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4:18 pm - 01/09/2013

Tina Fey Speaks Truth: NBC's Broad Comedy Plan Is Wrong

Tina-and-Amy-400x347Tina Fey has been the queen of NBC comedy for more than a decade, thanks to "Saturday Night Live" and "30 Rock." With "30 Rock" wrapping up its seven-year run, Fey signed a deal with the network and is poised to create new shows and possibly star in them for the Peacock network, but she has a problem with NBC's comedy plan.

"Those Thursday comedies, which the critics love, and we love, tend to be a bit more narrow than we'd ultimately like going forward," NBC's Robert Greenblatt told reporters in 2012.

However, he praised the current "niche" comedies. "I don't want to say anything negative about what Tina Fey does, or 'Parks and Rec' or 'The Office,'" he continued. "Those are great shows. But it's a challenge in comedy to broaden."

While speaking with The Hollywood Reporter prior to her Golden Globe hosting gig, Fey said NBC's "broad" comedy plan is wrong when asked if she had it in her to create a something not so narrow.

"You know what? They’re wrong, and I’m going to wait that out," Fey said. "What they want is hits, but no one knows what that is. Remember when Jeff Zucker was like: 'I've got a new plan! We’re only going to make hits!' [Laughs.] It’s hard. I couldn't do it. I couldn’t be a network exec
."

Fey's new deal is for four years.

"She's been a cornerstone of the network for over the past 10 years and there was just no way we were going to let her get away," Greenblatt said in September. "It's a measure of our esteem for her as a writer, actress and producer -- she's in a class by herself."

source
so_chic_doll 10th-Jan-2013 12:42 am (UTC)
"She could never have a career with her writing talent alone."

You do realize she was a head writer on SNL, right?
principino 10th-Jan-2013 12:43 am (UTC)
And that's a good thing? SNL is beyond terrible now and then. Are you seriously trying to say that that show has been consistently good in our lifetime?
broken_organ 10th-Jan-2013 07:28 am (UTC)
This. Telling me someone is an SNL writer is a great way to make me assume they're not funny.
diamond_dust06 10th-Jan-2013 12:48 am (UTC)
And didn't she also write Mean Girls?
grammaire 10th-Jan-2013 12:53 am (UTC)
Yes.
k5memo 10th-Jan-2013 01:01 am (UTC)
I think this alone makes her okay in my book.
principino 10th-Jan-2013 01:30 am (UTC)
It's not really much of a movie. Like the Hughes films from the '80s of its day.
cageyb 10th-Jan-2013 01:52 am (UTC)
It's also based on a book, so it's not like she came up with the concept from scratch either.
expromqueen 10th-Jan-2013 02:02 am (UTC)
are you saying john hughes didn't make good movies?
bananasnrum 10th-Jan-2013 01:30 am (UTC)
a hobo on the street could write better stuff tbh
summerswings 10th-Jan-2013 05:05 am (UTC)
Than Mean Girls? No movie in the last ten years has even come close to the enjoyability and rewatch factors of Mean Girls, so I highly doubt it.
bananasnrum 10th-Jan-2013 05:07 am (UTC)
snl
oracularist 10th-Jan-2013 02:33 am (UTC)
SNL is terrible though
summerswings 10th-Jan-2013 05:05 am (UTC)
Uh, yeah, NOW, when she isn't there anymore.

It wasn't when she was on it, people consider those the golden years.

vicvinegar 10th-Jan-2013 07:41 pm (UTC)
not when she was writer
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