‘Wisdom Of The Crowd’ Will Capture The Controversies Of Crowdsourcing

In CBS’ upcoming procedural Wisdom of the Crowd , Jeremy Piven plays billionaire tech innovator Jeffrey Tanner who takes justice into his own hands by seeking out his daughter’s killer with the most recent means of internet crowdsourcing.

CBS

“Honestly, the idea scared the hell out of me,” said EP/showrunner Ted Humphrey who worked with Keshet in adapting the Israeli series for a network audience. “In the last year we’ve all encountered the ying and yang of the internet in the way it can be used as a vehicle for human collaboration.” Humphrey said crowdsourcing is beginning to rear its head among police forces across the country, and the show, in addition to its human drama will deal with the online means of how it can be flawed and helpful in solving crimes.

When Humphrey was asked about whether network TV should take into consideration the current image of our nation’s police forces as being combative and corrupt, the showrunner agreed: “Network TV should reflect that. We have a detective on the show but that doesn’t mean he’s inside the police department. He conducts himself correctly, but he believes his department screwed up and were incompetent with the murder case of Jeffrey’s daughter.”

The showrunner said that the show will be ripping from the headlines and touching upon the racial divisions and police community relations.

In regards to showing how those in the flyover states feel about the portrayal of the police on TV, actor Richard T. Jones who plays Detective Tommy Cavanaugh says, “We all want the police to be on our side”.

Speaking about why he was drawn to the series, three-time Emmy winner Piven said, “Here’s a heartbroken guy who is trying to fill this void, it’s a fertile premise. He doesn’t want to solve crimes on a bigger level, just his daughter’s crime, and how that conflicts with this guy on several layers. He’s a human being who is emotionally available and will utterly do the wrong thing for the right reasons. I pretended I was on the fence (when considering this role), but I was always in.”

Of utmost important for Humphrey, who served as an EP and writer on The Good Wife, is establishing a similar type of drama in The Wisdom of the Crowd where the characters, not the procedural come first. “We found that on a weekly basis with that show, the audience was invested in the ongoing story of the characters, not the case of the week.”

Wisdom of the Crowd premieres October 1 at 8:30 PM on CBS.