Upfronts 2023: Pilot Buzz Muted By Writers Strike
deadline.comFor the second time in three years, the final stage of the broadcast pilot season has been upended by an extraordinary event.
In 2020, it was a global pandemic. This year, it is a writers strike. The work stoppage, which started May 2, did not impact pilots, which all had been completed before WGA’s contract with the studios expired May 1, I hear.
But it is expected to affect pickup decisions as the networks are faced with the possibility that no newly ordered or renewed scripted series could go into production for months if the impasse between the writers guild and the studios does not get resolved quickly (which appears unlikely).
These decisions are getting fewer and fewer as pilot season volume has declined sharply since the pandemic, with 14 pilots across three networks, ABC, CBS and NBC, this year. (Fox has given straight-to-series orders to dramas HI-Surf and Doc and has three new animated series for next season; the CW has been stocking up on acquired scripted series.) Not all pilots will hear their fate before the upfront week of May 15; for those that do, their creators may get the news on the WGA picket lines.
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