| 1 | %% |
| 2 | %% NOTE: Real-life examples only. In-universe examples go on TroubledProduction/FictionalExamples. |
| 3 | %% |
| 4 | ---- |
| 5 | !!Series with their own pages |
| 6 | [[index]] |
| 7 | * ''TroubledProduction/DoctorWho'' |
| 8 | * ''TroubledProduction/PowerRangers'' (also covers the feature films) |
| 9 | * ''TroubledProduction/RedDwarf'' |
| 10 | * ''TroubledProduction/SaturdayNightLive'' |
| 11 | * ''TroubledProduction/StarTrek'' (also covers the feature films) |
| 12 | [[/index]] |
| 13 | |
| 14 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 15 | |
| 16 | [[folder:#0-9]] |
| 17 | * Creator/JamesFranco and Creator/AnneHathaway's poorly-remembered hosting gig at the 83rd Annual (2011) MediaNotes/{{Academy Award}}s shows that this trope can have its negative effects even without financial, physical, legal, or personal issues playing a part, according to [[https://www.theringer.com/movies/2021/4/14/22381783/2011-oscars-james-franco-anne-hathaway-behind-the-scenes-story this anniversary story in ''The Ringer'']]. |
| 18 | ** The previous year's Oscars had gone over quite well. But it had occurred to the Academy that co-hosts Creator/SteveMartin and Creator/AlecBaldwin were over a hundred years old combined, and they decided that sooner rather than later it was time to make the show YoungerAndHipper. After talking to several potential hosts, they landed on the duo of Franco and Hathaway, who were the right ages but had never worked together before. They also hired some younger writers. |
| 19 | ** However, no one involved ever had a clear idea of just ''how'' the show was to take advantage of this talent ... much less the inclination to discuss it with anyone else. Long before reduction, one of the people involved said, it ''was'' clear that there were way too many cooks in the kitchen: Hathaway had her idea, Franco his, the writers their ideas, and the producers theirs. |
| 20 | ** Hathaway, like the professional she is, showed up at all the rehearsals and worked hard to learn her lines, endearing herself to everyone. Franco, however, was distracted by classes he was teaching and classes he was taking: acting and filmmaking in Southern UsefulNotes/{{California}}, and doctoral studies in English at Yale. The producers often had to keep up with him through phone calls where he was often waiting for flights. |
| 21 | ** Hathaway also had no problem with comedy as she'd done quite a bit in her career up to that point. Franco ... not so much. After OK'ing both the bit where he came out in a dress like one of Creator/MarilynMonroe's and the dress itself, Hathaway recalls that when it came time to rehearse it, Franco went over to her and asked "are we really going to go through with this?" |
| 22 | ** Some bits were dropped because the producers wanted to cast actors who had been in hit movies from that year in them, rather than some of the comic actors who could have made them work. At one point Creator/WillArnett was supposed to come out wearing flesh-tone underwear and parody the streaker who had run across the Oscar stage in 1974. But the producers would only approve it if they could get Creator/JimCarrey. |
| 23 | ** Due to all these issues, most of the dialogue in the show was written in a mad rush during the last few days before it. |
| 24 | ** Franco decided that the best way for him to make the show work was to play things cool and deadpan, to be a contrast to Hathaway's natural enthusiasm. It worked ... [[GoneHorriblyRight too well]]. He seemed to some viewers and reviewers to be confused about why he was there, and to this day the producers have had to tell people that, no, he was ''not'' stoned. |
| 25 | ** While no particular bit did the show in[[note]]unlike the 1988 Oscars' intro with the duet between Snow White and Creator/RobLowe[[/note]], it was apparent that it was slowly becoming a disaster. By the end of the ceremony, it was obvious that many of the A-listers had left the auditorium for aftershow parties. |
| 26 | ** The kicker was that, for all the producers' intents and hopes to reframe the Oscars for a younger audience, the telecast actually did worse with the 18-34 demographic than the previous year's had. |
| 27 | [[/folder]] |
| 28 | |
| 29 | [[folder:A]] |
| 30 | * ''Series/{{Airwolf}}'' had to deal with a star (Creator/JanMichaelVincent) with drinking problems who got arrested four times in four years and consistent budget overruns. After the ChannelHop the budgets were slashed, necessitating the removal of Vincent and co-star Creator/ErnestBorgnine, and worse than that they ''no longer had access to the titular chopper,'' requiring episodes to be cobbled together using StockFootage from previous seasons. |
| 31 | * The TV adaptation of radio sitcom ''Radio/TheAldrichFamily'' went through a truly absurd number of cast changes in its four years, with only House Jameson as the family patriarch as a regular presence. The other actors were replaced close to once a year, most dramatically when Jean Muir became a victim of [[RedScare HUAC]] and the show was forced to fire her or be cancelled. |
| 32 | * ''Series/{{ALF}}'' had several problems during its run, mainly due to the difficulty in staging a traditional sitcom with a puppet (ALF) as the main star (in fact, the show was not shot in front of a live studio audience because of this). To accommodate the puppeteers the floor of the set was riddled with trapdoors, adding a whole new and nerve-wracking dimension to the human cast's attempts to hit their marks; however, they were often reset multiple times for safety reasons even for a single scene, which led to upwards of ''25 hours'' of taping for one half-hour episode. There was reportedly so much tension among the actors that one of the leads, Max Wright, simply walked off the set after the finale was shot and never said goodbye to anyone. He disliked the puppet, claiming that it got the best lines. Paul Fusco also was very particular about ALF and disliked rehearsal. Even years later, Creator/TinaFey discussed how, when working on Creator/{{NBC}}'s 75th anniversary special, ALF's crew was very hard to work with. |
| 33 | * The attempt to relaunch ''Series/AllMyChildren'' and ''Series/OneLifeToLive'' online was filled with unfortunate production problems that ultimately resulted in the soap operas being canceled again: |
| 34 | ** Once Prospect Park purchased the license to the two soaps after they were canceled by Creator/{{ABC}}, they struggled for over a year to secure financing and their project was put on hiatus until they worked out deals with the many labor unions. Several members of the ''OLTL'' cast joined ''Series/GeneralHospital'' as their characters to continue work during the hiatus. |
| 35 | ** Prospect Park's contract required that production had to begin by a certain date, or else they would lose the license. Once funding was finally secured, the production team had only ''eight weeks'' to lease a soundstage in Connecticut, build thirty sets, begin writing episodes, casting (or re-casting) the actors, and begin production. Once cameras finally began rolling, they were writing episodes almost on the fly. |
| 36 | ** Reception to the episodes were mixed. Many of the original viewers of the soaps were 50+ and were not quick to embrace their move online. It was also clear that an online soap opera was not as good of an idea as originally believed since online viewers are more accustomed to binge-watching a storyline instead of watching it unfold over months or years. In response, Creator/OprahWinfrey's OWN cable network began showing repeats of the online episodes, though this was ultimately unsuccessful. |
| 37 | ** Then, due to budget cuts, the number of episodes premiering a week was reduced from four to two, causing much outrage among fans. Additionally, this caused an agreement for the shows to air on a cable network in UsefulNotes/{{Canada}} to end, removing a source of revenue for the show. |
| 38 | ** Next, Prospect Park got into a nasty battle with the union representing the behind-the-scenes staff on ''AMC'', which further highlighted the issues the firm was having with the show. To make the economics for the shows to work, Prospect Park got the unions to make certain concessions, contingent on the shows sticking to a below-broadcast budget. The union indicated that Prospect Park was not keeping to those reduced budgets -- in some cases, spending DOUBLE the contracted budget on an episode (roughly equal to the cost of an hour-long broadcast soap episode!). This served to shut down production several weeks early, forcing the shows into an early hiatus.... |
| 39 | ** Finally, Prospect Park sued ABC for killing off two ''OLTL'' characters they had leased to ''General Hospital'', believing they were trying to sabotage their efforts. This resulted in ''OLTL'' being put on indefinite hiatus after 40 episodes, and ''OLTL'''s actors on ''General Hospital'' were written off and brought back as [[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute different characters]] for legal reasons. Then ''AMC'' was canceled too after forty-three episodes. Long story short, neither show was ever able to wrap up their 40+-year-old storylines. Said lawsuit was eventually dismissed at the end of 2016, with ABC regaining the rights to both soaps, but it remains to be seen if they'll be revived once more. |
| 40 | ** Ultimately, it appears that ''AMC'' and ''OLTL'' failed on streaming because '''1)''' Streaming was still in its infancy and '''2)''' Prospect Park had no idea what it would mean to produce a soap opera. They could not make the financials work. In other words, they were produced by a startup that couldn't finance or manage them. Arguably, Prospect Park's biggest failure was relying on its own website and iTunes instead of Creator/{{Hulu}}. '''3)''' Soap operas are designed for a niche audience and it requires a commitment. Streaming shows have 8-13 episodes a season. It's a quick binge watch and then you're done until the next season. In a nutshell, to make soap opera work on a streaming platform, you would have to completely reimagine what you currently consider a traditional soap. Therefore, the storytelling and basic DNA would have to completely change. And soap fans have proven that they don't like change all that much. |
