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[10/05/12 - 11:14 PM]
Development Update: Friday, October 5
By The Futon Critic Staff (TFC)

LOS ANGELES (thefutoncritic.com) -- The latest development news, culled from recent wire reports:

Looking to keep track of all the various projects in development? Click here to visit our signature "Devwatch" section. There visitors can view our listings by network, genre, studio and even development stage (ordered to pilot, cast-contingent, script, etc.). It's updated every day!


THE ANNA NICOLE STORY (Lifetime) - Martin Landau and Virginia Madsen have both joined the cast of the Anna Nicole Smith biopic, while Mary Harron ("American Psycho") has signed on to direct. Agnes Bruckner stars as Vickie Lynn Hogan, a pretty but plain girl growing up in a small Texas town who transforms herself into Playboy pin-up Anna Nicole Smith. Madsen will play Vickie's mom Virgie with Landau as oil tycoon J. Howard Marshall, whom Smith infamously married when he was 89 and she was 26. John Rice and Joe Batteer penned the script while Craig Zadan, Neil Meron and Judith Verno are the executive producers for Sony Pictures Television. (Deadline.com)


BAD TEACHER (CBS, New!) - Gene Stupnitsky and Lee Eisenberg are looking to bring their 2011 feature to the small screen, which starred Cameron Diaz as a foul-mouthed, gold-digging junior high school teacher. Hilary Winston ("Happy Endings") will pen the TV take, a single-camera comedy, for Sony Pictures Television and the Mosaic Media Group. Stupnitsky and Eisenberg are executive producing via their Quantity Entertainment banner alongside Winston. (Deadline.com)


CELEBRITY SPLASH (ABC, New!) - The Alphabet has ordered a new reality competition series in which "celebrities perform dives from dizzying heights, which increase in difficulty each week, including backflips, somersaults and other gymnastic feats." In addition, a professional diving instructor gives each celebrity weeks of training. The Eyeworks USA-based project is based on a Dutch format with J.D. Roth, Todd A. Nelson and Brant Pinvidic among the executive producers. (Deadline.com)


GIRLS IN FILM (NBC, New!) - Hilary Winston ("Happy Endings") has booked a potential comedy at the Peacock about "three college best friends, who all find themselves single at 30 but with very different levels of dating experience." The project, from Sony Pictures Television, has a penalty attached. FanFare's Jamie Tarses is executive producing alongside Winston. (Deadline.com)


MIDNIGHTERS (FOX) - Scott Westerfeld's trilogy of books - about a group of people born at the stroke of midnight who have access to the 25th hour of each day, which they use to stop crime - is once again being developed for the small screen, this time at FOX. Chris Fedak ("Chuck") is penning the hour, which comes from Warner Bros. Television. Previous incarnations were set up at The WB in 2005, written by Darren Lemke; and NBC in 2009, written by Chad Hodge. Alloy Entertainment's Leslie Morgenstein and Gina Girolamo are also executive producing alongside Fake Empire's Josh Schwartz, Stephanie Savage and Len Goldstein. (Deadline.com)


MY BOSS IS MY ROOMMATE (FOX, New!) - Michael Showalter and Christina Lee have booked a single-camera comedy at the network about "a new kind of odd couple: Robert, a brash and entitled boss, moves in with Kate, his reluctant but loyal employee, at a time when both of their lives are falling apart." Warner Bros. Television is behind the project with Showalter and Lee presumably writing and executive producing alongside Principato-Young Entertainment. (Deadline.com)


ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK (Netflix) - Natasha Lyonne, Pablo Schreiber, Michael Harney and Lin Tucci have all landed roles on the upcoming drama, about Piper (Taylor Schilling), an engaged Brooklyn resident whose decade-ago relationship with a drug runner (Laura Prepon) in college results in her arrest and multiyear detention in a federal penitentiary. Lyonne will recur as Nicky, "a lesbian hipster and one of Piper's cellmates"; with Schreiber as Pornstache, a correction officer; Harney as Mr. Butorsky, "Piper's persnickety counselor at the prison"; and Tucci as Anita DeMarco, "an outspoken Jersey-Italian inmate who helps show Piper the ropes." Jason Biggs also stars in the Lionsgate Television-based hour, from executive producer Jenji Kohan. (THR.com)


SECOND SIGHT (CBS, New!) - Director Michael Cuesta ("Homeland") has sold a new drama to the Eye based on the 2000-01 U.K. series of the same name, which starred Clive Owen as "a homicide detective going blind who turns his affliction into an advantage - using his heightened senses and intuition to solve crimes." Cuesta will co-write the hour alongside his brother Gerald - as well as direct should it move forward - for CBS Television Studios. Also serving as executive producers alongside Michael Cuesta: Carol Mendelsohn and Julie Weitz of Carol Mendelsohn Productions, U.K. creator Paula Milne and agent-turned-producer Nick Reed. Gerald Cuesta and Phil Goldfine are co-executive producing. (Deadline.com)


