Memo to Showrunners: When the Going Gets Tough, Blame it On The Sets

Summer has to be the least favorite season for showrunners — especially those hired to shepherd the transition from recently ordered pilot to weekly TV show.For unlike the rest of America, a meaningful summer vacation with the kiddles is totally out of the question. Showrunners don’t have time for lazy days by the pool or the beach, baseball games, family reunions,  etc. — especially during this era of squeezed budgets and creative torpor.

Not that it was any easier when I was running Beverly Hills, 90210. I distinctly remember a particularly truculent 90 minute phone call the night of July 3rd before a single frame of footage for the series was shot, in which two network execs criticized every single story beat contained in our first six outlines.  These guys even hated our typeface!  Fortunately, because of a misunderstanding on my part, the next day I called every writer (on July 4th!!!) and authorized them to begin writing their teleplays — which saved us for being shut down two weeks later for “script problems” like Fox’s other two (long forgotten) new dramas “DEA” and “Against The Law”.

Of course, the chances of a new show of any era surviving its summer gauntlet on the way to syndication has always been an iffy proposition…but my heart goes out to the folks behind “Beautiful”, a new CW show about fashion models produced by Ashton Kutcher’s Katalyst productions, who is clearly dealing with stuff that ruins summers (not to mention fall, winter, and spring) as reported on hollywoodreporter.com:

The production start on CW’s new drama “The Beautiful Life” has been pushed back by a week, from July 22 to July 31. And despite the widely publicized recent meltdown and hospitalization of co-star Mischa Barton, sources close to the show say the reason for the delay is far more mundane: Some of the sets for the show were not completed on time. Still, given her medical issues, Barton’s situation on the show remains unclear.

What a relief to learn that it was not Mischa Barton’s illness that caused the delay — or script troubles, or clashing egos, or money woes, or any of the usual perils of production. It was those pesky sets! They get you every time! Oddly enough, the interior high school hallway for Beverly Hills, 90210 was not finished the week we went into production either, but we adjusted our shooting schedule and changed the locale of certain scenes to make it work. Hmmmmmmmm? Why didn’t these showrunners do that? What’s really going on here?

Well, what’s going on folks is a favorite bloodsport of the Hollywood entertainment press in which they try to predict which new show will be shut down or cancelled first by chronically whatever setbacks/misery a production company/showrunner is facing.  It’s gotcha journalism with lots of Schadenfreude thrown in to satisfy a very cynical and beaten down creative community waiting for time slots to open up.

Look, I’m a fan of Katalyst Productions so I hope they have a nice long run.  I also have a soft spot for Mischa Barton, whose fictional shopping spree makes for a wonderful three-part vignette by James Robinson, who plays Carver, a beleaguered salesman on showbizzle.com, our digital showcase and destination website.  But mostly, I’m a fan of catching waves in the morning when the surf is glassy and the dolphins check in on their daily up to Malibu to bask in the warm water of summer.