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If you walked into the 24,000-square-foot exhibition space at 8942 Wilshire Blvd. in Beverly Hills any day between May 7 and June 12 (the date Emmy nomination voting started), you would have seen a Netflix mecca of sorts, celebrating the piles of content from the past year that the streamer hopes will be recognized with nominations. After all, in this explosion of TV content, awards recognition is one surefire way to stand out. Among the installations in this prime rental space were the bar from Master of None (from which actual bartenders served comped drinks), the tiaras and costumes from The Crown, the van and bikes from Stranger Things, the lockers from 13 Reasons Why, a brick wall filled with cash from Narcos and the list goes on. There also…
Peter Morgan has a thing for Queen Elizabeth II. He first delved into her world with 2006’s The Queen, which won Helen Mirren an Oscar for the titular role. He and Mirren again revisited the subject with the play The Audience (for which she won a Tony). But there was more left in the well for the 54-year-old British screenwriter, so he created The Crown, Netflix’s big-budget drama that stars Claire Foy as a young version of the queen. “Instead of becoming less and less interesting, it just became more and more,” says Morgan, who is finishing the second season. He took a quick break to talk to THR about his royal fixation. What were your original plans for the series? My initial vision was that it would be three…
THE AMERICANS SHARING IS CARING • There aren’t any Soviet sleeper agents in the New York writers room of this Cold War drama, but everybody on this staff of seven has their secrets. That episode when Philip [Matthew Rhys] gets involved with EST, for instance, was inspired by one writer’s experiences with a friend. “Somebody in the room knew somebody who was going to EST and thought that’d be perfect [for a storyline],” says executive producer Joe Weisberg. “That blossomed into Philip going to EST. Which became something immeasurably bigger and more important to the story. That wouldn’t have happened if someone in the room hadn’t had that life experience.” GETTING UNSTUCK • When the team is having trouble with breaking a story, according to Weisberg, he and co-executive producer…
The Writer’s Warning goes something like this: “When you take on any project, the problems of its characters become your own, so you’d better like solving them.” Shadow Moon, the protagonist in Neil Gaiman’s best-selling novel American Gods, which we had the privilege of adapting for Starz, has plenty of problems, all under the umbrella of one larger one: his labored religious awakening. The story suited us well. Charting the character’s peak-to-valley odyssey of doubt and faith would require us to reconsider — then re-reconsider — our own religious fealties. After all, we do not always worship what we think we do. We might selfdefine as a lapsed but admiring Catholic or a Conservative Jew, but when we consider our actions, our praxis, our sacrifices and allegiances, especially over the…
Even though it’s called Divorce — viewers know exactly what’s in store for Frances (Sarah Jessica Parker) and Robert (Thomas Haden Church) — the HBO comedy manages to illuminate the way two people often can grow closer, or at least reveal themselves more to each other, during a split. Renewed for a second season a month after its October 2016 debut, the series landed a Golden Globe comedy actress nomination for Parker, who’s also an executive producer along with her Pretty Matches Productions partner Alison Benson. “People see a limitation in the title, but really, divorce becomes a part of your identity,” says Parker. “We’re working hard to convey all of the possibilities.” Also caught in the crossfire of the doomed relationship is the couple’s inner circle of friends, played…
Saturday Night Live, which could have its best year for Emmy nominations in decades — thanks to Donald Trump — was honored back in 2006 in a way few TV shows ever have been: Aaron Sorkin created a series about it. Still hot off his success with The West Wing, the writer-producer developed Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, an hourlong drama centered on the workings of a Los Angelesbased, SNL-like show. From the beginning, Studio 60 had major buzz. There was a bidding war between NBC and CBS, with the Peacock winning by paying what was reportedly “a near-record license fee.” A heavyweight cast was assembled that included Matthew Perry, Amanda Peet, Bradley Whitford and Sarah Paulson. The show was shot on Warner Bros.’ massive Stage 19, expensively retrofitted…
