The TV Set

It's TV pilot season in Hollywood. Mike Klein, after fifteen years of struggle, has finally had one of his scripts green-lit for development, this one, titled The Wexler Chronicles, specifically with the Panda Network. It is good timing as the extra money for as long as the project proceeds will help his personal finances in he and his wife Natalie expecting their second child. The project is a semi-autobiographical half hour dramedy - the comedy borne out of the tragedy, specifically his brother and thus that of the lead character having committed suicide - making it close to his heart. While he does have some say in how the pilot develops beyond the actual script, he will have to decide how much he will push back against the wants of the network president, Lenny, who has to consider the material in light of the competition. That push back, at any stage, may threaten the project in its entirety. Overall, her modus operandi seems to be to gear her network fare to the lowest common denominator regardless of how smart a project is purported to be, such as this one. While Mike's manager Alice is somewhat of a yes woman in doing whatever to push the project along, acting somewhat of a counterbalance is the new President of Primetime Programming, Richard McCallister, who, as a former BBC executive, is more accustomed to working on highbrow fare than he is with Hollywood sitcoms.