CBS Is Developing A 'Wizard Of Oz' Medical Drama Titled 'Dorothy'

[HappyEndings]

This looks good, better then Once at least they will keep the main characters together. Once is getting to the point were they need to drop Snow and David, since we now have Hook, Belle, and Rumble to many people sharing the lime light in my opinion. Snow is my favorite but getting tired of all the new people coming on board if they would have started with say Belle, or Hook it wouldn’t matter to me but they started with Snow White but have lost their direction in my opinion. I am also sick and tired of everyone being related to each other 🙁

CW In Talks For ‘Wizard Of Oz’ Drama

EXCLUSIVE: The summer of Wizard Of Oz continues with another sale of a high-profile Oz-themed drama project. I’ve learned that the CW is in negotiations for Dorothy Must Die, a drama from the Heroes trio of creator/exec producer Tim Kring and exec producers Adam Armus and Nora Kay Foster. Written by Armus and Foster with Kring supervising, I hear the project is based on the upcoming young adult novel Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige. It is a revisionist take on the classic tale set in present day, 80 years after Dorothy Gale supposedly came home. In reality, the magically-ever-youthful Dorothy has stayed in Oz, presiding over a now fascist fairyland with her perfectly manicured iron fist and the help of her henchmen – the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, and the Cowardly Lion. But when another young woman from Kansas is swept up in a tornado and magically dropped into this war-torn Oz, our hero discovers a revolutionary underground of witches and enchanted beings only to learn that she is destined to lead their people in the fight to reclaim Oz from a power-hungry Dorothy’s ruthless clutches. The book will be published next April, with digital prequel novella, No Place Like Oz, available now.

Dorothy Must Die, which is yet to be laid off at a studio, is the fourth Wizard Of Oz TV project sold in the past two months. It joins NBC drama Emerald City, a dark reimagining of the classic tale of Oz in the vein of Game Of Thrones from writer Matthew Arnold, CBS’ Dorothy, a medical soap inspired by the characters and themes from The Wizard Of Oz, and Syfy’s miniseries Warriors Of Oz from director Timur Bekmambetov, a fantasy-action reimagining of the classic story. The great interest in Wizard Of Oz is not entirely unexpected as the title has been getting a lot of attention in conjunction with the upcoming 75th anniversary of the 1939 feature, which will include a 3D re-release of the Judy Garland starrer. It also comes on the heels of the success of Oz The Great And Powerful earlier this year.

Related: NBC Buys ‘Wizard Of Oz’ Drama From Matt Arnold

The great interest in Wizard Of Oz properties this year comes on the heels of multiple Sleepy Hollow and Beauty And The Beast projects getting developed the last two development seasons. Both times, one of the projects, CW’s Beauty And The Beast and Fox’s Sleepy Hollow, went to series. In addition to Dorothy Must Die, Kring has another project with a writing duo in the works at the CW, a drama about illegal abilities-enhancing pills in American high schools. Heroes alum Zach Craley and Jarrett Conaway are writing. Kring, who most recently created/exec produced Fox drama Touch, and Armus and Foster, who serve as co-exec producers on Fox’s The Following, are with WME.

http://www.deadline.com/2013/09/cw-wizard-of-oz-drama-produced-by-heroes-creator-tim-kring/

Note: I would have started a separate thread but thought it would be easier to keep the OZ stuff together.

[HappyEndings]

@TVMoJoe @HeyheyDRA Oz was referenced in the Once pilot. If/when we go there is up in the air. But no immediate plans.

— Adam Horowitz (@AdamHorowitzLA) September 6, 2013

[Josephine]

I won’t watch the medical drama, after years of ER and Chicago Hope I’m burnt out on them.  I probably won’t watch the CW show, either.  Actually, I don’t think I’ve ever really been a fan of anything on the CW except Hart of Dixie and even that I quit watching after the first season.  I think they put it against something else I watch and it was sacrified and I just forgot about it.    I tend to forget CW actually exists.  On my cable system is up high in the listing and away from the other networks.

As for the influx of Oz stuff, last year it was Beauty and the Beast and Wonderland, which most of the pilots never got picked up.  This coming year looks like Oz is going to be in the spotlight.  I wonder if Networks might fare better bringing back the concept of miniseries.  I know cable shows do them, but rarely do Networks have them.  I grew up as a child of the 80s/90s and the big three always had miniseries.  They did musicals, fairytales, novels.   I think some of these fairytale projects would be better off as a miniseries.

The Oz series sounds a bit like Wicked, in that it’s from the opposite point-of-view and looks at Dorothy in a different light.  There are a lot of Wicked fans, both book and musical, so it will be interesting if it gets picked up how they were view this show.  But it’s unlikely that I will watch it.

HE, the show is called Once Upon a Time, not the Snow and Charming Show.  It’s an ensemble show, which means your favorite isn’t always going to be the focus.  Characters come and go, stories change. Any of the hour-long running shows that have stayed current and high in the ratings for a long period of time have been ensembles (ER, Grey’s Anatomy) or follow a formula (Law & Order).

 

Keeper of Rumplestiltskin's and Neal's spears and war paint and crystal ball.

[Author]

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