| 41 | * Making ''[[Series/AmericanGods2017 American Gods]]'', an adaptation of [[Literature/AmericanGods the novel of the same name]], has not been an easy task. [[https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/american-gods-canceled-at-starz A report on the show's cancellation downright called it "a magnet for trouble"]]. |
| 42 | ** The show's first showrunners were Creator/BryanFuller and [[Film/{{Logan}} Michael]] [[Film/BladeRunner2049 Green]]. Despite positive reviews, Fuller and Green were fired from the show, reportedly due to not only going $30 million overbudget during production of Season 1, but also due to friction and disagreements with both production company Creator/FremantleMedia, a company largely known for reality and game shows which oversaw the show for Creator/{{Starz}} and wanted to significantly lower the budget, and Creator/NeilGaiman, who disliked Fuller and Green's direction for the series, and wanted to stick closer to his original book. |
| 43 | ** Their replacement, Jesse Alexander, was personally chosen by Gaiman, and [[WagTheDirector was largely seen as a way for Gaiman and Fremantle to exert more control over the show]], with them even throwing out Fuller and Green's first six scripts for Season 2. There were even reports that other showrunners turned down the job out of wariness, and that Fremantle wouldn't have done anything that radical without Gaiman's consent. |
| 44 | ** This effort to course-correct went over disastrously with the cast and crew. Creator/GillianAnderson (Media) left the show in protest and scripts were constantly rewritten by the cast, who were behind Fuller and Green's original vision. And when cast members began to improvise, the production was forced to hire Creator/OrlandoJones (Mr. Nancy) as a writer so as to not get in trouble with the WGA. |
| 45 | ** Alexander also made few friends on set. He reportedly got into "screaming matches" with Creator/IanMcShane, and Starz was unhappy with Alexander's more conventional tone, preferring the more hypnotic, atmospheric nature of Fuller and Green. They also criticized the [[SpecialEffectFailure downgraded special effects]], with the third and fourth episodes receiving extensive retooling. |
| 46 | ** On top of all that, Season 2 went overbudget and [[ScheduleSlip overschedule]] again (which Alexander was explicitly hired for ''in order to avoid''), leading to a production hiatus and energy being spent on reshoots and pickups instead of creating the finale. This led to Alexander being, in the words of one crew member [[ReassignedToAntarctica "fired but not fired"]], and is not allowed to be involved with editing, show up on set, or have input on any aspect of production. After another writer left the showrunner position almost as soon as they were promoted, it fell on producing director Chris Byrne and line producer Lisa Kussner to salvage the production. This led to the Season 2 premiere being pushed back to 2019. The season ultimately got a mediocre critical response, but an overall quite positive audience response, leading to a third season being commissioned and yet ''another'' new showrunner, Charles H. Eglee, being hired to oversee its production. |
| 47 | ** On December 14, 2019, Jones announced on Website/{{Twitter}} that he had been fired from Season 3 the previous September under acrimonious circumstances. Without mentioning him by name, Jones claimed that Eglee (who is white) unilaterally decided that Mr. Nancy's angry black man characterization sent the "wrong message for black America" and described Fremantle as a "nightmare" company that treated its talent as "2nd class citizens". |
| 48 | ** And he wouldn't be the last cast member to get axed. Later it was announced that Mousa Kraish (The Jinn) wouldn't return for the third season as well. Then Music/MarilynManson's scenes were cut after former girlfriend Creator/EvanRachelWood and several other women accused him of abusive behavior. |
| 49 | ** To make things worse, miserable ratings led to a cancellation following season 3, forcing the producers to scramble to get a way to film a conclusion (probably a movie) given the last episode ends in a huge cliffhanger. |
| 50 | * Production on ''Series/{{Andromeda}}'' had an absolute whale of a time thanks to the [[ThePrimaDonna antics]] of lead actor Creator/KevinSorbo, who demanded that the show focus more and more on him at the expense of his co-stars, as well as [[ExecutiveMeddling executive demands]] to make the show more episodic and [[StatusQuoIsGod maintain the status quo at all costs]]. All of these factors led to showrunner Robert Hewitt Wolfe being fired after the end of Season 2, taking all pretense of character or story development along with him. Wolfe has since written a one-act play, ''[[http://www.cyberspace5.net/agentrichard07/coda.htm Coda]]'', which is a compressed form of his original plan for the series. Sorbo's antics also [[StarDerailingRole put a permanent dent in the actor's career]], and he soon descended into [[TheFundamentalist religious fundamentalism]], being unable to secure roles in anything except direct-to-video and made-for-television productions and Christploitation films such as ''Film/GodsNotDead'' and ''Film/{{Let There Be Light|2017}}''. |
| 51 | * Season 4 of ''Series/{{Angel}}'' had a sudden and drastic rewrite brought on because of Creator/CharismaCarpenter's pregnancy, which required changing much of the later two-thirds of the series. Creator/JossWhedon, supposedly out of spite and anger at having to do so, subsequently wrote Cordelia as the villain for the early half of the season while writing around the pregnancy, and ultimately Cordelia was written out of the show at the end of Season 4 with only a brief appearance in Season 5 to wrap up her arc. In 2021, with Whedon in hot water after accusations of abusive behavior while making ''Film/JusticeLeague2017'', Carpenter piled on with claims that the situation on ''Angel'' was even worse than anyone knew at the time, including Whedon trying to pressure her to abort her baby. From there the floodgates opened with numerous other actors from both ''Angel'' and ''Series/{{Buffy|TheVampireSlayer}}'', male and female alike, saying her story fit perfectly with their own experiences with Whedon. |
| 52 | * ''Series/TheATeam'' didn't start out as one, but it sure flamed into one in a hurry. For starters, Creator/GeorgePeppard, who had a reputation for being notoriously moody, made clear that he (and the other stars, with the exception of Creator/DwightSchultz) did not want Melinda Culea (or any female) to be added as full-on team members. Then, budgets were cut and scripts would be handed out with varying degrees of completeness. Finally, with ratings tanking, relations between Peppard and Creator/MrT grew so toxic that producers hired Peppard's friend Creator/RobertVaughn to try and smooth things over. It didn't work and the show was cancelled. T and Peppard eventually buried the hatchet before Peppard's death in 1994. |
| 53 | * ''Series/{{The Avengers|1960s}}'' had this during its sixth season. After Creator/DianaRigg announced she was leaving, searches were held to find a replacement actress -- including toying with the idea of a number of guest actresses. Creator/PatrickMacnee was apparently not aware this was going on at first. Creator/LindaThorson was chosen as she was dating producer John Bryce -- who was brought in to replace Brian Clemens and Albert Fennell. This change was because the studio wished to bring the show "back to realism" and Bryce had produced the Cathy Gale episodes. He also had to hurriedly shoot seven episodes to ship off to UsefulNotes/{{America}} with the last of the Emma Peel episodes. He only completed three before he was replaced by Clemens and Fennell again. Rigg also had to be brought back to hurriedly shoot a new introduction episode for Tara King. What's more, the Creator/{{ABC}} network in America aired the show up against ''Series/RowanAndMartinsLaughIn'', one of ''the'' most popular shows in the country at the time. Due to declining ratings, it was almost immediately cancelled. |
| 54 | [[/folder]] |
| 55 | |
| 56 | [[folder:B]] |
| 57 | * ''Series/{{Batwoman|2019}}'': |
| 58 | ** Had the unfortunate luck of losing its main star Creator/RubyRose after its inaugural season. While initially reported because [[https://ew.com/tv/ruby-rose-explains-decision-leave-batwoman/ Rose was overwhelmed by the stunt-heavy work the role made her do, which nearly left her paralyzed]] and that she parted from the show on good terms, Rose would come forward in October 2021 with [[https://www.cbr.com/batwoman-ruby-rose-horrifying-set-conditions-slams-wbtv-berlanti/ a slew of information]] about abusive and unsafe set conditions far beyond the initial reports. |
| 59 | ** Rose called out multiple members of the cast and production crew for their abusive actions; Rose described co-star Creator/DougrayScott as "a nightmare" for attacking a female stunt double and constantly screaming at women on the set, with complaints about his actions being ignored. Rose also put forth that showrunner Caroline Dries had forced the show to continue shooting through the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic, putting the cast and crew at risk until government action forced a production shutdown. (Other cast members, for their part, [[https://boundingintocomics.com/2021/10/24/batwoman-crew-member-speaks-out-calls-ruby-rose-a-dictator/ accused]] [[https://boundingintocomics.com/2021/10/22/batwoman-star-camrus-johnson-denies-ruby-roses-batwoman-accusations-a-lot-of-lies-were-spread/ Rose]] of abusive behavior as well.) |
