BOOK CLUB (The CW, New!) - Nina Colman ("Gigantic") has sold a potential drama to the netlet inspired by Hope Hartman's recent documentary about "eight women who have been members of a book club in Washington, D.C., that has lasted more than 60 years." Said effort will revolve around "a young woman in New York who starts a book club with three friends, her mother and grandmother." The "book of the week" framework then will be used to examine the lives of club members. Warner Bros. Television is behind the hour with Dan Lin and Jennifer Gwartz of Lin Pictures executive producing. (Variety.com)
BRIDGE, THE (FX) - Oscar-nominee Catalina Sandino Moreno ("Maria Full Of Grace") is the latest to board the drama pilot, about two detectives from the United States (Diane Kruger) and Mexico (Demián Bichir) who must work together to hunt down a serial killer operating on both sides of the American-Mexican border. She'll play the latter's second wife "who is at home to tend to the kids while Marco works long hours." Annabeth Gish, Emily Rios, Matthew Lillard, Ted Levine and Thomas M. Wright also star in the project, which Gerardo Naranjo is helming off a script by Elwood Reid and Meredith Stiehm. (Deadline.com)
HOT MESS (MTV, New!) - Annabelle Stephenson, Matthew Atkinson, Mathew Botuchis and Shoshana Bush are the first to be cast in the comedy pilot, about Amanda Marshall (Stephenson), "who is caught between her current and former boyfriend, and her close circle of friends from college." Atkinson plays Nick, "a member of Amanda's crew"; with Botuchis as "his partner in crime Todd"; and Bush as Vivi, "Amanda's closest girlfriend." Lauren Iungerich is writing and directing the half-hour - a redeveloped version of her previous effort "Dumb Girls" - as well as executive producing alongside Robyn Meisinger and Kim Fleary. (Deadline.com)
HUNTED (Cinemax) - The pay channel reportedly is looking to renew the freshman drama despite its production partner BBC opting against a second season. "We are making plans with creator and executive producer Frank Spotnitz and star Melissa George to present a new chapter in the Sam Hunter mythology," Cinemax's Kary Antholis said in a statement. "We are very pleased with what Hunted has done for Cinemax's brand and are very excited about what lies ahead." No other details were given. (Deadline.com)
KING & MAXWELL (TNT) - Chris Butler ("The Good Wife") has joined the cast of the drama pilot, about two former secret service agents (Jon Tenney, Rebecca Romijn) whose unique skill set often gives them a leg up on suspects and conventional law enforcement. He's on board as "the street smart and tough partner to FBI Agent Brandon Murdock (Michael O'Keefe)." Ryan Hurst also stars in the CBS Television Studios-based hour, which is adapted from characters created by bestselling author David Baldacci. Michael Katleman is directing from a script by Shane Brennan. (Deadline.com)
MISSIONARY, THE (HBO) - Jesse Plemons ("Friday Night Lights") has joined the cast of the drama pilot, about Roy (Benjamin Walker), a young American missionary who gets caught up in Cold War intrigue while helping a young woman escape East Berlin in the late 1960s. He's set as Sherwood Elbridge, "a young Coca-Cola executive who helps smuggle defectors out of the Eastern Bloc." Baltasar Kormakur is directing the project from a script by Charles Randolph and Malcolm Gladwell. (Deadline.com)
OUR FATHER (HBO, New!) - Screenwriters Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick ("Zombieland") and director Jay Roach ("Game Change") are set to team for a new drama about "one of America's most powerful pastors who fights to rediscover faith, reconnect with family, and return to dominance in the face of unlikely enemies." Roach will direct the potential hour should it move forward as well as executive produce alongside said duo via his two-year overall deal with the pay channel. (Deadline.com)
SUPER FUN NIGHT (ABC) - Lauren Ash ("Scare Tactics") has booked the remaining lead role on the single-camera comedy pilot, about three nerdy female friends on a quest to have "super fun" every Friday night. She'll play Marika ("a classic grenade who always wears ill-fitting sports attire"), a role played by Edi Patterson in the original CBS multi-camera version. Rebel Wilson and Liza Lapira also star in the project, which the former penned for the Warner Bros. Television-based Conaco Productions. (THR.com)
UNSUPERVISED (FX) - Co-creator David Hornsby took to Twitter to confirm the animated series has indeed been canceled by the cable channel. The show's three remaining episodes will turn up on Thursday nights at 11:30/10:30c beginning December 6. "Unsupervised's" previous 10-episode run averaged 611,000 viewers and a 0.4 rating among adults 18-49, well short of its lead-in "Archer" (1.177 million viewers, 0.7 adults 18-49 rating). (@HornsbyDavid)