THE SLAP (NBC, New!) - "Brothers & Sisters" creator Jon Robin Baitz is looking to bring the book-turned-Australian drama - which traces the shattering repercussions of a single event, a man slapping a child who is not his own, on a group of family and friends - to the U.S. Said effort, from Universal Television, is being eyed as an eight-episode limited series with Ted Gold, Tony Ayres of Matchbox Pictures and Walter Parkes and Laurie MacDonald of Parkes-MacDonald Productions executive producing alongside Baitz. Melissa George, Sophie Okonedo , Essie Davis, Jonathan LaPaglia, Alex Dimitriades and Sophie Lowe starred in the original version, which aired earlier this year on DirecTV's Audience Network. (Deadline.com)


TERESA (ABC, New!) - Nancy Miller ("Against the Wall") is set to pen a domestic take on the Mexican telenovela of the same name, about "an ambitious law student who is living a double life - one as an ambitious and smart law student who pretends to be like all the other wealthy kids at UCLA and another as an illegal immigrant living on the wrong side of the tracks." Said hour is set up at Lionsgate Television and Grupo Televisa with Miller writing and executive producing. (THR.com)


UNTITLED BOB DAILY/PIERCE GARDNER PROJECT (ABC, New!) - Bob Daily ("Desperate Housewives") and Pierce Gardner ("Dan in Real Life") are set to team for a potential drama at the Alphabet about "three diverse families whose lives get gloriously messy when they discover that they share a biological father, a successful bachelor in his 40s who's completely unprepared to embrace the family he never knew he wanted." Said duo will write and executive produce for the ABC Studios-based Mark Gordon Co. with the company's Gordon and Nicholas Pepper also serving as executive producers. (Deadline.com)


UNTITLED CHRIS MCKENNA PROJECT (NBC, New!) - Chris McKenna ("The Mindy Project") has sold a new comedy to the Peacock about the black sheep of a large family who moves back home to be the guardian of his youngest brother after their father passes away. Said effort, which has a penalty attached, is set up at Universal Television-based TBD Productions. Peter Traugott and Rachel Kaplain will executive produce alongside McKenna. (THR.com)


UNTITLED ELIZABETH WRIGHT SHAPIRO PROJECT (CBS, New!) - Elizabeth Wright Shapiro ("Movie 43") has booked a new comedy at the Eye about "an Ivy League feminist who comes to L.A to become an assistant professor and ends up moving in with two Playboy Bunny type females." Elizabeth Banks and Max Handelman are on board to executive produce the 20th Century Fox Television-based half-hour, with Shapiro serving as a co-executive producer. (Deadline.com)


UNTITLED TOMMY JOHNAGIN PROJECT (NBC, New!) - Tommy Johnagin ("Last Comic Standing") is set to star in a potential comedy at the Peacock about a couple who decides to take the next step and move in together only to learn that they're pregnant. Johnagin will likewise co-write the script with Mike Pennie ("My Name Is Earl") for Universal Television. Avalon Television's David Martin, Kara Baker and Jon Thoday will executive produce alongside Pennie with Johnagin serving as a co-executive producer. (Deadline.com)


AND IN OTHER NEWS... - Betty Gilpinhas has booked a season-long guest role on "Nurse Jackie" as a sexy first-year resident (THR.com); and actor Jim Rash, an Oscar-winner for his "The Descendants" screenplay, will pen an upcoming episode of his NBC comedy "Community" (Vulture.com).






  [october 2012]  
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· AGAINST THE WALL (LIFETIME)
· ANNA NICOLE (LIFETIME)
· BAD TEACHER (CBS)
· BROTHERS & SISTERS (ABC)
· CHUCK (NBC)
· COMMUNITY (NBC)
· DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES (ABC)
· DEVELOPMENT UPDATE (TFC)
· GIRLS IN FILM (NBC)
· HAPPY ENDINGS (ABC)
· HOMELAND (SHOWTIME)
· LAST COMIC STANDING (NBC)
· MIDNIGHTERS (FOX)
· MINDY PROJECT, THE (FOX)
· MY BOSS IS MY ROOMMATE (FOX)
· MY NAME IS EARL (NBC)
· NURSE JACKIE (SHOWTIME)
· ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK (NETFLIX)
· SECOND SIGHT (CBS)
· SLAP, THE (NBC)
· SLAP, THE (DIRECTV)
· SPLASH (ABC)
· TERESA (ABC)
· UNTITLED CHRIS MCKENNA PROJECT (NBC)
· UNTITLED DAILY & GARDNER PROJECT (ABC)
· UNTITLED ELIZABETH WRIGHT SHAPIRO PROJECT (CBS)
· UNTITLED TOMMY JOHNAGIN PROJECT (NBC)





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