| 60 | ** Stunt injuries were rife throughout the production. Rose showed proof of multiple injuries she suffered from stunt work, including a major cut that nearly caused blindness, a tumor, rib injuries, and revealed that her back injury had required major surgery to address. According to Rose, she was forced by WB executive Peter Roth to return to work a mere ''ten days'' after her surgery or she would be blamed for production shutting down. Other stunt-related incidents included a crew member suffering third-degree burns across their whole body and a production assistant left paralyzed from the waist down. To further pissed off Rose, She learned that Roth had paid a private detective to personally spy on her while on set and report his findings to him, possibly so that he could use them against her. the Detective failed to deliver any evidence that Roth could use to 'fit his personal narrative' towards Rose, and was promptly fired. To pour more salt on Rose's wounds, she wasn't allowed to attend Comic-Con in person due to the shooting schedule, and the studio refused to rearrange it at her request. |
| 61 | * ''Series/{{Bewitched}}'' got some of this from Day 1. The show's very first rehearsal occurred on November 22, 1963--the very day that President UsefulNotes/JohnFKennedy was assassinated. Production was slightly delayed as a result. Once production did get going, Creator/DickYork's famous troubles immediately became apparent. He was addicted to painkillers as a result of a disabling back injury he had suffered a few years before, and frequently came on set loopy and out of it, sometimes not at all. Creator/{{ABC}} executives wanted York fired from the very beginning, but the cast and crew fought to keep him in because of how well he performed his character, Darrin. After four seasons, this had gotten so bad, there were frequent episodes of Darrin doing nothing but laying in bed or not appearing at all. After the fifth season, he was finally fired following a seizure episode on set that left him in the hospital for a long time. He was replaced with Creator/DickSargent for the rest of the series. Similar problems also happened with Creator/AlicePearce, Irene Vernon, and Robert F. Simon who were all replaced for various reasons ranging from death (Pearce) to retirement (Vernon) to simply being unavailable (Simon). Also, as the show went on, Creator/ElizabethMontgomery (who played lead Samantha) and William Asher (the show's main director)'s marriage began falling apart, causing a lot of friction on set, and Montgomery had all but completely lost interest in the show and her character a few seasons before the end. |
| 62 | * Production for the sixth and final season of ''Series/BetterCallSaul'' was delayed for almost a year due to [[UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic COVID-19]] restrictions in New Mexico. And several months into resumption of filming, around the completion of "Point and Shoot", Creator/BobOdenkirk suffered a near-fatal heart attack and has since stated that he would have died if Creator/RheaSeehorn and Creator/PatrickFabian hadn't been around to alert a medic. Showrunner Thomas Schnauz has confirmed that the heart attack was a contributing factor to the season being split in two. |
| 63 | * The second season of ''Series/BigLittleLies'' |
| 64 | ** Andrea Arnold was hired to direct. The creators believed that her visual style would not be too different from what Creator/JeanMarcVallee had established in the first season. She was also required to consult David E. Kelley if she wanted to change any scenes but believed she had a free hand for the show's look. |
| 65 | ** With two episodes left to film, however, Kelley and the other creators apparently grew concerned that the show was looking very different from what they had expected it would, and apparently decided to take the show's editing away from Arnold (or, depending on who you talk to, implemented a plan they had made before production even started). |
| 66 | ** For this they brought back Vallée, which apparently required two and a half weeks of reshoots. This may account for the complaints that the second season was choppy and uneven, with some scenes contrived in order to facilitate key plot developments[[note]]such as Maddie's husband finding out about her affair by overhearing her conversation about it with her daughter[[/note]]. And rumor has it this was where Bonnie's death, {{Fauxshadow}}ed all season, was written out in favor of an ending that leaves open the possibility of a third season. |
| 67 | * ''Film/BlackMirrorBandersnatch'' was insanely exhausting for the entire crew, with its ambitious "choose your own adventure" structure requiring a much more intensive thought process than usual to come up with numerous branching stories that would all be equally satisfying. The show's following season ended up being delayed just because everyone needed a long vacation after finishing it. |
| 68 | * ''Series/BreakTheBank1985''. According to a biography, host Gene Rayburn was mainly picked for his name recognition (he was most famously the host of ''Series/MatchGame'', which lasted for most of TheSeventies) and, despite being known as a "silly" host on that show, was told not to joke around. He was later replaced with Joe Farago, and Rayburn became so frustrated that he placed an embargo on the episodes he hosted (to the point that they have never been rerun). This, combined with ''Entertainment Weekly'' accidentally revealing that he was older than the industry had thought, ended Rayburn's hosting career. |
| 69 | * ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'': As detailed in [[https://variety.com/2021/tv/features/joss-whedon-buffy-angel-charisma-carpenter-toxic-workplace-1234915549/ this Variety piece]], a slew of allegations against ShowRunner Creator/JossWhedon that surfaced nearly two decades after the show ended showed that production of the series, and by extension its spin-off ''Series/{{Angel}}'', was far more troubled than originally thought. |
| 70 | ** For starters, the budget was often stretched to its limit against the effects-driven nature of the show, and was OnlyBarelyRenewed after its first season thanks to rave reviews and hitting key demographics among otherwise unimpressive ratings. ExecutiveMeddling haunted the show throughout its run. |
| 71 | ** Long days of shooting led to exhaustion. Actors in heavy makeup could look forward to 21-hour work days, and it was not uncommon for shooting on Fridays to carry through to the early hours of Saturday (coining the term "Fraterdays" on the set), severely limiting the amount of weekend recovery time. Creator/ElizaDushku was legally emancipated from her parents just so her hours wouldn't be limited by child labour laws, and Creator/CharismaCarpenter later said the cast was so overworked that it led to physical harm. Creator/SarahMichelleGellar would often try to advocate for filming to not run overschedule, but was then dragged by other crew members as an unprofessional diva. |
| 72 | ** Following reports that Joss Whedon created a toxic work environment during reshoots on ''Film/JusticeLeague2017'', numerous persons involved with ''Buffy'' stepped forward to tell their own stories regarding Whedon; While viewed as cordial and collaborative by executives, Whedon was also a "casually cruel" and egotistical ControlFreak to those beneath his rank, creating a cliquish CultOfPersonality around himself as his status as an icon of geek fandom grew: |
| 73 | *** Charisma Carpenter was already on the bad side of Whedon from the outset by being a studio-mandated hire, while her reported "tardiness" backstage irked the producers. The breaking point, [[https://twitter.com/AllCharisma/status/1359537746843365381 Carpenter has claimed]], came when her pregnancy during the fourth season of the spin-off show ''Angel'' infuriated Whedon, who went as far as to pressure Carpenter to terminate her pregnancy to stay on the show. Her character was written off behind her back and later KilledOffForReal after she refused. |
| 74 | *** Creator/MichelleTrachtenberg was a regular subject of inappropriate and sexist jokes backstage, enough so that her family was alarmed at her treatment. Trachtenberg also claimed that an argument between her and Whedon resulted in Whedon saying... ''[[FridgeHorror something]]'', which was so extreme that a rule came down stating she was not to be left alone with Whedon again. |
| 75 | *** Creator/JamesMarsters, who played EnsembleDarkHorse Spike, claimed that [[https://www.comicbookmovie.com/tv/buffy_the_vampire_slayer/buffy-the-vampire-slayer-star-james-marsters-on-aggressive-disturbing-interaction-with-joss-whedon-a176820#gs.aylwza the unexpected popularity of his character]] angered Whedon, who blamed Marsters personally. Whedon went as far as to back Marsters up against a wall and threaten him, and continually took out frustrations related to the character on Marsters throughout production. Whedon himself presented a very different face to fans and claimed Spike was his [[CreatorsFavorite favorite character]], whose writing he was the most proud of. |
| 76 | *** Stunt Coordinator/Second Unit Director Jeff Pruitt and StuntDouble Sophia Crawford had [[https://metro.co.uk/2020/07/12/egomaniac-joss-whedon-faces-claims-buffy-stunt-double-12942160/ serious problems with Whedon]], who increasingly ignored Pruitt and became angered when Pruitt and Crawford [[RomanceOnTheSet became engaged while working on the show]]. The last straw was when Whedon demanded they end their relationship to keep working, to which they both refused. Whedon, for his part, claimed that [[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/alt.tv.buffy-v-slayer/jIAqP0884z0 they were not blameless in their departure]], particularly citing Pruitt for his own ego issues. |
| 77 | ** Whedon was not the only one igniting HostilityOnTheSet. Creator/SarahMichelleGellar also received a fair share of blame with her co-stars and [[http://buffyangelshow.fr/buffy/dossiers/jeff-pruitt-sophia-crawford-the-interview/ stunt double]] accusing her of [[ThePrimaDonna diva]]-[[WagTheDirector like]] behavior, especially after [[Film/IKnowWhatYouDidLastSummer launching her]] [[Film/Scream2 film career]]. Geller had her own problems with Whedon, to the point that she became disinterested in the show as early as the third season, while the creative decisions of season six nearly caused her to leave the show entirely. While remaining diplomatic regarding the show and the character of Buffy, Geller [[https://www.instagram.com/p/CLH4s_WjfZF/ later distanced herself from Whedon]] in the face of the various allegations. |
