EXCLUSIVE: In what will likely be one of the biggest cable sales of the year, Glee and American Horror Story co-creator Ryan Murphy is out shopping a racy new project. Open, which he is creating and writing with Dexter co-executive producer Lauren Gussis, is described as a modern, provocative exploration of human sexuality and relationships. The subject matter seems to lend itself to premium cable, though I hear selected basic cable networks are also being pitched. The project just hit the marketplace, and I hear there are already multiple networks bidding. Open marks Murphy’s first project with Fox 21, the cable production division of 20th Century Fox TV where Murphy is under a rich overall deal.
Murphy has three series on the air, which he co-created and executive produces: Fox’s Glee, FX’s AHS and freshman NBC comedy The New Normal. A fifth-season renewal for Glee is pending, and Murphy just unveiled that the upcoming third installment of AHS will be titled American Horror Story: Coven and will star Kathy Bates in addition to Jessica Lange, Sarah Paulson and Taissa Farmiga. Additionally, CAA-repped Murphy is directing the film adaptation of Larry Kramer’s celebrated Broadway play The Normal Heart for HBO, with Julia Roberts and Mark Ruffalo starring. Gussis, repped by CAA and Circle Of Confusion, also worked on ABC’s Once Upon A Time.
Fox 21’s slate includes the Emmy-winning Homeland for Showtime; FX’s Sons Of Anarchy; A&E’s Those Who Kill; and the FX pilot Tyrant, from Howard Gordon, Gideon Raff, and Craig Wright, which recently tapped Ang Lee as director.
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Something like HBO’s short-lived but wonderful “Tell Me You Love Me”?
CAN’T WAIT FOR THIS ONE.
Sounds like HBO’s short-lived byt awful “Tell Me You Love Me.” Hope it’s better. (One assumes given his track record that it will be less choked up with damn straight people.)
“…selected basic cable networks are also being pitched”
TV networks: Encore (35 million households), here!, Epix (11 million households), Cinemax, Logo (51 million households), FX, A&E (1am airings; 99 million households), HBO (31 million households), ReelzChannel, Showtime, AMC, Bravo, Starz, and USA.
Internet: Netflix
Shonda Rhimes 2.0?
Yay for the immensely talent Lauren Gussis! She’s a rock star!
This headline reads like an Onion article
New Normal and Glee need to get s**t canned so Ryan can focus on premium cable shows!!
So we can all expect this project to be mildly entertaining for three-quarters of a season and then it will be derivative, navel-gazing dreck thereafter. Great!
Golf clap.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Would love to see Julian McMahon back on TV in this (or anything for that matter)!
Fox 21 is kicking ass.
How much does David madden hate Bert SALKE at this point?
Now please cast Michael C. Hall! It’d be perfect, since Dexter is ending this year.
We’ll have to take this with a grain of salt. Ryan Myrphy is not exactly an authority on marriage. (The title “Open” is in reference to an open marriage.) But an open marriage is a contradiction in terms. The pilot is provocative, granted. But it’s ultimately unsatisfying for the audience just as it is so for the male protagonist: there’s an underlying uneasiness with the prospect of sharing one’s beloved with anyone else–most especially in the most beautiful and intimate and unifying act on earth: the marital embrace. A complete self-gift to another is the purpose of life, and the highest of loves. But it’s a mockery of that love to pretend that that self gift can be shared in an “open” fashion.