Damon Lindelof looks back at three seasons of The Leftovers after the HBO drama finished earlier this year.
He tells DQ about why he was drawn to Tom Perrotta’s book for a TV adaptation, how he worked with the author to create the critically acclaimed series and why the show was reset in a new location when the book’s story was exhausted by the end of the first season.
Lindelof, whose credits also include big screen blockbusters Star Trek: Into Darkness and Tomorrowland, discusses why fear and anxiety are key to his writing process and what differences he sees between working between film and television.
The writer also looks back on hit series Lost and reveals what lessons he learned from the show, which ran for six seasons on US network ABC.
Damon Lindelof, the prolific showrunner, producer and film screenwriter behind cult series The Leftovers and Lost, is the latest high-profile speaker to join the line-up at Drama Summit West, which takes place in LA on May 19.
You can see the full line-up and register online by CLICKING HERE.
Damon Lindelof
Lindelof will front a showrunner keynote Q&A at the event, discussing the third and final season of the critically acclaimed HBO series The Leftovers, his current work and his approach to the craft. The session will be chaired by The LA Times television and entertainment writer Libby Hill.
As well as TV work on Lost with JJ Abrams, Lindelof has also served as as a writer and producer on a number of science fiction films, including Ridley Scott’s Prometheus, World War Z, Star Trek, Star Trek Into Darkness and Tomorrowland.
Elsewhere at Drama Summit West, a high-profile showrunner panel forms part of the creative line-up featuring Marti Noxon (Sharp Objects, Unreal), Ilene Chaiken (Empire, The Handmaid’s Tale), Courtney Kemp (Power), Naren Shankar (The Expanse) and John Wirth (Hap & Leonard, Hell on Wheels). This panel sees the writer-producers discuss their evolving role and how they are creating, writing, developing and producing stories in new ways to meet audience and channel demands.
Delegates will also learn about the programming priorities for the top programming chiefs at AMC, Showtime, Starz and TNT at the event and how they are working with the international market, in a cable superpanel. The programming chiefs will also discuss challenges in the market and provide a sneak peak into some of 2017’s hottest new dramas, which they have commissioned, including Twin Peaks, American Gods, The Alienist and The Son.
Streaming giant Netflix also hosts a session at the event on its global coproduction and international originals strategy. This will be fronted by Elizabeth Bradley, VP of content, and Erik Barmack, VP of international originals, respectively. They will discuss how they are using Netflix multimillion-pound content budget to boost its library with original home-grown content in the 130-plus territories it now serves, as well as work with international partners on global coproductions.
British TV executive and former BBC drama chief Ben Stephenson will take part in a Next-Generation Producers panel, discussing his latest role as head of television at JJ Abrams’ Bad Robot. He is joined by The Night Manager producer The Ink Factory’s co-CEO Stephen Cornwell, American Crime Story producer Color Force’s senior VP television Nellie Reed and Anonymous Content’s Rosalie Swedlin, who’s latest projects include Caleb Carr adaptation The Alienist and The Wife, starring Glenn Close and Christian Slater.
The panel will discuss how some of the US’s hottest independent studios and seasoned producers are developing, producing and packaging next-generation drama, defining new models akin to the feature film world, finding new stories in a saturated market and working with creatives and writers.
A special focus on the Latin American market also forms part of the event. Execs from HBO Latin America, Globo, Fox Networks Latin America and Keshet Latin America will discuss the growing ambition for drama in the region, as well as the opportunities in this dynamic market.
Business sessions on coproduction and finance and the big questions in scripted TV also form part of the day with execs from BBC Worldwide, Lionsgate, Eone Entertainment, CAA, WME, Studiocanal TV, All3Media North America and Sonar Entertainment taking part.
The day will close with a networking cocktail party between 6pm and 9pm, organised in association with CAA.
It’s been a topsy-turvy week for US showrunner/screenwriter Carlton Cuse, who is currently working with cable channel A&E on two scripted series, Bates Motel and The Returned.
A few days ago, he learnt that the former had been greenlit for seasons four and five, but the latter – an adaptation of French zombie drama Les Revenants – has been cancelled after a lacklustre debut.
The Returned is a rare failure for Harvard-educated Cuse, whose shows tend to run and run. His first big success was Nash Bridges, which aired on CBS from 1996 to 2001.
A small hiccup came in 1998 with the quickly cancelled series Martial Law, also on CBS, but it seems churlish to even mention it when you consider that Cuse would later become one of the key architects of ABC’s Lost, arguably the standout drama series of the last decade. Although Cuse wasn’t involved as a writer in the pilot or the early episodes of season one, he co-wrote a number of episodes in the second half of its freshman year and then took on additional writing duties in seasons two and three.
