‘Stripes’ TV Series In The Works At CBS
You know, I thought we might go a full week without a new edition of “Hollywood is out of original ideas”, but no… CBS came through at the last minute, announcing they’re looking at developing 80’s Bill Murray army comedy ‘Stripes’ into a tv show.
For those of you too young to have caught the film, it starred Murray as John Winger, a man who loses everything in his life, so decides to join the army. Somewhat of a slacker, Winger does find purpose in his life as he’s thrown together with a bunch of oddball, dysfunctional, eccentrics, which includes Harold Ramis, John Candy and Judge Reinhold.
The film was directed by Ivan Reitman, who would go on to reunite Murray and Ramis for his next flick – ‘Ghostbusters’.
This new ‘Stripes’ tv show would be a single-camera comedy (as opposed to a studio-based sitcom,) and sticks with the same basic premise of the film version. The adaptation comes Trevor Moore, Sam Brown and Zach Cregger from NYC based comedy troupe ‘The Whitest Kids U’ Know’. Sony Pictures TV and CBS Television Studios are set to make the series, with Reitman returning to direct the show and executive produce.
I wasn’t really aware of ‘The Whitest Kids U’ Know’ before this announcement, but you can find some of their sketches on YouTube. They are suitably funny and dark, so they seem like a good fit for this type of comedy. The fact they’re looking at making it single-camera rather than studio sitcom also seems to be a step in the right direction. However, the network is CBS, and that does make me wonder how far the will allow the guys go with a show that is potentially making fun of the military… Especially in the USA.
The ‘Stripes’ tv show is currently only in development for CBS at the moment, but we’ll let you know if we hear more.
