Summer Production Halt Means No Fall Shows For TV Columnists

• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, 10 hours ago

A production crisis brought on by the Hollywood writers’ and actors’ strikes has left a void in an annual rite of summer for the nation’s TV columnists.

It is the yearly midsummer previewing of the new fall shows, which are traditionally made available sometime after the May upfronts.

They are only the pilots, and they come with cautionary notes and advisories on the emails from network publicists.

Unless I missed them somehow, I have seen no emails this summer guiding me to the pilot screeners.

The p.r. reps almost always point out that, by their nature, these pilots are works in progress. Sometimes, they undergo changes before they are ready to be presented as series’ premieres.

These can include tweaks, reshoots, post-production enhancements, and even occasionally, the recasting of a prominent role.

For this reason, the emails also request that the shows not be reviewed in their midsummer, pilot form. 

The networks usually provide access to the finished, ready-to-air versions of the shows much closer to the start of the fall season. 

On all of this, I have long been willing to play along. For many years, I have put off writing “official” reviews of any of the pilots until a few days in advance of their premiere dates in September, October and sometimes beyond.

However, in some years, when watching the works-in-progress pilots in the summer, I have written TV Blogs in August -- right about now, as a matter of fact -- that I position, somewhat cheekily, as “previews,” as opposed to “reviews.”

Whether or not I try and sneak some opinions into these “previews,” I do enjoy watching the fall network pilots every summer to get my own preview of what’s in store.

Perhaps more importantly, these previews do result in a number of midsummer TV Blogs at a time of year when the supply of new shows grows fallow. 

Indeed, in my experience, the two months in which program premieres are scarcer than at any other time of the year are June and August.

Since discussions of new content are often the lifeblood of the TV Blog, a paucity of programs can be a challenge.

The dramas and comedies that were announced in May and supposed to premiere this fall -- but are now on indefinite hold -- number about 12 (give or take) spread over the four broadcast networks.

Thus, I am going this whole summer without seeing the new “Matlock” coming to CBS and starring Kathy Bates. 

In addition, I will not get to sample “Elsbeth,” the CBS spinoff of “The Good Wife” and “The Good Fight” that is centered on one of the attorney characters from those shows, Elsbeth Tascioni, played by Carrie Preston (pictured above).

Another missing CBS show is “Tracker,” the new drama about a lone wolf survivalist who tracks down missing people for law enforcement.

NBC’s new dramas are also MIA -- “The Irrational,” starring Jesse L. Martin as a crime-fighting expert in human behavior, and “Found,” about a crusading p.r. specialist who also tracks down missing people.

An even bigger loss to TV columnists everywhere is the absence of the NBC comedy “Extended Family” starring Jon Cryer. 

Fox’s new dramas that will not be seen until who-knows-when are “Rescue: HI Surf,” about lifeguards in Hawaii, and the medical drama “Doc,” which was previously the title of a 1970s sitcom and a drama series of the early 2000s.

Only ABC had the apparent good sense last May to refrain from promising scripted shows by this fall because the writers’ strike had already begun on May 2. The actors followed in July.

Please do not feel too badly for the TV columnists who will have to muddle through the dog days of August without the fall pilots to keep us company.

Somehow, I always come up with something, including the occasional TV Blog about some inside-baseball situation that affects only TV columnists.