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Josh Schwartz Steps Into the Sitcom Ring

BuzzSugar — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 12:30:55 -0700

We all know and love Josh Schwartz as the mastermind behind The O.C., Gossip Girl, and Chuck, and now he's ready to take on something new. Along with fellow Chuck producer Matt Miller, Schwartz is in the process of writing a pilot for a half-hour sitcom for CBS about a just-married couple in their twenties.

Now that How I Met Your Mother is heading into what's presumably it's final seasons, this could be the perfect time for Schwartz to bring something new to CBS. I've loved all of his shows, and I'm kind of giddy about seeing his signature sarcasm play out with characters that are a bit older.

Link Time! 3/19

BuzzSugar — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 13:30:32 -0700

A beautiful, appreciative post about Natasha Richardson's contribution to stage and screen. - Popwatch
The members of My Chemical Romance are not at all interested in having their music in a Twilight movie. - MTV Movies Blog
Nine memorable TV shows about TV. - TV Squad
OMG, Lost Boys 3. F'real?! - Cinematical
Which of these Davids will save HBO? - Vulture
The new, free Fandango app for iPhones has arrived, to the joy of movie lovers everywhere. - geeksugar
Audio and photos from the Decemberists' Hazards of Love premiere at SXSW. - Stereogum
The Gossip Girl spinoff is not called Lily, and more from Josh Schwartz. - Watch with Kristin

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First Look: Rockville, CA

BuzzSugar — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 13:30:32 -0800

From The OC to Gossip Girl, every Josh Schwartz project has always used great music - usually thanks to the handiwork of superstar music supervisor Alexandra Patsavas. Now, the two are teaming up for a new online series called Rockville, CA, an online soap for theWB.com set in a fictional rock club.

From the look of this trailer, all the standard Schwartz components are present: hipsters, snappy (if occasionally cheesy) dialogue, possible bar fights, and lots of making out. According to the official description, the club in question "is a place where a group of twentysomethings from diverse backgrounds gather regularly to hear their favorite up-and-coming bands, blow off steam, fall in love with the wrong people, and then talk about how they've fallen in love with the wrong people." What's really impressive, though, is the lineup of bands that will be performing for the show: Lykke Li, Phantom Planet, Kaiser Chiefs, and Eagles of Death Metal are just a few (full list here).

When I talked to Schwartz in January, he said he'd enjoyed experimenting with a web format for the first time: "Each episode isn't like, somebody had a twin brother and somebody drove off a cliff in the car," he said. "It's smaller. But the cumulative effect, I think, of all those 20 episodes is, 'Wow, I really went on a journey with those characters.' Smaller moments just take on a bigger reverberation." Hey, I'm in. Rockville, CA premieres online March 17, and to check out the trailer, just read more.

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Link Time! 2/3

BuzzSugar — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 13:30:26 -0800

Wall-E's director says there's no sequel in the little robot's future. - MTV Movies Blog
Here's video proof that Tori Spelling is filming 90210! - Watch with Kristin
Check out this Watchmen update: Sequels, images, and new poster. - Cinematical
Here's a lengthy, Chuck-centric Josh Schwartz interview. - HitFix
I wish I'd had this House drinking game for last night's episode. - TV Filter
The new video for Oasis's "Falling Down" is pretty interesting. I'm digging the song, too. - Stereogum
Fair or ridiculous? The Arizona residents who saw porn during the Super Bowl are getting $10 from Comcast. - TV Squad
I would totally dance to this remixed musical version of Christian Bale's verbal freakout. - GiggleSugar
Now that Michael Cera is playing Scott Pilgrim, want to know what all the fuss is about? Here's an excerpt from book five of the comic, out tomorrow. - Vulture

Photo courtesy of Walt Disney Pictures

Chuck's Dad, the Super Office, and More From NBC

BuzzSugar — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 11:45:02 -0800

News on the Gossip Girl spinoff and Amy Poehler show was just the start of the good stuff to come out of NBC's TCA session yesterday. I also got some news on Chuck and the post-Super Bowl episode of The Office. Read on for details:

