a place to launch and test shows but also as a place where shows can live, they're going to fall further and further behind," he said.

ABC.com

Posted by Michael Seidelman at 9:35 AM | Permalink

The Bungie / Microsoft megaselling science fiction action game property that was quickly sold to both Universal and Fox is edging close to turnaround with the news that Alex ("28 Days Later") Garland's draft will be shelved in favour of a new draft yet to be written by DB Weiss. This pushes the project out of a summer 2007 tentpole target.

In the "Halo" games the player adopts the role of "Master Chief", a futuristic trooper lost and on his own on a ring-shaped alien world after alien warriors force the evacuation of his spaceship. "Lord of the Rings" and "King Kong" helmer Peter Jackson was signed on to produce the film property last year.

DB Weiss was also tapped to write an adaptation of another science fiction property with a long development history, Orson Scott Card's "Ender's Game" that lately has Wolfgang Petersen attached to it.

More in Dark Horizons >>

Posted by Keith Loh at 11:58 AM | Permalink

CBS President Nina Tassler faced dozens of reporters Saturday at the Television Critics Association meeting where she was asked repeatedly how network television would deal with serialized TV shows that have been cancelled before the end of their storylines. In the end Tassler admitted it was a problem and hinted that fans left hanging might be served through another medium.

Earlier this year fans of HBO's "Deadwood" were up in arms when it was revealed that the cable channel would not be giving the series its final season in a planned four-season arc. In the end the public battle between HBO and creator David Milch resulted in a compromise: two HBO-movies to tie up the loose threads. (HBO also announced this weekend that expensive costume drama "Rome" would be ending this season as well.)

More about CBS' quandry in the San Jose Mercury >>

More on the Deadwood fallout in the Kansas City Star >>

Posted by Keith Loh at 12:33 PM | Permalink

Film and television studio Lionsgate announced Wednesday it bought Debmar-Mercury LLC, an independent television distributor.

Lionsgate hasn't disclosed the terms of the purchase, but said it allows for the creation of a new distribution outlet for it's own films and programming. It will also help bring in revenue from third-party entertainment properties. For the 2007 fiscal year, the studio is planning it's own slate of nine primetime TV series and said it would benefit from Debmar-Mercury's "distribution capabilities across new and traditional media outlets."

Debmar-Mercury has distribution rights to "South Park" and the Lionsgate series "The Dead Zone."

Debmar-Mercury will retain its name and operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Lionsgate under principals Mort Marcus and Ira Bernstein.

Posted by Mike Laverdiere at 4:33 PM | Permalink

Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest smashed box office records over the weekend ($135 Million + for it's first 3 days!!!) but a screenwriter wants a piece of that pie.

Writer Royce Mathew claims he created "drawings" and a "screenplay" for a project he called "Supernatural Pirate Movie" - and now he fears his ideas have been turned into a Disney blockbuster. Royce states he even called the pirate ship in his film treatment the Black Pearl - the same name used for Johnny Depp's craft, and the subtitle for the original film. And he also created a lead characters called Will Turner - the same name as Orlando Bloom's swashbuckler in the Disney films - and Elizabeth - the Christian name of Keira Knightley's character. The screenwriter insists he registered the drawings and his screenplay with the US Copyright Office, and is now suing the The Walt Disney Company, Buena Vista Home Entertainment, Touchstone Home Video and producer Jerry Bruckheimer, claiming movie bosses used his ideas as a blueprint for the Pirates of The Caribbean films.

Source: Internet Movie Database

Posted by Michael Seidelman at 11:50 PM | Permalink

David Trottier from the Writersstore.com lays down what he thinks are the new rules on spec style formatting: cut out camera direction, forget the continues, keep the action lean. The bottom line, Trottier writes, is:

Keep in mind that your audience is the reader of your script (not movie-goers) and that he/she is weary of reading scripts. So don't encumber his/her read with technical directions. Just let the story flow like a river. That river will flow if you use visual, clear and concrete language that directs the eye without directing the camera and touches the heart without dulling the senses.

Finally, don't get paranoid about formatting rules; the story is the thing.

Posted by Keith Loh at 8:47 AM | Permalink

This is a good article by Lynda Sandoval, a police officer and novelist in Denver:

Cops don't say, "We had a really bad accident on the highway." What is a "bad" accident to civilians is a "good" accident to a cop. A good crash, a good brawl, a good sex assault. It's not a value judgment. No one really thinks a sex assault of any type is good. Bad is good, because 99.9% of cops want to handle the bad incidents, so when they happen, that is "good." When a cop returns from days off or vacation, you'd most likely hear him/her asking, "Did anything good happen while I was gone?"

"Good" means bad.

Posted by Keith Loh at 10:27 AM | Permalink

The Canadian Radio-Television Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), the regulatory body for Canada's airwaves has called for two reports on the state of the Canadian TV industry. At the recent Banff Television Festival, CRTC chairman Charles Dalfen said that the outcome of the reports may lead the commission to amend it's controversial 1999 TV policy.

The regulator wants to review aspects of it's regulatory framework for over-the-air TV, including revisiting whether broadcaster expenditure requirements on Canadian programming should be reinstalled. Many blame the lack of growth in Canadian drama on the removal of the requirements in 1999.

"We haven't observed any significant movement in spending on Canadian drama," Dalfen told the crowd on June 12, citing a mere 3% broadcaster spending increase between 2001 and 2005.

It's the first time Dalfen has acknowledged that, perhaps, the CRTC policy may have hurt Canadian drama production.

"We're very encouraged, actually," said CFTPA president and CEO Guy Mayson. "To us, Mr. Dalfen's speech is really opening the door on a rethink on the effectiveness of the '99 policy, and may be opening the door to new ways of producing more programming."

The CAB, representing private broadcasters, which prefer a more free-market approach, issued a diplomatic response, saying, "Such reviews [are] essential in order to modernize the existing regulatory framework."

One report will focus on advertising and whether alternative ad methods such as product placement should be tallied in the 12 minutes of commercials broadcasters are allowed. It will also focus on the economic status of small market TV and if broadcasters should be required to switch to digital over-the-air transmission in a country where less than 20% of viewers still use 'rabbit ears.'

The regulator will also be preparing a separate but related report on the impact of digital technology on Canadian broadcasters.

On the web:
Full story at Playback Magazine
Transcript of Charles Dalfen's speech on CRTC website

Posted by Mike Laverdiere at 2:06 PM | Permalink