USA Greenlights Three Scripts, Sci Fi One Series

USA Network, Sci Fi Channel Aim for Broadcast Networks Next Fall

By Anne Becker -- Broadcasting & Cable, 10/7/2007 8:00:00 AM

Cable executives, coming off a summer in which their originals trumped broadcast 2-1 in the 18-49 demo, are already laying plans to tilt broadcast’s dominance next fall and throughout the year.

NBC Universal’s USA Network and its sister network, Sci Fi Channel, are among the leading cable networks stepping up efforts to premiere projects year-round.

USA just signed a trio of script-development deals for dramas it could debut outside of the summer, and Sci Fi green-lighted to series a spinoff of its popular Ghost Hunters show.

The new projects -- which could either run outside of summer or make room for existing shows to do so -- build upon slates of other year-round contenders that both networks announced at their July Television Critics Tour Association presentations.

USA is working on a project from Michael Jacobs, the writing/producing visionary behind ABC’s long-running Friday-night family-targeted programming block, “TGIF.” Jacobs -- whose hits included Boy Meets World and Charles in Charge -- signed on to write Joe Prophet, a lighthearted hour-long drama about a man who may or may not be an angel of God.

The network also ordered a script for a series spinoff of 2005 feature film Thank You for Smoking. The show -- from Universal Media Studios with writer Jim Dodson and the film’s producer, David Sacks -- would pick up where the movie left off, with the smoking-industry lobbyist protagonist wanting to reform his ways. The series would see him standing up for various positive causes in each episode.

Finally, USA has ordered a script for Life Insurance (working title), a high-concept piece from Reveille and former Sex and the City/Veronica Mars staff writer Aury Wellington. The show would track a lawyer who goes incognito to help his less successful lawyer brother after he is presumed murdered by suspects in a crime he is prosecuting.

The new pilots, all designed to fit with USA’s character-driven brand of serious drama with light overtones, join another trio the network announced at its summer press tour presentation: Halo (Fox TV Studios), The Expert (Universal/DreamWorks) and Citizen’s Arrest (Universal). The shows would likely shoot in early 2008.

All three shows would likely shoot in early 2008. This would mean that if they went to series and weren’t ready for this summer, they could debut sometime during the year. Or, if they became summer shows, the network could move some if its more established hits to other months of the year, says original programming chief Jeff Wachtel.

"We may start taking some of our successful shows and launching them in other seasons," said Wachtel.

Given that it is months away, USA’s slate next summer is not yet set. Neither of the network’s summer Sunday shows, The Dead Zone and 4400, have been picked up, nor has a seventh season of Friday-night series Monk. But guaranteed to return next summer is a third season of its companion series Psych, as well as a second season of Thursday-night series Burn Notice. Other summer contenders include the new Shiri Appleby series To Love and Die in LA and a rumored full series version of last summer’s limited series, The Starter Wife.

Sci Fi is also looking to increase its year-round output. The network green-lighted to series status a spinoff of its popular Ghost Hunters , Ghost Hunters International, and it plans to debut six episodes in January.

"It is definitely a goal of ours to keep reality on all year round," Sci Fi original-programming chief Mark Stern said.

The network has lowered its demos by bolstering its scripted hits with reality throughout the year and plans to announce a series of new reality projects over the coming weeks.

Projects already in development at Sci Fi include another Ghost Hunters sequel, UFO Hunters, as well as Run for Money, a reality competition set at national landmarks. The network is also working on two series with filmmaker Francis Stokes – God, Inc., a single-camera comedy about an imagined office of the almighty one, and an hour-long drama about time travel – and The Awesomes, an animated workplace comedy about superheroes.