BLACKWOOD (MTV, New!) - Gwenda Bond's young adult novel - about "19-year-old Miranda Blackwood who, when 114 people, including her father, suddenly vanish off Roanoke Island, begins to investigate the mass disappearance, teaming with her high school sweetheart" - is being developed as a drama at the cable channel. Peter Calloway ("Brothers & Sisters") is on board to pen the adaptation with Kelsey Grammer, Stella Bulochnikov and Brian Sher also executive producing via their Lionsgate Television-based Grammnet Productions. (Deadline.com)
PARANORMAL HOUSEWIVES (Lifetime, New!) - Katie Ford ("Chaos") has sold a potential drama to the cable channel inspired by a real-life group of female professional paranormal investigators in Southern California. Said members - Erin Potter, Kirsten Thorne and Marsha Covert-Garcia - will serve as consultants on the project, to be executive produced by Ford, Red Om Films' Julia Roberts, 3 Arts Entertainment's Elaine Goldsmith-Thomas and Madhouse Entertainment's Robyn Meisinger for ABC Studios. Red Om's Lisa Gillan and Marissa Yeres Gill are also set as producers as are German Michael Torres of GMT Films and Rick Telles. (Deadline.com)
UNTITLED BOSTON WOMEN PROJECT (A&E, New!) - Mark Wahlberg ("Teamsters") has scored a pilot order from the network for a half-hour reality series featuring "the day-to-day life of four of tough, hard-as-nails women who juggle family, work, and relationships all while remaining true to their way of life" in Boston. Leverage Management's Stephen Levinson, Bill Thompson Productions' Bill Thompson and 44 Blue Productions' Stephanie Drachkovitch will executive produce the project alongside Wahlberg via his Closest to the Hole Productions. (Deadline.com)
BASTARDS (ABC, New!) - "Ugly Betty" alums Silvio Horta and Salma Hayek are set to re-team for a new drama at the Alphabet about "a colorful Cuban-American family who have their lives turned upside down when it's revealed that the family patriarch had a child with the family maid over 25 years ago." ABC Studios is behind the hour, which Horta will write and executive produce alongside Ventanarosa's Jose Tamez as well as The Mark Gordon Company's Mark Gordon and Nicholas Pepper. (Deadline.com)
LEVERAGE (TNT) - Executive producer Dean Devlin has released a letter indicating the show's upcoming December 25 season finale was written as a series finale due to uncertainty over if there will be a sixth season. "The episode that will air on Christmas is, in fact, the series finale we had always envisioned," he wrote. "This is not to say we would not do a season six should we get the opportunity." (LeverageFans.com)
UNTITLED HANNIBAL BURESS PROJECT (ABC, New!) - Comedian Hannibal Buress is set to star in a potential comedy at the Alphabet "inspired by Buress' standup and has him starring as a cop in a small town." Buress will co-write and serving as a co-executive producer on the half-hour alongside Rob Sheridan ("18 to Life") with 3 Arts Entertainment's Dave Becky also executive producing for ABC Studios. (Deadline.com)
BABES ON A BUS (FOX, New!) - The network has ordered a pilot for a potential dating series in which 10 single women from the big city board a bus that takes them from small town to small town in search of love. At each stop, "the town's finest bachelors will be on hand to impress them with romantic scenery and delicious local food" with the ladies ultimately tasked with choosing to stay or move onto the next town. Endemol USA is behind the project, which is based on a Norwegian format. No auspices were given. (THR.com)
GATES, THE (NBC) - Marc Buckland ("My Name Is Earl") is set to helm the comedy pilot, about the hijinks that ensue when parents drop off and pick up their kids at school each day. He'll work from a script by Cathy Yuspa and Josh Goldsmith, who are executive producing alongside Kapital Entertainment's Aaron Kaplan and Feelgood Fiction's Laurence Bowen and Philip Clarke for 20th Century Fox Television. (Deadline.com)
JENNI (ABC, New!) - Mexican-American singer Jenni Rivera is set to topline a multi-camera family comedy at the Alphabet about "a strong, middle-class, single Latina woman working to raise a family using unique parenting skills, while struggling to run a family business and navigate her extended, co-dependent relatives - all while fighting the cultural perception that she needs a man to do it." Robert L. Boyett ("Family Matters") and Robert Horn ("Designing Women") are behind the half-hour with Rivera and her manager Pete Saldago serving as producers for ABC Studios. (Deadline.com)
MRS. G'S BIGGER LOVE (Lifetime, New!) - Julie Golden has landed a new drama at the cable channel about a bored Seattle housewife who gains fame from her fictional day-in-the-the-life-of-a-female-polygamist blog who goes on to cover up her "normal" life to perpetuate the myth. Said hour is based on an entry in Heather Gatticio's blog Derfwad Manor, which espoused a polygamist scenario involving George Clooney, Brad Pitt and Javier Bardem. Jennifer Love Hewitt and Jeanie Bradley of Fedora Films, which has a first-look deal with the network, are the executive producers. (Deadline.com)