| 78 | * ''Series/{{Bull}}'': It was initially planned for Creator/ElizaDushku to frequently appear as a central character, but Dushku balked at inappropriate behavior by lead actor Creator/MichaelWeatherly that she regarded as sexual harassment. She was subsequently written out of the series after just a few appearances, and Creator/{{CBS}} paid a monetary settlement to Dushku that was not publicized until a few years after the fact. After Weatherly issued a denial, Dushku went into further detail, claiming Weatherly engaged in rape humor, made several distasteful comments about her appearance, and flaunted his close ties to CBS boss Les Moonves (himself later ousted over allegations of sexual misconduct). |
| 79 | [[/folder]] |
| 80 | |
| 81 | [[folder:C]] |
| 82 | * ''Series/CentralParkWest'' has the infamy of being one of the biggest television flops of TheNineties, and looking back at its production, it's not hard to see why. |
| 83 | ** The show was developed as a spinoff of Creator/{{Fox}}'s ''Series/MelrosePlace'', and was slotted in Creator/{{CBS}}' schedule at a time when Fox was trouncing them in the ratings after taking over the broadcasting rights to [[UsefulNotes/NationalFootballLeague NFL]] games. CBS subsequently decided to retool its entire programming lineup to cater to younger viewers, and ''CPW'' was rushed into development alongside cover stories and features explaining how revolutionary and sexy the new program was. In the end, all it did was create backlash among potential viewers. Not helping matters in this case was the fact that CBS found itself on different channels in many markets due to many CBS affiliates switching to Fox after the NFL deal. |
| 84 | ** The show's first two episodes went up against anniversary installments of ''Series/BeverlyHills90210'' and ''Melrose'' when Fox learned of the launch. According to the book ''[[http://books.google.ca/books?id=NIsAu5PqgqQC&pg=PA153&dq=central+park+west Gen X TV: The Brady Bunch to Melrose Place]]'', the show was given no time to grow and cultivate viewers organically like its predecessors, leaving it dead right out of the gate. Articles written after the first two episodes indicated panic among CBS executives -- a recap of the first two episodes was stitched onto the front of the third and fourth episodes in an attempt to get viewers up to speed. Additionally, the show was spending a large amount of its budget on-location shooting in UsefulNotes/{{New York|City}} (even in winter conditions). This and other factors drove each episode's budget up to more than $1 million per episode. |
| 85 | ** Once it became clear that the show's ratings were garbage, CBS was forced to stick with it in the hopes that it would get better (and to attempt to recoup their lost investment of nearly $15 million). The network spent millions of dollars revamping the series. Creator/MarielHemingway (who played the lead character, Stephanie) exercised her option to quit and Creator/GeraldMcRaney and Creator/RaquelWelch were brought on as a fellow media tycoon and his ex-wife. Welch later admitted that she [[http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,292839,00.html took the role]] for the [[MoneyDearBoy money]] because she wasn't getting the plum lead roles that she used to, even though her agent told her to stay away from it. The show was {{Retool}}ed as a ''Series/{{Dynasty|1981}}'' clone in an attempt to appeal to older viewers, but it was too late. The remaining episodes were burned off by airing two episodes per week, and then-CBS President Les Moonves later admitted the network had made a terrible mistake when they attempted to get away from their roots. |
| 86 | * It's something of a miracle that the original ''Series/{{Charmed|1998}}'' series managed to last eight seasons, given how rocky the road was almost from the start. |
| 87 | ** The first season's production tried to initially film every episode in seven days, since the other Aaron Spelling shows were usually done that way. Unfortunately, ''Charmed'' also had a lot of stunts and special effects, as well as wardrobe changes to contend with. Filming days would often run close to eighteen hours, and legal requirements to have a certain amount of rest hours between days meant that the next one's call time would continually be pushed back. It wasn't until the network complained about how tired the actors looked on camera (requiring an excessive amount of lighting around the eyes to try and hide it) that they were given an extra filming day for the schedule. Rose [=McGowan=] however still described this as hard going, since it was shooting "half a feature film in eight days". |
| 88 | ** Holly Marie Combs had a rough deal from the start. Despite being Aaron Spelling's favourite for the role of Piper, the network refused to cast her because they felt she didn't have "star power", and only conceded when Shannen Doherty threatened to withdraw from the project too. And even then, to be petty, they forced Aaron Spelling to cast Lori Rom as Phoebe instead of his preferred choice[[note]]She filmed the pilot but then left, and was then replaced with Alyssa Milano, who was offered the role straight away but it's not been said if she was the original actress considered.[[/note]] and she recalls producers overworking her during Season 1 and saying something to the effect of "I'm going to prove that the network was wrong about you". She faced lots of disrespect with the higher-ups not subtly trying to make her wear push-up bras, and leaving no alternate options in her wardrobe choices, so she would often go braless as a form of rebellion. |
| 89 | ** The show's creator, Constance M. Burge, left after Season 2 (though stayed on as an Executive Consultant until Season 5) because she disagreed with the introduction of Cole Turner. Season 2 had been taken up with a love triangle between Piper, Dan, and Leo, and Burge didn't want Season 3 to be dominated by a love story too. The actors didn't want her to leave and it was also accompanied by changes in writers and producers, which didn't help the on-set atmosphere... |
| 90 | ** While the three lead actresses began the series as good friends (enough for them to act as each other's bridesmaids), tensions were running high by the third season - Creator/AlyssaMilano and Creator/ShannenDoherty admitting that there were days they'd only speak to each other to say their lines. Holly Marie Combs attributed this to creative frustration over fights with the higher-ups to give the necessary money for stunts and special effects, and Shannen Doherty's own burnout from a lifetime in the industry. Alyssa Milano later owned up to not realising the network was actively pitting them against each other over pay and magazine covers to prevent them from banding together the way the ''{{Series/Friends}}'' cast had. Things were especially tense in the second season, during which Holly Marie Combs fell ill, and Shannen Doherty alleges that Alyssa Milano's family "blocked" her from visiting in the hospital, meaning they had a falling out too. Ultimately, by the end of the third season, Doherty was fired after the producers were informed that Milano had been building a case to sue for creating a toxic work environment with the network's psychologist. She was told by her team that her career wouldn't survive another firing, so she was forced to say that she chose to leave on her own. Few people believed the story, especially when the show resorted to killing Prue offscreen between seasons. |
| 91 | ** Holly Marie Combs wanted to leave the show as well after the firing, but recalls being threatened by a producer that if she did, they would garnish her wages from whatever job she did next ("even if I go to Seattle and start bagging groceries") until they recouped the money they felt they'd lost out on. She was granted a pay rise to $80,000 per episode and given AndStarring in the opening credits, as well as becoming a producer in the fifth season specifically she wanted to prevent similar things from happening again. |
| 92 | ** After Doherty left, Creator/RoseMcGowan was brought in as Paige, a long-lost Halliwell sister to replace Prue. In her autobiography, she revealed that she was told the show would likely only be on the air until the fifth season - in the hopes of getting to syndication - so she signed a five-year contract expecting to only be there for two. She was also incredibly unhappy at how her character was [[ReallyGetsAround being written]] in the fifth season, supposedly angrily going to the writers and saying "Paige isn't a ho!", which was fixed afterwards. She has been quoted as saying "each year, ''Charmed'' would get renewed and each year I would cry." Once she went public about her assault from Harvey Weinstein, she admits that having to cope with the trauma of sexual assault coupled with long shooting hours of network television were not kind to her mental health - resulting in impulsive things like dyeing her hair red just to annoy the producers. She recalls several incidents such as getting screamed at by a director minutes into a shooting day or studio execs threatening to destroy her career if she were caught smoking pot on set. |
| 93 | ** During the fifth season, an episode involving Phoebe turning into a mermaid saw a spike in ratings with male viewers, and the network forced the writers to create more episodes involving the Halliwell sisters turning into various fantasy creatures that required a different skimpy costume. Krista Vernoff, who had been a writer and executive producer since the first season, cited this as the last straw and chose to leave once her contract ran out at the end of Season 6. Even though Brad Kern offered her a pay rise, she preferred "the uncertainty of staffing season". Kern himself was hit with multiple allegations about inappropriate behaviour in the writers' room, including showing off Shannen Doherty's ''Playboy'' to the whole room, making fun of Alyssa Milano after an illness made her gain weight, telling female writers to write naked (Vernoff herself was once told "I bet you're good in bed" in front of the whole room). Co-producer William Schmidt was fired after only a few months, and to this day believes it was because he confronted Kern over his behaviour. |
