NBC has 'Zeroes' interest in drama project

Feature writer-helmers look at last hour of crisis situations

By Nellie Andreeva

The feature writing-directing team of Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor are venturing into television with a one-hour project for NBC.

"Zeroes," from Universal Media Studios and BermanBraun, is described as a high-intensity drama chronicling the last hour of a crisis situation.

BermanBraun approached Neveldine and Taylor with the idea to do "a crisis show that doesn't bore you with all of the buildup leading to the crisis," Taylor said.

"We want to drop right into it and sustain the absolute most berserk state of crisis, when all of the options have been exhausted," he said. "We want to take that last 60 minutes and sustain it for the entire show."

"Zeroes" refers to a fictional team of guys called in as a last resort who are "absolutely ruthless" in their use of force, Taylor said.

Neveldine and Taylor are writing the script. The two also are on board to direct the potential pilot.

In doing so, they plan to use their film experience.

"We came out of guerrilla filmmaking," Taylor said. "We learned how to work superfast under pressure, generating a lot footage on a small budget."

UTA-repped Neveldine and Taylor wrote and directed "Gamer," "Crank" and "Crank: High Voltage." They most recently wrote the screenplay for "Jonah Hex," which is being directed by Jimmy Hayward.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/television/news/e3i422dde68f61e91f2f8c37d886bc4b15e

That doesn't sound like a long term hit that can bring the network out of the brink. If successful at all (and I'd doubt it), it would be temporary and a limited success. More bad development at NBC, IMO.

I don't know if this has the potential to be successful or not, but damn--"the boring build-up"? How do they expect the audience to have a connection to the stories without a build-up? And, really, how many crises can you have? How soon before they start repeating themselves?

It's an interesting idea--I only hope they can make something good of it.

Edited November 2, 200916 yr by YRBB

So basically this show will be Punisher wannabes who go around saving people we don't know and won't care about?

This seems more suited to FOX.

Uh...NBC's new strategy is greenlighting new shows that have titles that rhyme with shows that were initially hits for them?