SILICON VALLEY (HBO, New!) - "King of the Hill" alums Mike Judge, John Altschuler and Dave Krinsky are set to team for a live-action comedy at the pay channel "set in the high tech gold rush of modern Silicon Valley, where the people most qualified to succeed are the least capable of handling success." Said trio will co-write the half-hour, which has a pilot order, with Judge attached to direct. Also executive producing are Scott Rudin and 3 Arts Entertainment's Michael Rotenberg and Tom Lassally. (Deadline.com)
UNTITLED DEBORAH KAPLAN/HARRY ELFONT PROJECT (E!, New!) - Screenwriters Deborah Kaplan and Harry Elfont ("Leap Year") have sold a potential drama to the cable channel about "a young entertainment lawyer who dies but is determined to pursue a romance with a woman who's still alive - while he exists in limbo in New York City, working for the department that judges the recently departed." They'll write and executive produce for Universal Cable Productions and Aaron Kaplan's Kapital Entertainment. (Deadline.com)
WEIRD DESK (ABC, New!) - Carl Binder ("Stargate Universe") and David N. Titcher ("The Librarian") have booked a 13-episode straight-to-series order from the Alphabet for a new drama about a clandestine organization "tasked with investigating and solving occurrences of the paranormal, supernatural and sometimes extra-terrestrial" using mysterious intelligence rerouted from the CIA and NSA. Said effort will track Morgan, "an obstinate, socially inept and brilliant man who would now be dead if it weren't for his special forces trained partner, Rosetta." ABC Studios and Christina Jennings's Shaftesbury Films are behind the hour, targeted for this summer, with the latter's Tom Mazza and Maggie Murphy executive producing alongside Binder and Titcher. (Deadline.com)
HERE IF YOU NEED ME (CBS, New!) - Kate Braestrup's novel - about "a female state trooper who, after her husband is killed, takes over his life and finds spirituality in the process" - is being developed as a drama at the Eye. Neil Tolkin ("The Emperor's Club") is set to pen the hour with Jeffrey Kramer, Carol Mendelsohn and Julie Weitz executive producing via the latter duo's CBS Television Studios-based Carol Mendelsohn Productions. Jody Hotchkiss will also serve as a co-executive producer with Braestrup herself serving as an executive consultant. (THR.com)
HOT MESS (MTV) - Johnny Pacar ("Make It or Break It") is the latest addition to the comedy pilot, about Amanda Marshall (Annabelle Stephenson), "who is caught between her current and former boyfriend, and her close circle of friends from college." He's on board as Ben, Amanda's ex-boyfriend, in the project, which also stars Matthew Atkinson, Mathew Botuchis and Shoshana Bush. Lauren Iungerich is writing and directing the half-hour. (Deadline.com)
LOCO (CBS, New!) - Ayelet Waldman ("Applebaum") has scored a script commitment from the Eye for a new drama about "a couple whose best friends are killed and are tasked with integrating four unusual and gifted kids into their family." Sarah Timberman and Carl Beverly of the CBS Television Studios-based Timberman-Beverly Productions will executive produce the hour alongside Waldman, who will pen the script. (THR.com)
MESSED UPTONS, THE (NBC, New!) - Newcomers Jessie Miller and Bennett Wolin have sold a potential comedy to the Peacock about 33-year-old Jenn Upton, who "after hitting rock bottom, discovers she's actually the crazy glue that holds her broken family together and learns that life isn't so embarrassing if your family is as big of a mess as you are." They'll serve as co-executive producers on the half-hour with Stacy Traub executive producing for the 20th Century Fox Television-based Imagine Television. (Deadline.com)
STALKERS (Lifetime) - Lela Loren ("H+") has joined the cast of the backdoor pilot movie, based on Rhonda Saunders's book about Diane Harper (Drea de Matteo), "a hot-headed cop with a troubled past, and a polished, ambitious DA (Jodi Lyn O'Keefe) who team up to bring a stalker (Mena Suvari), obsessed with her former lover, to justice." She'll play said lover in the project, which also stars Henry Simmons. Mark Tonderai is directing from a script by David Wiener. (Deadline.com)
UNTITLED KENAN THOMPSON PROJECT (NBC, New!) - "Saturday Night Live" cast member Kenan Thompson is set to star in a multi-generational family comedy at the Peacock about a man who moves in with his in-laws. Bryan Tucker is penning the script with Thompson, Andrew Singer and Lorne Michaels also executive producing via the latter's Universal Television-based Broadway Video. No other specifics were given. (TVGuide.com)