| 94 | ** For the final season, The WB slashed the budget in half. As a result, series regular Dorian Gregory was PutOnABus and Creator/BrianKrause had to be temporarily written out for ten episodes - a decision most of the cast hated. Creator/KaleyCuoco had to be brought on as a new character Billie both to fill the {{Fanservice}} requirements and to lessen the lead actresses' shooting hours. For the final episode, the budget was so tight they had to rely on archive footage for a lot of things, and Shannen Doherty couldn't come BackForTheFinale[[note]]The word from the producers is that she wasn't asked and a picture would cost too much, but Shannen herself says she was asked and turned it down.[[/note]] -- and they also had to juggle Alyssa Milano and Rose [=McGowan=]'s other acting commitments (the reason Phoebe and Paige [[spoiler: are dead for half the finale is because of this]]). |
| 95 | ** Creator/AlyssaMilano later revealed that there was no on-set producer from the fifth season onward and that she and Holly Marie Combs took turns doing it in addition to acting (Rose [=McGowan=] was also offered the chance to be a producer but turned it down). She's described the process as "hectic", and that it was nearly impossible to get the show-runners on the phone to verify dialogue changes. Creator/RoseMcGowan years later accused her of making the set toxic because of this. |
| 96 | * ''Series/{{Cheers}}'' had its share of issues over the years, including poor ratings early on, Creator/ShelleyLong often not getting along with the rest of the cast, the illness and death of Creator/NicholasColasanto during the third season, and recurring actor Creator/JayThomas being fired and having a [[DroppedABridgeOnHim bridge dropped on]] his character after insulting Rhea Perlman in a radio interview, but all things told it was a pretty non-troubled production until the final season (Season 11) rolled around. |
| 97 | ** After the end of Season 10, the long-serving showrunner team of Cheri Eichen, Bill Steinkellner, and Phoef Sutton departed, leaving the far less experienced duo of Tom Anderson and Dan O'Shannon to take over. Running out of ideas, writers started focusing a lot more on the flaws of the characters in order to create comedic tension, along with recycling a script from spin-off show ''Series/{{Wings}}'' wholesale. |
| 98 | ** Near the middle of the season, lead actor Creator/TedDanson announced that it would be his final season. The writers approached Creator/WoodyHarrelson to take over as the lead actor, but he declined unless Danson stayed on. Other actors were also starting to grow bored with their roles and wanted out of the series, too, forcing the writers to hustle their resources together to write an ending that made sense. This eventually resulted in series creators Glen and Les Charles -- who had mostly stayed in hands-off executive producer roles since Shelley Long left the series and was replaced by Creator/KirstieAlley at the start of Season 6 -- having to come back and write the finale themselves after Anderson and O'Shannon couldn't come up with a workable storyline. As the season came to a close, many characters were given closure that seemed to come almost out of nowhere. Lilith's actress, Creator/BebeNeuwirth, also strangely disappeared mid-season and made very few appearances. |
| 99 | ** The final episode was set to be filmed and Shelley Long was brought back. The writers had a minor feud over whether to allow Diane and Sam to be together. Shoots took so long that Long had to go back to her other commitments, and the episode's closing scene in the bar was filmed without her. The scene was also done in secret without a studio audience, meaning a laugh track had to be added after the fact. The final episode proved to be one of the most watched and remembered series finales in television history. |
| 100 | ** Then there's the matter of Creator/KelseyGrammer's substance abuse, which took a spike in this season. Co-stars noticed that he was oddly difficult to work with and would often be nearly catatonic between takes. After several intervention attempts, Grammer finally got help. He would ultimately not make a full recovery until the early seasons of the spinoff ''Series/{{Frasier}}''. |
| 101 | * Part of the reason Creator/TheBBC's 26-episode miniseries ''Churchill's People'' was such a catastrophic flop was a severely troubled production. |
| 102 | ** Series creator Gerard Savory had been pitching the idea of adapting UsefulNotes/WinstonChurchill's four-volume ''A History of the English-Speaking Peoples'' into a dramatic prestige project since shortly after Churchill himself died in 1965. Unfortunately, the books are saturated not just with Churchill's political biases, but with his personal interests, focusing on political and military minutiae and having little to say about social history or the development of agriculture and industry (UsefulNotes/ClementAttlee quipped that Churchill should have called the books ''Things in History That Interested Me''). This meant the stories and characters had to be largely invented by the writers to bring key moments in the history of Britain and its former colonies to life. Almost every episode had a different writer and a different director, resulting in highly variable quality for both the scripts (which wheeled back and forth between stilted {{Info Dump}}s and anachronistic lines such as "I'll smash your face in!") and, despite the "[[AllStarCast who's who]]" of acting talent present (name a stage or TV performer active in Britain in the 1970s and they probably appeared in an episode), the performances. |
| 103 | ** It took until early 1973 for production to finally begin, and with the energy crisis gripping Britain at the time, the budget for the series was slashed to a meagre £1.25 million (less than £50,000 per episode). This resulted in the series being entirely shot on cheap studio sets, even for outdoor scenes, and the tacky effects (such as visible nozzles spraying "fog" on a suspiciously flat Scottish heath) and "crowds" of a dozen people at most were pathetically obvious throughout. Individual incidents also set production back; Dennis Waterman, playing King Harold II on the eve of the Battle of Hastings, accidentally hit himself in the eye not with an arrow (as allegedly happened to the real Harold) but with the lace of his cloak, requiring medical attention and a return to the makeup chair. Finally, the series was scheduled to begin as part of the celebration of what would have been Churchill's 100th birthday in 1974, but industrial action at the BBC led it to be postponed until New Year's Eve that year. Then-new [=BBC1=] controller Brian Cowgill declared the results "untransmittable", and later said that if it was "part of the inheritance" upon taking over the position of controller, then he "rather wished [he] hadn't been included in the will." |
| 104 | ** The fallout was almost immediate. Critics were already suspicious when the BBC refused to screen the episodes for them in advance (one observed that such a gesture was "seldom due to forgetfulness or modesty"), and when the first episode, "Pritân", boasted a script that seemed more concerned than anything else with the linguistic argument that Britain is only so named because of a misunderstanding by the Roman invaders[[note]] More precisely, according to Churchill, the original Celtic inhabitants of what is now called Britain were the '''P'''ritans -- ancient Greek explorers referred to them as the ''Pretani'' -- but the Romans thought they were the same people as the Brythons in what is now Brittany (and who also lived in what are now Cornwall and Wales).[[/note]] and used pitifully obvious rubber props for dismembered body parts, the reviews were overwhelmingly negative. ''[[UsefulNotes/BritishNewspapers The Sunday Telegraph]]'' described it as "a co-production disaster" that "not only sounds like a school's radio programme, it looks like it too." It was originally scheduled for Mondays at 9:25pm, but audience figures dropped so quickly (not helped by the series' airing opposite the popular Creator/{{ITV}} drama ''Public Eye'') that it was booted to later in the evening and replaced with ''Series/{{Kojak}}''. By the time the final episode, "Death of Liberty", shuddered off the screens in June 1975, the series had been all but forgotten by the public. And since the series was a co-production with Time-Life, it also aired on American public television to even smaller audiences. Such was the failure of the series that the BBC had to overhaul the procedure whereby it commissioned new dramas, and it hasn't commissioned anything similarly large-scale since then. |
| 105 | * As ''Series/{{Community}}'' continued on there came a lot of reports of behind-the-scenes trouble. |
| 106 | ** Creator/ChevyChase was rather upfront and vocal about his distaste for the show and had a rocky relationship with Dan Harmon. He admitted he didn't have much interest in being on a sitcom, as those tended to have the most grueling schedules. Filming in the study room, covering each cast member around the table, would lead to ''sixteen to twenty hour days''. |
| 107 | ** The show had a passionate fanbase but the ratings gradually diminished and the show was frequently over budget, which exacerbated Creator/{{NBC}}'s relationship with the show. There were claims of episodes being filmed with unfinished or rewritten scripts and mismanaged production scheduling (one such claim was that several sets were lit, staffed, and staged to facilitate ''one joke'' featuring multiple {{Cutaway Gag}}s). Harmon's insistence on having big, expensive episodes with a cinematic look while also mocking the network in the show itself took BitingTheHandHumor a little too literally. |
