Five years after the launch of his "Desperate Housewives" helped turn around ABC's fortunes, Marc Cherry is developing a new series for the network targeted for next season.

Cherry is in discussions with ABC about the project, which he will write with "Desperate Housewives" executive producer Alexandra Cunningham.

In development circles, the project has been referred to as a "Desperate Housewives" spinoff, but while there was some discussion about spinning it from the hit dramedy, it will now be a stand-alone show.

The premise is being worked out, but the show is expected to have the tone of "Housewives." Cherry and Cunningham are expected to exec produce the project with another "Housewives" exec producer, Sabrina Wind.

There has been a lot of curiosity about what Cherry would develop as a follow-up to "Housewives" under his overall deal with ABC Studios, the show's producer. He spent the past five years on the hit series and has made it clear that he will stay involved until it ends. That is not expected to change if he gets another show on the air.

Meanwhile, Cunningham has been a rising star on "Housewives," which she joined after the pilot as a producer and quickly moved through the ranks to exec producer.

Cherry is repped by Paradigm, Cunningham by WME.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/television/news/e3i731d7f0f9e7e4ab136e62704460c8249

Great. More lame murder mysteries in primetime!

Cherry is great with ideas and with amping up the comedy, but he's a one-trick pony.

Great. More lame murder mysteries in primetime!

Cherry is great with ideas and with amping up the comedy, but he's a one-trick pony.

LOLOLOLOLOL.

I'm serious.

Some of his ideas(i.e. Lynette's cancer, Gabrielle being a mom, Andrew being gay) are fabulous. I just got sick of the lame murder mysteries.

I should have said, "Marc Cherry is SOMETIMES great with ideas."

Leave it to Sylph to go proofreading.

One DH is bad enough.

Ugh.

I was hoping for 2 things:

1) That he had abandoned that idea.

or, if not 1 then

2) that another series would mean less control over DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES.... But it doesn't seem to be....

LOLOLOLOLOL.

I'm serious.

Some of his ideas(i.e. Lynette's cancer, Gabrielle being a mom, Andrew being gay) are fabulous. I just got sick of the lame murder mysteries.

I should have said, "Marc Cherry is SOMETIMES great with ideas."

Leave it to Sylph to go proofreading.

Well, that's all correct. He also suffers from a typical writers' disease: maniacally and obsessively pursuing one single project and re-writing the same story 500 times.

But hey: who knows if they'll pick it up.

If they were smart they would look at Y&R for their new star and hire Victoria Rowell, she'd be great as a Desperate Housewife.