Fox Buys Marshall Herskovitz/Ed Zwick-Produced Soap, Steve Faber Comedy

Thirtysomething creators Marshall Herskovitz and Ed Zwick, who recently returned to television with an overall deal at 20th Century Fox TV, have sold their first project under that pact, an adaptation of Richard Murphy’s novel Confessions Of A Contractor, which has landed a script commitment plus penalty at Fox, with Chaos creator Tom Spezialy writing. Additionally, Fox has bought a comedy penned by Wedding Crashers co-writer Steve Faber.

Confessions of a Contractor is described as a soap about the combustible mix that results when you blend desire, jealousy, and home renovation. Spezialy, Herskovitz and Zwick will executive produce. This 20th TV’s second stab at developing a TV series based on Murphy’s novel. During the 2008-09 season, a drama written by Murphy and executive produced by Shawn Ryan was set up at CBS.

Steve Faber’s comedy, tentatively titled Merry Go Round, will be written by Faber, who will executive produce with Alan Gasmer and Peter Jaysen for Sony Pictures TV. Based on a true event of Jaysen’s, life, the project revolves around five inseparable best friends in college (two women and three men) who by chance are reunited ten years later and, in spite of themselves, resume their old college personas — good and bad, normal and odd, due to the fact that all three guys were madly in love with one of the women… and perhaps still are. Genesis Entertainment-repped Faber also is teaming with Gasmer and Jaysen as well as Grant Turck on the feature side to adapt Shepherd Mead’s book How To Succeed With Women Without Really Trying.