After a year of pitching a Mad About You revival, the show finally has a home. Spectrum Originals announced today that it picked up the sitcom for a limited event series to air later this year.
So far the only original cast members returning are Paul Reiser and Helen Hunt aka Paul and Jamie Buchman. I am sure that will change as they ramp up production. When they do start filming, Hunt will direct the first episode along with starring in it.
Katherine Pope, Head of Original Content, has this to say about it, “Two decades ago, fans fell in love with this show, and this time will be no different as Paul, Helen and Peter [Tolan, EP] explore modern marriage through the eyes of two people who have just become empty-nesters. We can’t wait for everyone to fall in love with the Buchmans all over again.”
How much do you want to bet that they have an episode dealing with them trying to figure out how to use social media and how to do esex? I can just hear his NY accent whining about it now.
This is Spectrum’s second original series. LA Finest, a spinoff of Bad Boys with Gabrielle Union and Jessica Alba, will debut on May 13th.
A few months ago, Paul Reiser was all excited for a Mad About You revival series, but now things are looking a lot less optimistic. He told The Tampa Bay Times, “Sony is trying to figure out from their end; that’s where I just walk away and go, call me when you figure it out. I don’t know what happens at that level. They make their deals with whoever they make their deals with. So we’ll see if it happens. It may not happen. It likely won’t happen. My guess is it won’t happen.”
Reiser is hoping if it does happen, to get it on a streaming service over a broadcast channel, and even that is not looking likely at this point.
He kind of hinted that the problem might be the concept. He wants to do the show about their daughter Mable going away to college, and he and Jamie (Helen Hunt) are trying to deal with being just a couple again. Something many people do when their kids grow up and leave the house.
How mad would you be if Mad About You did not happen?
Hours after Helen Hunt told Ellen DeGeneres that she and Paul Reiser have been meetings in her kitchen a lot recently about doing a Mad About You revival, Entertainment Weekly reports that they closed a deal with Sony to bring back the show. Now it is up to the studio to sell the show to a network and Mad About You will join Will & Grace and Roseanne on our TVs again.
Since those two shows have been successful, it seems like a no-brainer for NBC to be the one that picks it up since they aired it the first time. At this rate, NBC will only air revivals of their old sitcoms on Thursdays. I would not be surprised if they are talking to the casts of Wing, Family Ties and Night Court to bring those comedies back. I am rooting most for the last one. What shows do you want to see back on TV?
When it comes to Mad About You returning to the airwaves, I am lukewarm. I watched it, but it is nothing that makes me say it needs to come back. Do you think it does?
Back in December, Paul Reiser said he was interested in a Mad About You Reunion. Yesterday when his TV wife Helen Hunt was on The Late Late Show, she told James Corden that she is also up for it.
But it gets even better than that, she revealed to the CBS host that she and Reiser had breakfast earlier in the day at her house to talk about it. They just don’t want it to “suck”. Then she shared with us, “We would like to do it. Although, we felt very proud of what we did. We just don’t want to wreck it and make it sucky. That’s the goal.”
And with that confirmation, NBC is probably calling them as you read this and offering them a 10-episode deal. Soon it will be nothing but our childhood’s on TV. You know what, I am OK with that. Very OK with that!
Last month, Paul Reiser told Larry King that he was finally “open” to a Mad About You revival and now there are rumors that Sony is shopping it around for a limited run. According to TV Line, the revival would center around Paul and Jamie Buchman becoming empty nesters because their daughter is going off to college.
I, for one, would love to see how they would react to having the apartment to themselves again. You know, they would be wanting to try to have sex in the living room when someone would come barging through the door. Acting like newlyweds, who have actually been married forever.
