What’s happening in the comedy world now…
- ABC has pulled Don’t Trust the B in Apt. 23 from its primetime schedule. Eight episodes remain unaired! New episodes of Happy Endings will air in that time slot, as well as its existing one.
- TBS has cancelled The Wedding Band after one season of airing at 10 p.m. Saturdays. Anyone surprised about this?
- Comedy Central has promoted Kent Alterman to President, Content Development & Original Programming. He’ll remain based in Santa Monica, Calif. His oversight includes development and production of original content across all platforms.
- HBO is developing a feature film version of Bored to Death, with Jonathan Ames writing a script to catch up with the characters played by Jason Schwartzman, Zach Galifianakis and Ted Danson.
- ABC has ordered single-cam Pulling to pilot, from writers Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky and producer Aaron Kaplan, based on a British series about three 30-something women.
- CBS has ordered a pilot for the TV “sequel” to film franchise Beverly Hills Cop, with Brandon T. Jackson playing the son of Eddie Murphy’s Axel Foley. Shawn Ryan wrote the script. CBS also is making a pilot of Dana Klein’s multi-cam Friends With Better Lives.
- FOX gave Seth MacFarlane and his producing/writing partners Alec Sulkin and Wellesley Wild a straight-to-series order for their latest project, an untitled live-action sitcom about two guys in their 30s whose dads move in with them. FOX also has ordered four comedy pilots. They are: I Suck At Girls, from Bill Lawrence based on Justin Halpern’s book; Sherry Bilsing-Graham and Ellen Kreamer’s To My Assistant; Andrew Gurland & Justin Hurwitz’s House Rules; and David Rosen’s Friends And Family, an adaptation of the British series Gavin and Stacey.
- NBC, meanwhile, wants Sean Hayes back. He has an untitled multi-cam pilot written by Victor Fresco about a guy dealing with his teen-aged daughter and his boss. NBC also ordered pilots for a single-cam based on DJ Nash’s life; single-cam Girlfriend In A Coma, about a 34-year-old woman who wakes up from a lengthy coma to discover she had given birth during it; and Justin Spitzer’s Holding Patterns, a multi-cam about friends who survived a plan crash. Funny stuff, eh?!