Yes, Chuck's dad will be found - and he'll be played by Scott Bakula of Quantum Leap! "[Executive producer] Chris Fedak and I were huge Quantum Leap fans," Executive Producer Josh Schwartz said. "We watched it religiously."
Does finding dear daddy mean there could be wedding bells for Ellie and Awesome before the season's up? "Very possibly," Schwartz said. "That is why Chuck said, 'I'm going to go find dad,' so he can be there to walk her down the aisle."
Also, we'll see Jeff shirtless and in 3D before the season's up - but not at the same time. "We felt like that was going to be too much for America," Schwartz said. For the record, Fedak worships Jeff; Schwartz worships Lester.
Another thing he's excited about: the upcoming guest appearance by Chevy Chase. "We are like psycho Chevy Chase fans on the show, and we've talked about Fletch and Spies Like Us, and we have all of these Spies Like Us references inside of our show," Schwartz said. He'll play the head of a company that's sort of Apple-ish, "real visionary in the software game," and he'll be a little edgier than we've seen from Chase before.

To get some info about The Office, just read more.

The post-Super Bowl episode of The Office will be a little more stand-alone than a typical installment because of all the new viewers it could attract, said Paul Lieberstein (who plays Toby but is also a writer and producer on the show). But the plot still sounds very Office-ish: "Dwight, in an effort to do extreme disaster training because he's frustrated with the way people have responded to it in the past, locks everyone in the office and sets fire to it," he said. "And then Michael has to help everyone."
Finding out The Office would be on after the Super Bowl was both intimidating and exciting. "There was certainly a sense of, 'This could take over the year,'" Lieberstein said. "In a way it felt like we were writing a pilot."
As for what Idris Elba will be doing on the show: He'll be playing a character who gets promoted to Jan's old job over Michael (who naturally thinks he's a lock for the position). "Michael doesn't handle it well," Lieberstein said. "There's quite a lot of tension with a presence that imposing and a guy like Michael Scott who just can't get it together."
Unlike in the BBC version of The Office, we may never see the documentary that the crew has supposedly been filming all these years. "I don't know if it's going to be the most satisfying way to see Michael Scott grow as a person," Lieberstein said. "You know, just to kind of become a horrible ex-reality star."

Are you excited to meet Chuck's dad? See Big Mike eat a doughnut in 3-D? Watch Dwight try to burn Dunder Mifflin down?

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Josh Schwartz Spills Secrets on the Gossip Girl Spinoff

BuzzSugar — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 05:30:13 -0800

I was full of questions after hearing that Gossip Girl's long-rumored spinoff was going to be focused on young Lily - so it was a pleasant surprise to see the gossip guy himself, executive producer Josh Schwartz, turn up at NBC's TCA party on Thursday night. Read on to find out what I learned:

Pay attention to the next-to-last episode of Gossip Girl this season. That's when the spinoff characters will be introduced, Schwartz said. "It'll be flashbacks that will sort of illustrate a crisis. It will resonate thematically with something that will be happening inside that episode."
They're seeking the actress to play young Lily. "We're starting now," he said. "We have a couple months."
They didn't necessarily want to do a spinoff at all - until they hit on this idea. "We talked about The It Girl, the book series that is a spinoff, but for me and Stephanie [Savage, also an executive producer], to do another teen drama . . . we needed something that was going to inspire us. We started talking like, 'What if we did this?' and that got us really excited."
Yes, versions of Lily and other characters could be in both shows at once. "We can introduce characters on the spinoff and then they can show up in the present, and vice versa, and the two things can kind of inform each other," Schwartz said.

To hear about the fashion, the music, and why Lily's a character worth exploring, just read more.

