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LOS ANGELES (thefutoncritic.com) -- The latest development news, culled from recent wire reports:
Looking to keep track of all the various projects in development? Click here to visit our signature "Devwatch" section. There visitors can view our listings by network, genre, studio and even development stage (ordered to pilot, cast-contingent, script, etc.). It's updated every day!
LIFESTYLE LEMONAID (FOX) - Chris Klein ("Wilfred") has booked the male lead on the comedy pilot, based on Nikki Joel's tell-all blog about her outrageous marriage to top WME talent agent Brandt Joel. He'll play Brad, "an ex-Navy man who still sports the crew cut and now works as a construction foreman," alongside the previously cast Erin Richards as Jackie, "a thirtysomething mother, wife and friend who "can be a handful." Rob Riggle had originally been tapped for sale role when the project was set up at HBO. Mark Wahlberg, Steve Levinson, Wayne Carmona and the Joels are executive producing the presentation, which was penned by Jordon Nardino. Production begins next month. (THR.com)
LOST GIRLS (The CW) - Jennifer Baggett, Holly Corbett and Amanda Pressner's travel memoir is being redeveloped as a drama at the netlet. Rebecca Sinclair ("90210") is on board to pen said take, which "centers on four very different 20-something American women, each at a point of crisis, who decide to escape their lives and their country, and go abroad [but] when one of them vanishes under mysterious circumstances, the remaining three pledge to find her." ABC previously took a stab at the project in 2010 with Ildy Modrovich writing and Jerry Bruckheimer among the executive producers for Warner Bros. Television. CBS Television Studios has subsequently come aboard to produce while Ridley Scott and David W. Zucker of Scott Free Productions will executive produce alongside Sinclair. (Deadline.com)
MILA 2.0 (ABC, New!) - Debra Driza's upcoming book - "a sci-fi thriller about a young woman who discovers that she is a Mobile Intel Life-like Android, Mila, an experiment in artificial intelligence created by the U.S. government and her scientist mother, who kidnapped her when she was found to have human emotions" - is being developed as a drama by the Alphabet. David DiGilio ("Traveler") is penning the adaptation which is set up at the ABC Studios-based Shondland with Shonda Rhimes and Betsy Beers also serving as executive producers. (Deadline.com)
SECRET LIVES OF WIVES, THE (Lifetime) - Joe Flanigan ("Stargate: Atlantis") has boarded the drama pilot, which explores the unvarnished truth behind the marriages of four different women - Michelle (Kim Raver), Reed (Salli Richardson), Keaton (Amber Clayton) and Jessie (Lauren Bittner), breaking down the creative ways each close friend nurtures, maintains and endures what many see as an impossible convention of modern life. He'll play Reed's husband Jared, "unshaven and a shadow of his former self who has become passive and unresponsive to his marriage." David Conrad, Callum Blue and newcomer Derek Smith also star in the Warner Horizon Television-based hour, inspired by the book by Iris Krasnow. (Deadline.com)
THOSE WHO KILL (A&E) - Chloë Sevigny and Omid Abtahi are the first to be cast in the drama pilot, about a police detective and a forensic psychiatrist who both in very different ways possess a deep psychological understanding that connects them to the serial killers they investigate. She'll play Catherine Jensen, "the newly appointed Detective in the Boston Police Department's Homicide Division who is intelligent, fearless, strong and determined." Abtahi then is set as Jerry Molbeck, "a brilliant and dutiful homicide detective who is happy to do research for Catherine as she gets closer to finding a serial killer." Joe Carnahan is helming the Fox 21-based hour from a script by Glen Morgan. (Deadline.com)
TROOPER (TNT) - Brooke Nevin ("Breakout Kings") has joined the cast of the drama pilot, about K.J. Flaxton (Mira Sorvino), a recently divorced female state trooper who is as unconventional at work as she is at home raising her three kids. She'll play her sister Dakota, "who herself is putting the pieces of her life back together." Anna Wood played said role in the project's original incarnation at CBS. Writer Aron Eli Coleite and director Jason Ensler are behind the hour, which comes from the Warner Horizon Television-based Jerry Bruckheimer Television. (Deadline.com)
TROPHY WIFE (ABC) - Bradley Whitford, Marcia Gay Harden and Michaela Watkins have all boarded the comedy pilot, about reformed party girl Kate (Malin Akerman), "who finds herself with an insta-family when she falls in love with Brad (Whitford), a successful charmer with a quirky sense of humor who has three manipulative kids and two judgmental ex-wives." Whitford will play said fellow with Harden and Watkins as his ex-wives Diane, "a former Olympic swimmer who is now an orthopedic surgeon and the mother of their 15-year-old fraternal twins"; and Jackie, mother of his youngest child, "a good-natured yet self-centered woman, who embraces youth and fun and is always surprised when her freewheeling style rubs people the wrong way." Jason Moore is helming the ABC Studios-based half-hour from a script by Emily Halpern and Sarah Haskins with Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky also executive producing. (Deadline.com, TVLine.com)
UNTITLED REBECCA SINCLAIR PROJECT (The CW, New!) - Rebecca Sinclair ("90210") has sold a new drama to the netlet about "a self-obsessed young pop star - the black sheep of her religious family - who isn't interested in saving anything but her own career, until a fan claims to have been miraculously healed by her touch and word spreads that she has divine powers." She'll write and executive producer for CBS Television Studios. (Deadline.com)
WENTWORTH HALL (FOX, New!) - Director Jake Kasdan and writer Lew Morton are developing a new animated comedy at the network about "a group of misfit college students making plenty of bad decisions while attending a once-prestigious university." Said effort is set up at 20th Century Fox Television with Morton writing and executive producing alongside Kasdan. Melvin Mar will serve as a producer. (Deadline.com)
AND IN OTHER NEWS... - Dan Harmon and Justin Roiland's animated comedy "Rick & Morty" is on track for a 10-episode order at Adult Swim (Deadline.com); Mather Zickel will recur on "House of Lies" as "a finance genius who owns several casino resorts in Las Vegas" (Variety.com); Mike Colter and Warren Kole have both landed arcs on "The Following" as a federal agent is brought in to supervise Hardy (Kevin Bacon) and a devotee of serial killer Joe Carroll (James Purefoy), respectively (TVLine.com); Mark Deklin will replace Christopher Wiehl in an upcoming episode of "Castle" (TVLine.com); Ethan Embry is bound for "Once Upon a Time" as "a visitor to the ABC drama's not-so-sleepy Maine burg" (TVLine.com);
Fred Willard will visit "Hot in Cleveland" as "a veteran and old grade-school flame of Georgia Engel's Mamie Sue" (THR.com); Grant Gustin is set to recur on "90210" as "a charming and good-looking college student from a wealthy and privileged background" (THR.com); Charlene Tilton will return as Lucy Ewing on TNT's "Dallas" revival (TVGuide.com); 16 CBS owned-and-operated stations have cleared "The Queen Latifah Show" for a fall 2013 launch (Deadline.com); Joe Mazzello will recur on "Justified" as "a preacher who has saved the lives of drug addicts" (Deadline.com); and Sterling K. Brown has landed an arc on "Person of Interest" as a no-nonsense narcotics detective/love interest for Taraji P. Henson's Carter (Deadline.com).
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