Image Credit: Kevin Winter/Getty Images Steven Spielberg may help Fox make a big splash on Monday when the network announces its fall 2010 lineup in New York. Sources say Spielberg – who is one several high-profile producers behind the network’s big-budget drama Terra Nova - taped a special introductory message that will be presented to advertisers if the network orders the show to series. The high-concept project is about a family 100 years in the future that travels back to the prehistoric era and is executive produced by Brannon Braga, ex-Fox Chairman Peter Chernin, agent-turned-producer Aaron Kaplan, and Craig Silverstein, among others. Chernin also is expected to appear in the video message.
Sources told EW that a 13-episode commitment for the show is a foregone conclusion and an offer to play one of the leads has already gone out to Kyle Chandler (the Friday Night Lights star ended up passing). The show is expected to shoot in Hawaii later this summer.
This would be the second time in less than two weeks that Spielberg’s name and/or likeness was used to promote a project that has yet to start production. Over the weekend, the trailer for Super 8 – a movie Spielberg is executive producing and J.J. Abrams is directing – debuted in movie theaters before Iron Man 2. Production on Super 8 begins this fall for a summer 2011 release.
Meanwhile, EW obtained the script for Terra Nova, which begins in 2149 A.D. The scene: a large group of settlers are preparing to leave the apocalyptic world they live in to time travel back millions of years via a massive, high-tech contraption. Their goal is to see trees, enjoy a blue sky, eat real food – basically, to start over in this so-called Eden. But what they find is unlike anything they were expecting.
Image Credit: Garcia: Glenn Harris/PR Photos; Perry: Tommaso Boddi/PR Photos; Cuthbert: Robin Wong/PR Photos Goodbye 24, hello comedy for Elisha Cuthbert! The network confirmed today that it has picked up the single-camera comedy Happy Endings for fall that stars Cuthbert as a bride who breaks up with her groom at the altar. It’s one of three laughers that earned orders today by ABC. The others are Mr. Sunshine, a Matthew Perry (Friends) starrer about the owner of a sports arena, and Better Together, a comedy with Joanna Garcia (Privileged) that focuses on two sisters in different stages of their romantic relationships.
