CBS Nabs Comedy Produced By Ben Affleck & Matt Damon, Starring Tom Papa And Written By Cathy Yuspa & Josh Goldsmith

EXCLUSIVE: After a heated bidding war, one of the highest-profile comedy packages this season — a half-hour starring comedian Tom Papa that boasts Ben Affleck and Matt Damon as executive producers and Cathy Yuspa and Josh Goldsmith as co-writers — has landed at CBS with a put pilot commitment. 20th Century Fox TV is producing.

Based on the stand-up of Papa and the experiences of Damon, the multi-camera comedy, titled More Time With Family, centers on a guy (Papa) who changes his career and gives up a life on the road to spend more time at home with his family — but when he gets there, he realizes no one asked him to do that. The project originated with Papa and Damon who had worked together on two movies, The Informant and Behind The Candelabra. They teamed with Damon’s childhood friend and frequent collaborator Affleck, whose company, Pearl Street Films, is making a big push in television. The three met with a number of writers, going with Yuspa and Goldsmith and setting up the project at 20th TV where the scribes are under an overall deal. Damon and Affleck will executive produce through Pearl Street along with Papa, Yuspa, Goldsmith and 3 Arts’ Dave Becky and Josh Lieberman. This marks Pearl Street’s second TV sale and second big commitment — the company also has crime drama The Middle Man at Fox, which has a pilot order with Affleck directing and Glenn Gordon Caron writing.

Affleck and Damon were previously partnered in LivePlanet, which produced several TV shows in the early 2000s, including drama Push, Nevada and docu series Project Greenlight. In addition to his successful stand-up career, Papa, repped by ICM Partners, 3 Arts and Del, Shaw, Moonves, previously co-created and toplined the 2004 NBC comedy series Come To Papa. Last season, The King Of Queens alums Yuspa and Goldsmith, repped by ICM Partners, wrote and executive produced the NBC comedy pilot The Gates. Oscar winners Affleck and Damon are with WME.