Lily was compelling because it was his way into writing about the '80s. "She was my DeLorean," he said. "She was my phone booth."
Wipe those visions of bad '80s fashion out of your head. "Stephanie is the fashion guru, and the stuff that she and [costume designer] Eric Daman have done for Gossip Girl I think is really influential and impactful. . . Eric is going to do the new show as well, so you know the clothes are going to be great.
And the music is going to rock. "Our goal is going to be to dig up under a couple of rocks maybe some songs you haven't heard in other '80s kinds of things and find some forgotten gems as well as stuff that you love," Schwartz said. "Some songs are still great no matter how many times you hear them, and we definitely don't want to shy away from those, but we all are also interested in finding music that maybe you forgot about or never even heard. And there's a whole generation of viewers, Gossip Girl viewers, who I think this music - this whole world, this decade - will be largely new to."

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Gossip Girl Spinoff News: It's All About Lily!

BuzzSugar — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 17:26:15 -0800

OK, this news is blowing my dome on so many levels. First of all, the news itself:

After months of gossip and speculation, [Gossip Girl] creators/exec producers Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage are proceeding with a spinoff that will serve as a prequel to the hot sophomore drama and chronicle the wild teen years of Lily van der Woodsen (Kelly Rutherford) in Los Angeles in the 1980s.

So. . .

Now we know it is all about young Lily, which is fine by me. Schwartz said he didn't want to "upset the chemistry" of the current cast and I think that's smart.
L.A. in the '80s?! Yeah!
Schwartz says he is also "inspired by the opportunity to tell overlapping stories and introduce characters that will appear in the past and the present - and hopefully enrich both shows," which is so time-warpy and kind of fun. Think of the possibilities! If we meet Lily's first boyfriend in the spin-off, say, he can show up on Gossip Girl later to wreak havoc. That's some synergy, folks, and I like it.

How do you feel about this? Good news? Bad news? Do you wish another character were getting the spinoff instead?

Photos courtesy of The CW

Link Time! 11/25

BuzzSugar — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 14:30:21 -0800

A case for keeping Eli Stone alive. - TV Squad
For the Star Wars fanatic in your life: a Darth Vader toaster. Yeah, I said it. - Cinematical
Whoa, Jenny Lewis did a song for the Bolt soundtrack! - Stereogum
Josh Schwartz vs. a bunch of questions about Chuck. - Give Me My Remote
A gentle reminder that it's really, really not worth it to rent or buy Fred Claus. - Popwatch
Why is there such a gap between popularity and quality on TV? - Clique Clack TV
Oh, Joel McHale. You always make me so happy. The Soup takes on Twilight. - MTV Movies Blog
Hahaha: Funny clip of John Legend on A Colbert Christmas. - CitizenSugar

Josh Schwartz Signs On for Teen-Focused X-Men

BuzzSugar — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 10:38:16 -0800

I loved the first couple of movies in the X-Men series (not so much the 2006 Brett Ratner installment, but hey, we all make mistakes), and I'm a big fan of Josh Schwartz's snappy TV writing, so this seems like it could be a perfect fit: Schwartz has signed on to write X-Men: First Class, a film focusing on a younger group of X-folk. Schwartz could also direct the movie, though he so far hasn't taken Fox up on the option.

According to Variety, the idea is to focus on the younger characters - Rogue, Iceman, Kitty Pryde, etc. - from the previous films, possibly also using elements from the X-Men: First Class comic series. There's no mention of Wolverine (aka newly crowned Sexiest Man Alive High Jackman), but maybe after his X-Men Origins movie hits theaters next Spring, he'll want to stop by.

If Fox wants an X-Men that will appeal to teens while keeping its geek cred, Schwartz seems like the man for the job: Gossip Girl and The OC prove he's got a handle on teen drama, while Chuck covers the nerdy end of things. Do you think he's got the chops to lead the X-Men franchise in this new direction?

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Which Josh Schwartz Show Are You Watching Tonight?

BuzzSugar — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 15:30:59 -0700

When Chuck premieres tonight, it will be competing against Josh Schwartz's other show, the formidable Gossip Girl. One's a funny spy spoof; the other's a sassy soap. So, which one are you watching?

Photos courtesy of The CW and NBC