It’s January Spec Script Bonanza At The Broadcast Networks
Interesting times in the broadcast network TV front:
“Got any specs?” has become a popular refrain around Hollywood these days as pilot spec scripts are thriving in a very unusual network executive environment — new top programmers at two of the major broadcast networks, NBC and ABC. With Paul Lee joining ABC in the end of summer when buying season was already underway, and especially Bob Greenblatt, who is just now taking over NBC, studios and producers had been betting that there would be strong demand for specs as the execs may not be that attached to projects they didn’t develop and may look outside for fresh scripts that are ready to shoot.
The gamble seems to be paying off. All 4 pilots Greenblatt greenlighted today were spec (though one, Michael Patrick King’s Mann’s World, was originally bough by NBC’s old regime in early November.) That includes the Steven Spielberg-produced musical Smash, from DreamWorks TV and UMS, which Greenblatt originally developed at Showtime, David E. Kelley/WBTV’s Wonder Woman, which was shopped earlier this month, and a comedy from writer Jhoni Marchiko and 20th TV, which was taken out earlier this week.
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Why are specs being taken out now? The key is to wait until the network brass have read the script they had commissioned, one studio source said. “We wait for the panic to set in and then we go in,” the source said.
Two things. As noted, it’s unusual to have two networks with new heads of programming at the same time. Whenever someone new in authority comes in — and this pertains to movie studios as well — they tend to clean out much of what has been in development as that represents the thinking and tastes of the previous regime, then go about sourcing new projects to put their stamp on the slate.
The other thing is this: The popularity of writers penning a spec TV pilot represents a sea change from the way things used to be when that sort of thing was virtually unheard of. The standard route was to pitch pilot ideas. I don’t know if there was a particular event that happened to spark the shift — although I do seem to recall that “The Wonder Years” pilot was a spec script — but more and more you see writers putting their vision for a series down on paper to present to the networks. You can see the advantage from a buyer’s standpoint: They get a much fuller sense of what the series can be from a script rather than a more general sense based on a pitch.
Takeaway: Before any aspiring TV writer starts pounding out one original spec pilot after another, note that the projects in play at the broadcast network level are all ones written by established writers. If you’re an outsider, you may have the greatest spec TV pilot ever, but that doesn’t necessarily translate into a deal. Unlike movies, where a spec script (unless it represents the first of a potential series of movies) is pretty much a 1-production deal which can be judged on the merits of the story itself, in the TV world it’s as much if not more about the writer — how good they are, what their credits are, how much experience they have. A TV programmer has to have confidence the writer can run a show and manage to deliver 12, 22 or however many episodes a season.
You’re much better thinking of TV specs the traditional way: Figuring out a current series that best represents your skills, interest, and voice, and writing a spec episode of that series. Use that to open the door, get an assignment or hired onto a show’s staff, write some episodes, get some credits, work your way up the producing ladder. At some point, you’ll have enough credibility your reps will advise you to pull out that great pilot idea you have and spec it.
For more of the Deadline article, go here.
For more analysis from someone who knows a lot about TV writing, Ken Levine offers his thoughts on the same phenomenon.