| 108 | ** In Season 4, Harmon was fired and the show passed on to staff writers for a half-season worth of episodes to premiere mid-season. Harmon was rehired for Season 5 for another half season of episodes, scrambling to accommodate the events of Season 4 into his plans while also {{retool}}ing the show beyond the study group. The show was eventually [[ChannelHop picked up to be a Yahoo exclusive]] for a sixth season, but by then half the cast had left for various personal reasons. |
| 109 | * ''Conquest'', originally titled ''The Organic Intelligent'', was a sci-fi series about {{Artificial Human}}s that Creator/{{Netflix}} picked up in 2018 even though its creator, Carl Erik Rinsch, had only a single prior feature film credit to his name, the infamous dud ''Film/FortySevenRonin'' (covered in more detail on the Live-Action Films page), and no experience as a ShowRunner. What happened next, as [[https://archive.is/DTPUG this article]] by John Carreyrou for ''The New York Times'' explains, was a meltdown that ensured that the show would never see the light of day. |
| 110 | ** Rinsch initially financed ''The Organic Intelligent'' with his own money, hiring a mostly European cast and crew to avoid [[UsefulNotes/UnionsInHollywood Hollywood union rules]], and conditions were grueling. A shoot in Kenya went on for 24 hours straight without interruption, and in Romania, an actress caught hypothermia. Rinsch initially sought extra funding from a production company called [=30West=], but when he missed a deadline, [=30West=] threatened to take over the project and kick him off. Rinsch was only saved when Creator/KeanuReeves, who he'd befriended on the set of ''47 Ronin'', bailed him out and offered additional funding in exchange for a producer credit. This was enough to film six short episodes about four to ten minutes each, which he used to pitch the show to streaming services. |
| 111 | ** In 2018 at the height of the streaming boom, streaming services were greenlighting movies and shows left, right, and center in order to fill their content libraries. ''The Organic Intelligent'' immediately became a hot property, with Netflix outbidding Creator/PrimeVideo for the rights and promising Rinsch final cut and a budget of $61.2 million, paid out in installments, in exchange for renaming the show ''Conquest''. Netflix made this offer even as Rinsch was embroiled in a legal battle with [=30West=] and other early investors, and so when he signed the deal, they got $14 million of the show's budget as part of a legal settlement. |
| 112 | ** From that point on, Rinsch's behavior grew increasingly erratic. During production in UsefulNotes/SaoPaulo, local union representatives accused him of being a BadBoss who frequently shouted at his team. In Budapest, he went days without sleep and accused his wife Gabriela Rosés Bentancor (an Uruguayan model and fashion designer who was also a co-producer on the show) of plotting to kill him. Several members of the crew, including Rosés, worried about his drug use, specifically an amphetamine called Vyvance used to treat ADHD, such that Rosés, Reeves, Rinsch's brother, and a number of crew members tried to stage an intervention for him after production in Budapest wrapped, which soon fell apart. |
| 113 | ** The wheels fell off in March 2020 when the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic arrived. Having already spent $44.3 million, Rinsch asked Netflix for more money. Netflix was skeptical, as the project had fallen behind deadlines and Rinsch was working from two versions of the script (one for a complete 13-episode {{miniseries}}, and an expanded one for a show that might get a second season), but acquiesced and sent Rinsch another $11 million when he said that the production would completely fall apart without it, on the condition that, if they didn't agree to his second season after five weeks, he'd have to use the money strictly to complete the one season he'd promised them. With production shut down due to the pandemic, Rinsch started investing that money into the stock market, and lost more than half of it in a matter of weeks. |
| 114 | ** The pandemic also seemed to be having a personal effect on Rinsch's psyche. He started claiming that he knew the origin of the coronavirus, that airplanes in the sky were actually alive, and that he could predict lightning strikes and volcanic eruptions. Some of his bizarre ramblings made their way back to Cindy Holland, Netflix's vice president of original programming, when he texted them to her. Rinsch's deteriorating mental state led Rosés to file for divorce in July and Netflix to call the LAPD out of growing concern about his behavior, especially after Netflix executive Rochelle Gerson called Rosés to see if she could get them some of the footage from the show, a call that left her afraid for Rosés' safety. |
| 115 | ** On March 18, 2021, Netflix informed Rinsch that it would no longer be funding ''Conquest'', and that he was free to shop the show around to other networks and streamers provided they reimbursed Netflix for what had already been spent. Rinsch spent what was left of his budget on cryptocurrency, which actually did pay off amidst the crypto bubble of 2021-22, leaving him with nearly $27 million, of which he spent $8.7 million on luxury cars, watches, and furniture. To Rosés' divorce lawyers, who suspected that Rinsch made those purchases to hide his crypto winnings, he claimed that they were part of production on ''Conquest''. To Netflix, however, he said that they were made with his own personal money while claiming that Netflix had breached his contract by ending production on the show, and that they owed him more money. Netflix responded that payments were contingent on hitting various production milestones, which it claimed Rinsch never did. |
| 116 | * ''Countdown with Keith Olbermann'' became this near the end of its existence, and the experience put Creator/KeithOlbermann's career as a political commentator on hiatus for several years. Where to begin? |
| 117 | ** It started as a case of getting ScrewedByTheNetwork. In 2008, ''Meet the Press'' moderator Tim Russert suddenly died of a heart attack at Creator/{{NBC}}'s UsefulNotes/{{Washington|DC}} bureau. Russert had been a champion of ''Countdown'' and defended it against NBC executives who did not like Olbermann's left-wing message and/or style.[[note]]Olbermann stated in a 2006 C-SPAN interview that there were people within NBC and General Electric who did not like his criticism of the [[UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush Bush]] Administration, but left him alone because his program was successful.[[/note]] Without Russert to vouch for him, Olbermann's enemies within NBC began [[ExecutiveMeddling trying to turn his colleagues against him]]. |
| 118 | ** In 2010, Olbermann made donations to three congressional candidates ahead of the November midterm election, in reported violation of an MSNBC policy barring personalities from doing so. He was suspended indefinitely. A fierce backlash from Olbermann's viewers -- some of whom noted that right-wing MSNBC commentator Joe Scarborough had made similar donations with no repercussions from the network -- forced MSNBC to allow Olbermann back by the end of the week. Over the following months, Olbermann's relations with MSNBC deteriorated. |
| 119 | ** On January 21, 2011, Olbermann was told about forty minutes into his newscast that he had been released from his MSNBC contract. In his quickly improvised farewell speech, Olbermann thanked his viewers and staff, but notably neglected to mention MSNBC President Phil Griffin and NBC News President Steve Capus.[[note]]Contrary to online rumor at the time, Comcast -- which had taken control of MSNBC and its parent and sister companies days before Olbermann's firing -- had nothing to do with this outcome.[[/note]] |
| 120 | ** Several months later, in June 2011, it was announced that Olbermann had been hired by the indie progressive network Current TV, and would relaunch ''Countdown'' and air it in his old timeslot. On top of getting his show back, Olbermann and Current TV worked out a deal where Olbermann would wield considerable power as the network's chief news officer, and also own an equity stake. He also got a new studio and several well-known pundits and celebrities as contributors. He was slated to become Current TV's signature prime-time anchor. |
| 121 | ** While the premiere was a success, the new ''Countdown'' devolved into a mess within the year. Current TV failed to deliver on a promised Platform/HighDefinition studio and simulcast channel, while Olbermann reportedly became an abusive [[ThePrimaDonna Prime Donna]] behind the scenes. He started airing shows completely in the dark to cut costs, then refused to come to work for extended periods of time or major news events. In March 2012, Current TV decided to cut Olbermann loose and terminated his contract. |
| 122 | ** In the end, despite a court settlement, everyone lost. Without Olbermann, MSNBC went into such a decline that it posted its worst ratings in a decade by February 2015. Current TV, now unable to bank on Olbermann's star power, was eventually sold to Al Jazeera. Olbermann himself withdrew from political commentary -- rejoining Creator/{{ESPN}} for a time -- until he joined ''GQ'' magazine in 2016 and launched ''WebVideo/TheResistanceWithKeithOlbermann'' covering the presidency of Creator/DonaldTrump. In 2022, Olbermann was reportedly in talks to return to MSNBC and take over Rachel Maddow's timeslot, only for Maddow to [[https://www.thedailybeast.com/msnbc-almost-brought-back-keith-olbermann-to-replace-rachel-maddow veto the idea]]. |
| 123 | * ''Series/TheCultureVultures'': Creator/LesliePhillips collapsed from an internal haemorrhage between the filming of "Rake's Progress" and "Double, Double, Toil and Trouble". While he recovered enough to return to the set, his health issues caused the series to [[CutShort end prematurely after five episodes]]. |
