Your Dad Is About to Have Questions About the Strikes
Bad news, dads of America: the five Dick Wolf shows previously set for NBC’s fall schedule are all being removed due to the ongoing Hollywood strikes.
That means no “Chicago Med,” “Chicago Fire,” “Chicago P.D.,” “Law & Order,” or “Law & Order: SVU.” Wolf’s “Law & Order: Organized Crime” was not originally part of the fall slate, and it still isn’t. In addition, returning comedy “Night Court” is also being held back; new sitcom “Extended Family” will also wait.
It was the writers strike that carved up the schedule in this case, not the SAG-AFTRA strike (yet), a person with knowledge of the changing plans told IndieWire. “Extended Family” is actually fully in the can, a second source told IndieWire — it just needs a half-hour partner (the previous plan at it paired with “Night Court”) — to fill out a programming hour.
In place of the “One Chicago” shows that fill out the entirety of Wednesday primetime. Now, a repeat-episode of one of the “Chicago” series will open the evening, leading into a new “Quantum Leap” and then a new “Magnum P.I.”
Thursday nights on NBC will now open on a “Law & Order” universe rerun, followed by a new “Transplant” episode (new here — it’s a Canadian series), and then a “Dateline” encore hour. (New series “Found” is moving from Thursdays at 10 p.m. ET to the same hour on Tuesdays.)
NBC is not alone in the scramble; on Monday, CBS retooled its fall schedule. Out are new episodes of “Young Sheldon,” “Blue Bloods,” “NCIS,” and “FBI.” You’ll also have to wait for “The Good Wife”/”The Good Fight” spinoff “Elsbeth” and Kathy Bates in the new “Matlock.” In are repeats, reality TV, whacky game shows, and even the UK version of “Ghosts.”
One week ago, The CW revised its own fall plans. Scripted series “All American” and “61st Street” have been moved from fall to midseason, as has “I Am,” a series of documentaries.
The original schedules, released in conjunction with the annual TV upfronts in May, were somewhat between optimistic and unrealistic. Whatever the adjective, they certainly were not “strike-proof” as several networks touted.
IndieWire reached out to reps for fellow broadcast networks Fox and to query if their respective schedules have Fall-TV changes on the horizon. There are “no changes anticipated” a Fox, a spokesperson told us; ABC had nothing to share.
Times are tough for the over-the-air networks; streamers are typically not beholden to time slots and are less married to the calendar, both in terms of production and scheduling.
To individuals of the demographic naturally attracted to broadcast-television procedurals in 2023, we’re truly sorry to be the bearer of bad news; your kids probably should have been the ones to tell you. (And if you don’t yet know, you might not even want to know what happened to Tucker Carlson.)
The WGA walked out of work and onto the picket lines on May 2, which really disrupted the industry. The writers guild and studios (AMPTP — the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers) are far apart on subjects like streaming residuals, the use of AI in production, and staffing minimums, to cherry pick a few issues. While the directors guild was able to come to terms with the AMPTP and avoid a strike, the actors guild, SAG-AFTRA, could not. Members of SAG-AFTRA joined the WGA on strike last week, with pay raises, more AI, and other protections on that table.