As Overall Deals Crumble At Studios…Could It Breathe Fresh Talent Into Television?

Sep
7,
2023

As the WGA strike goes into its fourth month we’re seeing the fall of the big A-List Overall deals. And maybe, just maybe that isn’t a bad thing.

Overall deals see top tier big names get first looks at every single idea that crosses their mind oogled by the studios, but what does that mean for the new guys? Lately, it’s been stagnant ideas. Television and streaming are honestly primed and ready for new ideas and stories that arent endless regurgitations of “been there, seen that.” Does the death of the overall mean we can see the birth of taking chances on new stories again? We hope so. It might be the best thing to come out of the WGA strike.

Warner Bros. Television Group has suspended pacts with Gerg Berlanti, Chuck Lorre, Mindy Kaling, Bill Lawrence and more. Industry insiders have been whispering that Chuck Lorre’s multiyear pact with his decades-long studio was quietly suspended in May, only a week into the strike. Others lost theirs not too long after but details remain hush hush at the moment.

All six prolific producers are behind multiple shows and all have development projects at the studio that they had been working on. It’s important to note that the deals have been suspended and not outright canceled/dropped as once the labor action concludes, Warners will need its top producers to ramp up writing and producing immediately as the content pipeline continues to thin.But we hope that the studio will pump fresh scribes into the pipeline for ideas. The public wants fresh takes, and it’s past time the studios took notice and stopped recreating the same storyline season after season.

What do you think? Do you want to see new and fresh ideas on television and streaming? With shows like Squid Game making waves we don’t understand why American television continues to bet on old story models and re-tellings.