Carlton Cuse has worked on hit shows such as Lost and Nash Bridges
By season four, he was penning the all-important opening and closing episodes in partnership with Damon Lindelof – a role he kept until the show ended in 2010. The final episode earned Cuse and Lindelof an Emmy nomination.
Bates Motel, a prequel to Alfred Hitchcock’s classic thriller Psych, launched in 2013 and marked the start of an incredibly prolific period for Cuse. In 2014, his vampire drama The Strain debuted on FX and in 2015 came A&E’s The Returned. He’s also working on Colony for USA Network, a thriller about life in LA after a mysterious foreign occupation and the efforts by the proxy government to crush the resistance movement. Initially greenlit as a pilot, it secured a 10-episode order in February. And as if all of this isn’t enough to be getting on with, he also found time to create a 2015 pilot for Amazon Studios called Point of Honor.
Bates Motel: renewed for seasons four and five
With so much good stuff to Cuse’s name, what went wrong with The Returned? At first sight, you might argue that Cuse had too much on his plate – with four series at various stages of production and development. But that seems unlikely given that Cuse typically shares creative responsibilities with a strong partner, thus easing the workload. In the case of The Returned, for example, he worked alongside Raelle Tucker, who established her credentials on HBO’s hit vampire series True Blood.
It is more likely, perhaps, that The Returned arrived in the US too late, with ABC’s Resurrection – another show about the dead coming back to life – hitting the market in 2014. It’s also just possible that we’re starting to see flaws in the scripted format model, at least in terms of foreign dramas being adapted for the US market.
While the success of Homeland, based on Israeli drama Hatufim, has proved that this model can work, the growing number of scripted format failures suggests transplanting shows is not such a safe bet.
John Ridley won an Oscar for 12 Years a Slave
While no one likes it when one of their shows doesn’t work, Cuse is unlikely to be too downbeat about the loss of The Returned. In a profile by Variety, he observed philosophically how “in Hollywood, it’s impossible to get the temperature of the porridge just right. No matter what your intentions are, Hollywood has a 90% failure rate. I had to put a few different irons in the fire because I didn’t think everything was going to work.” To his credit, Cuse is currently running at a higher success rate than most.
There is also news this week concerning another of the US industry’s hottest talents, John Ridley. After winning an Academy Award in 2013 for 12 Years a Slave (Best Adapted Screenplay), Ridley has been riding high with American Crime, a series he created and wrote for ABC. ABC is clearly very impressed with Ridley because it has renewed American Crime for a second season and this week also ordered a pilot from him, entitled Presence. It will be produced by ABC Studios.
In development for the 2016/2017 season, Presence is about a former army counter-insurgency operative who starts a new career as an unlicensed private investigator in LA. There are also reports that Ridley is working on a secret project with ABC Studios’ sister division Marvel Studios.
Ridley’s ABC show American Crime
Ridley, soon to turn 50, is something of an eclectic talent. Have started his adult life as a stand-up comedian, before going on to write episodes of shows including The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Subsequently, he has written and directed movies, produced TV series and penned numerous books. His novel Spoils of War became the acclaimed David O. Russell movie Three Kings.
On the subject of novelists-turned-screenwriters, the big story of the week in the UK is that Irvine Welsh (who will forever be referred to as the author of Trainspotting) is working on a 6×60’ series called Too Much Rock N Roll. Backed by producer Keo Films and distributor Content Media, the drama will tell the story of Anthony and Christopher Donnelly, who were born into Manchester’s notorious gang culture but went on to launch an internationally successful fashion label.
The factual drama, which continues Keo’s recent push into scripted series, is based on the Donnellys’ autobiography Still Breathing, which was published in 2013.
Irvine Welsh (pictured) and Dean Cavanagh are writing Too Much Rock N Roll
Welsh and long-time collaborator Dean Cavanagh are co-writing the show, having previously worked together on projects like Good Arrows, Dose and Wedding Belles. In a joint statement, Welsh and Cavanagh said: “We’re really excited to be involved in telling the story of the Donnelly Brothers for the screen. We’ve been offered many true-life stories over the years but what attracts us to this story in particular is the fact that Anthony and Christopher are unbeatable – they won’t take no for answer – and we’re going to capture that spirit. It’s something we relate to, having spent decades working in the business that is ‘show’ and all the attendant bullshit that comes with it. Anthony and Christopher are stand-up lads and so are we. Hopefully this is the start of a long and creative partnership.”