| 124 | [[/folder]] |
| 125 | |
| 126 | [[folder:D]] |
| 127 | * David Croft considered the filming of Series 9 of ''Series/DadsArmy'' to be, in his own words, "an ordeal": |
| 128 | ** Creator/JohnLeMesurier looked thin and ill as he was suffering from liver failure brought on by excessive drinking. |
| 129 | ** Creator/ArthurLowe's trouble remembering his lines was getting worse, to the point where Captain Mainwaring's office drawer was constantly full of bits of script for him to read. |
| 130 | ** Creator/ArnoldRidley ripped a cartilage in his leg meaning he had to be ferried by limo to and from the studio. He also was absent from the location filming for "Number Engaged" due to illness. |
| 131 | * The second season of ''Series/{{Damages}}'' was severely troubled off-screen in a way that explains many of its [[SeasonalRot on-screen problems]]. Most of these were down to casting a [[Creator/WilliamHurt season secondary lead]] who had never done a TV drama series before and was completely unprepared for the bruising schedule and long days of recording. After some very bad behaviour, this led to the character who had been intended as the key figure in the season's plot having to have his involvement and screen time severely cut, leading to a very oddly-paced and unfocused season. |
| 132 | * ''Series/{{Deadwood}}'' became legendary for its behind the scenes trouble: |
| 133 | ** It was the most expensive regular series aired at the time, with the budget being $6 million an episode, largely dedicated to [[ShownTheirWork authentically recreating]] the titular Old West town as it looked in the 1870s. Interiors and exteriors functioned as elaborate, stage play-like sets, and it had lighting that could recreate the sun's position for a certain time of day. As such, it's the rare Creator/{{HBO}} series that's co-owned by another studio ([[Creator/{{Paramount}} Paramount Television]]). |
| 134 | ** Then there were problems with Creator[=/=]Showrunner [[Series/NYPDBlue David Milch]], whose [[BunnyEarsLawyer wildly unconventional style]] relied heavily on combining PurpleProse and WritingByTheSeatOfYourPants. Actors spoke of only having a few minutes to rehearse Milch's extremely difficult, almost Shakespearean dialogue he wrote or rewrote just before the fact. |
| 135 | ** Beyond that, sequences and entire ''episodes'' were left on the cutting room floor due to Milch's displeasure with them, with Milch even admitting that much of the third season had been reshot. |
| 136 | ** All these factors led to HBO cancelling the series after its third season, and TheMovie meant to tie up loose ends being mired in DevelopmentHell for nearly a decade. |
| 137 | ** Several sources announced that the script to the finale movie had finally been completed in 2017...just in time for the death of Creator/PowersBoothe. It's very likely that his character Cy Tolliver was included in the script given his prominent role in the show, though no official word was provided if rewrites had occurred. The film [[TheCharacterDiedWithHim would not have the Cy Tolliver character recast]]. |
| 138 | ** Shortly before the movie was finally released in 2019, Milch revealed that he'd been suffering from progressive Alzheimer's Disease for the past few years, which forced him to mostly leave the production alone after turning in his script in stark contrast to his usual extremely hands-on production style. |
| 139 | * A Series 7 episode of ''Series/DeathInParadise'' ran into trouble when the actor playing that week's murderer died of natural causes mid-shoot. The ending was quickly rewritten so the killer managed to flee before the police arrested him. |
| 140 | * ''Series/DowntonAbbey'' had its first season go off pretty swimmingly, ending up as one of the most acclaimed shows of the year... and then spent the next five years in a morass of problems. |
| 141 | ** Many of the actors grew increasingly unhappy with how little they were given to do as the show's scope grew larger, (One of those who was unhappy was Elizabeth [=McGovern=], who played Lady Cora) with several of them quitting along the way. Some of these were major characters, forcing Creator/JulianFellowes to hastily write their deaths to explain their absence. The most damaging was Creator/DanStevens as half of the show's major romantic couple Matthew Crawley, who wanted to do other projects while still remaining on the show. Fellowes was so furious at Stevens for this that he refused to so much as let his name be spoken on set for the remainder of the show, and downplayed Matthew's huge role in the first three series as much as possible, with him hardly ever being mentioned again. This led to the show feeling more like a trashy soap opera and less the highbrow drama (complete with an understated, witty sense of humor) as intended, and reviews quickly soured. Many fans also stopped watching at this point. |
| 142 | ** Fellowes' obsession with SceneryPorn and portraying the lives of the early 20th-century upper class led to more and more discomfort on set, especially his insistence on writing scenes around the dinner table which he then micromanaged and caused to take far longer to film than they should have... all while the food went bad under the lights and everyone had to suffer the stink. |
| 143 | ** Finally, his writing strategy was [[WritingByTheSeatOfYourPants to only write the first half of each series ahead of time, then wait to write the rest until filming was underway and he could see how the actors played off each other]]. (Most TV writers write seasons ahead of time and only make changes as needed.) This sometimes resulted in some very awkward storytelling as he decided to beef up a certain character's role, only to discover their actor couldn't commit to the show any further like he wanted them to. The worst of these was Charles Edwards as Edith's love interest Michael Gregson, whose departure was so clearly a bad story option that Fellowes simply had him go missing in Germany and left his fate unknown for two years... before finally giving up and having Gregson discovered to have been killed. |
| 144 | ** By the time the show ended, it was widely regarded as a joke and Fellowes' slow CreatorBreakdown over all the problems left his reputation quite a bit lower than when he'd started. Many of the main cast were happy to be free of the show after its conclusion, among those were Dame Creator/MaggieSmith (Lady Violet) and Michelle Dockery (Lady Mary) That said, Fellowes' bridges with the cast were more rattled than anything else, as they would all come back for the hugely successful [[Film/DowntonAbbey 2019 film]] and its equally successful 2022 follow-up ''Film/DowntonAbbeyANewEra''. |
| 145 | [[/folder]] |
| 146 | |
| 147 | [[folder:E]] |
| 148 | * The 1992-93 [[Creator/TheBBC BBC]] soap opera ''Eldorado'' is widely regarded as one of the biggest misfires in the corporation's history, and many of the reasons for the audience apathy that led to its getting the axe after just one year can be traced back to a very troubled production. |
| 149 | ** ''Eldorado'' began life as ''Little England'', a series about a community of British expats struggling to maintain a sense of national and cultural identity while forging new lives for themselves on UsefulNotes/{{Spain}}'s Costa del Sol. Creator Tony Holland, who had given the BBC its first hit soap opera in decades in ''Series/EastEnders'', submitted the idea for a competition held by the corporation to solicit ideas for a new soap opera to compete with commercial rival Creator/{{ITV}}'s long-running audience magnets ''Series/CoronationStreet'' and ''Series/{{Emmerdale}}'', at a time when the BBC's audience share was lagging behind ITV and the government was considering turning it over to private ownership. At a November 1991 meeting, [=BBC1=] controller Jonathan Powell and two other executives approved ''Little England'' to enter production. |
| 150 | ** Problems set in almost immediately. Holland was paired with ''[=EastEnders=]'' producer and longtime friend Julia Smith, who would handle the production while Holland and ''[=EastEnders=]'' scriptwriter Tony Jordan handled the scripts. They had just six months to put the series together for its premiere and decided to build the sets on a remote Spanish hillside miles from the nearest city, Fuengirola. Where ''[=EastEnders=]''[='=] Albert Square had been built in eight months and in UsefulNotes/{{England}}, the Spanish construction crew had just half that time to build the more ambitious ''Little England'' set, which featured an authentic old town with a church, a shopping plaza, and the British expats' apartment complex. Construction quickly fell behind schedule, so that when shooting began, they had to rewrite the scripts to use the sets that were available until construction finished.[[note]] Following the series' cancellation, the sets were abandoned for many years before being converted into a hotel complex.[[/note]] |
| 151 | ** Producer Julia Smith took charge of casting; she often gambled on casting unknowns, and while this had paid off on ''[=EastEnders=]'' (with, for example, Leslie Grantham as "Dirty" Den Watts), she seemed to aim lower for ''Little England''. Though some of the actors, such as Campbell Morrison, Jesse Birdsall, Patricia Brake, and Faith Kent, were seasoned veterans, many others had little or no prior acting experience and/or a weak grasp of English; most notably, German student and timeshare salesman Kai Maurer, who had never acted before in his life and didn't even know what a readthrough was until he participated in one with the rest of the cast, was cast as windsurfing instructor Dieter after a single five-minute audition. Campbell Morrison recalled in an interview that, at the first readthrough, a director came to him with a message from Julia Smith telling him his reading was too over-the-top broad Scots; Morrison replied that he was the least of Smith's worries. |
