By David Bauder, Media Writer
NEW YORK (AP) --PBS was looking forward to a relatively free lane to offer fresh television to viewers downtrodden by the Hollywood strikes this fall, but that advantage may only last a couple of months now.
A tentative deal reached late Sunday in the crippling TV writers strike, with hopes that actors would soon follow suit, has given rise to hopes that new episodes of favorite scripted shows might return sometime this winter.
With commercial networks largely bereft of fresh material beyond reality shows, sports and game shows, PBS has a fall schedule of new programming, including a heavy dose of nonfiction, led by Ken Burns' look at "The American Buffalo."
"I have to believe that people are looking for new stuff," said Paula Kerger, CEO of the Public Broadcasting Service.
PBS' plans were virtually unaffected by the strike. One exception is a delay making "American Historia," a three-part documentary series helmed by actor John Leguizamo about Latino figures in history, Kerger said. PBS acquired the docuseries " Becoming Frida Kahlo," about the artist, to replace it and it premiered last week.
PBS has also bought a few more scripted series that were made outside of the U.S., she said. Most of them are aimed at PBS' streaming service, although the Danish series "Seaside Hotel" has aired on the television network.
For the most part, however, PBS has to plan well in advance and isn't nimble enough to quickly switch things up to take advantage of how rivals were affected by the strike, she said.
A British drama about the lives of people fighting World War II, "World on Fire," is premiering its second season in October. Its first season aired two years ago, but production has been put on hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Burns' series premieres on Oct. 16. Among the nonfiction projects on the docket this fall are "Evolution Earth," about how animals are adapting to changes in their habitat caused by humans; "The Busing Battleground," about the 1970s-era integration fight in Boston; along with "American Masters" programs on Jerry Brown, lawyer Floyd Abrams and drummer Max Roach.
"Frontline" will sink its teeth into Elon Musk's takeover of Twitter, Vladimir Putin's crackdown on the Russian press and the Houston Astros' cheating scandal. The "Frontline" documentary collaboration with The Associated Press, "20 Days in Mariupol," premieres on the service on Nov. 21.
"Nova" will have a five-part series on "Ancient Earth" in October and will also look at the fight against malaria.
Other scripted series are on the docket, including "Unforgotten," "Van Der Valk," and "Little Bird," the latter about an adopted woman who tries to investigate her personal history.
Until new material is available on the commercial networks, Kerger has her hand up, hoping people take notice of what PBS has to offer. That may be the best she can do, since there's no coordinated advertising campaign to tell people what's out there.
"Our marketing budgets are usually pretty slim," she said.
Carrie Coon Relishes Being Part Of An Ensemble–From “The Gilded Age” To “His Three Daughters”
It can be hard to catch Carrie Coon on her own.
She is far more likely to be found in the thick of an ensemble. That could be on TV, in "The Gilded Age," for which she was just Emmy nominated, or in the upcoming season of "The White Lotus," which she recently shot in Thailand. Or it could be in films, most relevantly, Azazel Jacobs' new drama, "His Three Daughters," in which Coon stars alongside Natasha Lyonne and Elizabeth Olsen as sisters caring for their dying father.
But on a recent, bright late-summer morning, Coon is sitting on a bench in the bucolic northeast Westchester town of Pound Ridge. A few years back, she and her husband, the playwright Tracy Letts, moved near here with their two young children, drawn by the long rows of stone walls and a particularly good BLT from a nearby cafe that Letts, after biting into, declared must be within 15 miles of where they lived.
In a few days, they would both fly to Los Angeles for the Emmys (Letts was nominated for his performance in "Winning Time" ). But Coon, 43, was then largely enmeshed in the day-to-day life of raising a family, along with their nightly movie viewings, which Letts pulls from his extensive DVD collection. The previous night's choice: "Once Around," with Holly Hunter and Richard Dreyfus.
Coon met Letts during her breakthrough performance in "Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolfe?" on Broadway in 2012. She played the heavy-drinking housewife Honey. It was the first role that Coon read and knew, viscerally, she had to play. Immediately after saying this, Coon sighs.
"It sounds like something some diva would say in a movie from the '50s," Coon says. "I just walked around in my apartment in my slip and I had pearls and a little brandy. I made a grocery list and I just did... Read More