UK company reportedly looking to serve up British version of ‘Cheers’
Thirty years after Ted Danson‘s Sam Malone declared, “Sorry, we’re closed,” to end the 11-season classic sitcom Cheers, a U.K. company is reportedly interested in serving up an English version.
That’s the news from Deadline, which reports that the U.K. company Big Talk has tapped Men Behaving Badly writer Simon Nye to develop a new version of the show that was based at that Boston bar where everybody knew your name.
Cheers opened for business on NBC on the evening of Sept. 30, 1982, and its finale, “One for the Road,” attracted 40 million viewers on the evening of May 20, 1993 — one of the most-watched finales of all time.
During its run, the show earned a total of 179 Primetime Emmy nominations and 28 wins, and spun off another Emmys magnet, Frasier, in 1993.
Shailene Woodley stars in the new limited series adaptation of Lisa Taddeo’s New York Times bestselling nonfiction book, Three Women.
The show follows Woodley as Gia, a character loosely based on Taddeo, as she interviews three different women from across the United States, exploring their varied sexual and emotional experiences.
Woodley told ABC Audio that after she read Three Women, she felt Taddeo had written everything she “felt but didn’t know how to articulate.”
According to Woodley, crafting a character based on Taddeo was more than just collaborating with her.
“It wasn’t a collaboration as much as it felt like a connection and then a true desire to honor what our natural connection elicited,” Woodley said. “Gia is not Lisa, but Gia also isn’t me. It almost felt like she was the intersection of both of us.”
Taddeo wholeheartedly agreed, saying Woodley’s performance made her feel seen “in the most dynamic way.”
“Shailene’s performance made me feel seen without even, like, mimicking or mirroring me,” Taddeo said. “She’s one of the most talented actors out there, but she also has one of the warmest hearts.”
The show covers many serious topics ripe for discussion. So, what does Woodley hope viewers take from it?
“I hope that they walk away feeling a little less alone and maybe feeling like it isn’t weird or obscure to go through things that are very normal, everyday experiences that women have, like miscarriages or, like, having sex on your period or having body dysmorphia,” Woodley said. “I don’t know one woman who hasn’t been through one … if not all of those things. And I think it’s important that we take these situations that have become such taboo in our culture and really normalize them.”
ABC Audio has confirmed that Lost veteran Matthew Fox has joined the cast of The Madison, the forthcoming spin-off of Taylor Sheridan‘s Yellowstone.
Fox joins Michelle Pfeiffer and Suits alum Patrick J. Adams in the MTV Entertainment Studios and 101 Studios project, said to be “a heartfelt study of grief and human connection following a New York City family in the Madison River valley of central Montana.”
For his part, Fox will play Paul, “a self-reliant bachelor who loves the outdoors.”
As reported, Adams will play Russell McIntosh, “a young investment banker who has followed the life path set before him from the start.”
Elle Chapman plays Paige McIntosh, “a somewhat self-centered woman who indulges in a luxurious New York lifestyle provided by her parents and investment banker husband.”
Beau Garrett will play Abigail Reese, “a resilient and sardonic New Yorker, who is a recently divorced mother of two,” and Amiah Miller will play Abigail’s eldest daughter, Bridgette.
Phil Donahue, whose influential TV talk show aired for nearly 30 years, has died at age 88.
Donahue died Sunday night of an undisclosed illness, according to a family statement provided to ABC News by a representative for Donahue’s wife of 44 years, actress Marlo Thomas.
The family requests in lieu of flowers that donations be made to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital or the Phil Donahue/Notre Dame Scholarship Fund, according to the statement.
After working as a local TV reporter in his native Ohio and launching a talk show on local CBS affiliate WHIO in Dayton, he moved his The Phil Donahue Show to the local NBC affiliate WLWD, also in Dayton, in 1967. Three years later, it entered nationwide syndication, now simply titled Donahue.
The show would run for 26 years in syndication, produced at NBC’s 30 Rockefeller Plaza, until its last show in September 1996.
He is survived by his wife, Thomas, to whom he had been married for 44 years.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.