Fox Picks Up John Stamos Comedy ‘Grandfathered’ & ‘Guide’ To Series
Fox has completed its comedy series pickups with nods to Grandfathered starring John Sta
mos and The Guide To Surviving Life (formerly Cooper Barrett’s Guide to Surviving Life), which join freshly picked-up The Grinder, toplined by Rob Lowe. All three are single-camera, with neither of the network’s multi-camera pilots making it to series. With the network’s renewed comedy series — New Girl, Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Last Man on Earth — also all single-camera, Fox will have an all-single-camera comedy lineup for the first time in several years.
The Grinder and Guide are from 20th TV, while Grandfathered hails from ABC Studios, marking only the third comedy series order from an outside network ever for the studio, following Scrubs (NBC) and Gary Unmarried (CBS), and the first in seven years. (Grandfathered became a co-production with 20th TV when it landed at Fox with a put pilot commitment in September in a bidding war with ABC.)
While starring vehicles The Grinder and Grandfathered were early standouts, Guide flew under the radar early on, getting a boost by solid testing results, with the momentum carrying it to the finish line. This marks the first series order for Gail Berman’s Jackal Group since the company’s launch last summer in partnership with the Fox Networks Group and the official return of the former Fox entertainment president to the network.
Written by former The Office head writer Danny Chun, Grandfathered has ER and Full House alum Stamos playing a version of himself: a charismatic longtime bachelor whose life is upended when he discovers he’s a father — and a grandfather. Stamos is executive producing through his St. Amos banner, along with Galavant creator Dan Fogelman, exec producing through his ABC Studios-based Rhode Island Ave Prods., and Chun, who also has been under an overall deal at ABC Studios. Josh Peck, Paget Brewster, Christina Milian, Kelly Jenrette and Ravi Patel co-star.
In Guide, written and executive produced by Jay Lacopo and executive produced by Gail Berman, 26-year-old Cooper Barrett (Jack Cutmore-Scott) turns to a camera after a particularly calamitous experience and, using cautionary tales from his own life, episode by episode, helps the youth of America survive the ridiculous disaster that is life and love in your 20s. Bill Callahan has been brought in as showrunner and also will executive produce. Meaghan Rath, James Earl, Charlie Saxton, Justin Bartha and Maureen Sebastian co-star.