Norman Lear’s Senior Comedy ‘Guess Who Died’ Picked Up for a Pilot by NBC

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The Hollywood Reporter is divulging that NBC has picked up Lear’s long talked-about sitcom Guess Who Died for a pilot development commitment.

Guess Who Died is a passion project that Lear has had in the works for about seven years now, so the news must be exciting for the TV icon, whose extensive resume includes The Jeffersons, Good Times, All in the Family, One Day at a Time, The Princess Bride, This is Spinal Tap and more. If the show does get picked up, it will be the first show that Lear has produced for NBC since Sanford and Son ended in 1977.

The show, set in a senior living community, will reportedly be partially based on Lear’s own life experiences, particularly his take on what the key to longevity truly is: an ever-expanding mind and the willingness to learn. As the name implies, the cast will mostly consist of senior-aged actors who, through Lear’s masterful writing, will depict conflicts and revelations that are a part of life at any age, not just the later stages. You can check out a brief reading from the show, recorded by CBS Sunday Morning at last year’s Austin Film Festival, below.

 

Most of us expect that, by the time we hit 95 years old, our lives will be mostly uneventful, filled with long afternoons spent sipping lemonade on the porch and reminiscing about the original Ghostbusters. Not Norman Lear, though. The prolific television writer and producer hasn’t slowed down much in his old age, evidenced by the fact that the 95 year old writer may soon have two shows on air simultaneously.

Lear has been in the news quite a bit this past year; The reboot of his hit sitcom One Day at a Time was renewed for a second season on Netflix back in March, and earlier this month he announced that he would be boycotting the Kennedy Center Honors, for which he was selected as an honoree.

 

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Bill Tressler

Bill is a writer and comedy enthusiast from New York. An avid gamer and podcast fan, he strives to always toe the line between charming irreverence and grating honesty.
Bill Tressler
Bill Tressler
Bill is a writer and comedy enthusiast from New York. An avid gamer and podcast fan, he strives to always toe the line between charming irreverence and grating honesty.