| 152 | ** Then, ExecutiveMeddling began to strangle the production. With British television now reaching audiences all over UsefulNotes/{{Europe}}, Smith, under pressure from BBC executives, told Holland and Jordan that they had to place more emphasis on the non-British characters. Over time, further non-British characters were added to the cast, characters Holland and Jordan had no idea how to write for (or even which language they should use -- English, which was unrealistic, or their native languages, which British audiences wouldn't understand). Finally, the BBC told Holland the title, ''Little England'', might put off audiences in UsefulNotes/{{Scotland}}, UsefulNotes/{{Wales}}, and UsefulNotes/NorthernIreland, and ordered the series re-christened ''Eldorado''. |
| 153 | ** When filming finally started in late spring of 1992, the sets were still not finished, and the shooting schedule was organised so that five weeks of episodes would be ready to air when the series premiered in July. Scenes were shot at breakneck speed, done in single takes except in the event of major line flubs or technical malfunctions, and with no time for the crew to reflect on whether or not a scene should be re-written or dropped altogether. As the sets were mostly stone walls and tiles, the sound had heavy echo problems that could not be resolved before the episodes were due to air (particularly in scenes involving female characters in stiletto heels, the "clackety-clack" of which nearly drowned out the dialogue). Tony Jordan recalled in an interview that the first time he attended a day's shooting, the scene being shot bore almost no resemblance to the scenes he and Tony Holland had written. The increasingly stressed Holland and Julia Smith, whose working relationship had already had many fractious moments over the years, turned on each other and fell out permanently. |
| 154 | ** The series was launched in a blitz of publicity (which may have done more harm than good as said publicity featured multiple {{Spoiler}}s), and ''Eldorado'' began airing three times a week starting on 6 July 1992. Although ITV tried to "strangle the series at birth" by airing an hour-long episode of ''Coronation Street'' at the same time, the first episode drew an audience of over eight million, but by the third episode, this figure had dropped to five million, and to barely half that figure six weeks later. The press attacked the series mercilessly, finding the characters without believability (the central plot from the premiere, in which a middle-aged restaurateur returns from a trip back to England with his new 17-year-old wife, was particularly criticised), the acting amateurish, and the handling of the international cast (when they spoke in their native languages, there were no subtitles; when they spoke in English, they had almost impenetrable or comically over-the-top accents) laughable. |
| 155 | ** Because of the heavy investment of licence-payer money in the series, the BBC tried to salvage it as best they could with a change of personnel. Julia Smith was the first to go (ostensibly due to ill health; she died five years later), replaced by another ''[=EastEnders=]'' producer in Corinne Hollingworth. She scrapped the idea of scenes in languages other than English without subtitles, chose not to renew the contracts of over half a dozen cast members (including Kai Maurer), and held the writing to a higher standard. Tony Holland left voluntarily not long after, utterly disillusioned with how far the series had deviated from his original vision. |
| 156 | ** Although the remaining cast and crew felt the changes to the scripts and the production were a dramatic improvement and ratings began to rise again, the damage had been done, and the appointment of John Birt as BBC Director General in late 1992 and Alan Yentob as [=BBC1=] controller a few months later sounded the death knell for the series. The last episode aired on 9 July 1993; it was fifteen years before the BBC commissioned another new soap opera (the similarly short-lived UsefulNotes/{{Australia}}-set ''Out of the Blue''). Tony Holland never wrote for British television again, and the once stellar reputation of executive producer Creator/VerityLambert (who, thirty years earlier, had been a central figure in the creation of ''Series/DoctorWho'') never quite recovered (although she did go on to produce several series of ''Series/JonathanCreek''). |
| 157 | * ''Series/{{Empire}}'' began facing serious problems near the end of its run: |
| 158 | ** Season 5 was thrust into a horrific conundrum when main cast member Creator/JussieSmollett claimed to have been attacked and nearly lynched by right-wing extremists. After a wave of sympathy from everyone, the UsefulNotes/{{Chicago}} police charged Smollett with fabricating the entire incident over a pay dispute with Creator/{{Fox}}, as the alleged attackers were actually former extras from the show who he'd paid to stage an attack ''with a check''. The show's storylines were thrown into disarray as Smollett needed to be hastily written out of the season's final two episodes. Despite the charges eventually being dropped, the fiasco will continue to have reverberations, as the producers have insisted Smollett's character wasn't the TonightSomeoneDies victim the season had been building to. The show's next season was decided to be its last shortly afterward, with Smollett not being invited back. |
| 159 | ** The final season ran into its own problems when production was shut down due to safety measures surrounding the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic with the last two episodes left incomplete. The network eventually decided to make the eighteenth episode, which was completed in time, the de facto series finale with footage from the incomplete episodes worked in to try and provide some closure. |
| 160 | [[/folder]] |
| 161 | |
| 162 | [[folder:F]] |
| 163 | * ''Series/FamilyFeud'' had its share of backstage troubles from original host Richard Dawson, particularly in the later years. Namely, he was a prima donna who was often at odds with the producer, even barring him from the set and debating with him on answers. Creator/MarkGoodson once remarked that Dawson gave him ''tsoris'' (Yiddish for "trouble"). Not helping his case were some rather unorthodox moves, such as hiring his son to work on the show (to which the production team [[TakeThat fired back]] with a CreditsGag that replaced everyone's surname with "Dawson"), refusing to stop tape whenever possible (leading to such oddities as having [[BonusRound Fast Money]] played on cue cards when the board broke down or having the contestant coordinator host a round while Dawson went to readjust a back brace he was wearing at the time). His show-opening monologues were also chewing up more and more air time (something that Creator/MontyHall criticized him for in a ''TV Guide'' article -- notably, a piece on game shows featuring interviews with several hosts, one which Dawson declined to participate in unless they put him ''and only him'' on the cover). To respond to this, the show's producers began cramming in more and more rounds and upping the point limit from 300 to 400, creating a very rushed game that no longer had time for any byplay at all. Combined with increasing competition from ''Series/WheelOfFortune'' and ''Series/{{Jeopardy}}'', the Dawson-hosted ''Feud'' went off the air in 1985, and Goodson vowed that he would never work with Dawson ever again. Dawson's prima donna reputation likely led to him largely retiring afterward (although he briefly returned in 1994 to host the show's first revival as an attempt by Goodson's son Jonathan -- who took over after his father's 1992 death -- to revive the then-faltering revival). Although age had mellowed his ego somewhat, it also mellowed his hosting qualities considerably, and he faded back from the limelight again (as did ''Feud'' until 1999). |
| 164 | * E! Network's ''Fashion Police'' struggled greatly at the beginning of 2015, starting with the death of Creator/JoanRivers, the show's star and main attraction for most and the departure of George Kotsiopoulos. The show limped on with comedienne Creator/KathyGriffin sitting in for Rivers and Brad Goreski replacing Kotsiopoulos. However, scandal struck after the 2015 MediaNotes/{{Academy Award}}s, after host Giuliana Rancic joked that attendee Creator/{{Zendaya}} looked like she smelled of "patchouli oil" and "weed" because she chose to wear her hair in dreadlocks that night. Rancic apologized, but that didn't stop both Griffin (no stranger to controversial statements herself) and Kelly Osbourne from quitting soon after. When the dust finally settled, E! announced they were putting the show on hiatus until September to "refresh" it before next award season, which led to a new panel comprising of Rancic, Goreski, Joan's daughter Melissa, Creator/MargaretCho, and [[Series/TheRealHousewives [=NeNe=] Leakes]] from the sixth season until its conclusion in November 2017. |
| 165 | * ''Series/FriendsAndNeighbours1954'' wasn't renewed due to a combination of production problems and a disappointing script. |
| 166 | [[/folder]] |
| 167 | |
| 168 | [[folder:G]] |
| 169 | * In 2021, Creator/{{G4TV}} was relaunched to great fanfare, only for it to die again after less than a year. [[https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2022/10/21/g4-shutdown-froskurinn-comcast-twitch/ This in-depth investigation]] by Nathan Grayson for ''The Washington Post'' goes into more detail, but to sum up, it was an absolute disaster behind the scenes that was plagued by awful ratings, HostilityOnTheSet, and ill-thought-out publicity stunts. |
| 170 | ** In July 2020, a time when the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic and the resulting lockdowns caused a surge in the popularity of video games and streaming, Comcast announced that it was relaunching G4, the first TV network devoted to video games, which originally aired from 2002 to 2014. |
| 171 | ** Most employees interviewed for Grayson's report pin the blame for G4's failure on Tucker Roberts, the son of Comcast's CEO and the head of Comcast Spectacor's gaming brand who was put in charge of the relaunch. While bringing back G4 was mostly his idea, he was also very fickle in his decisions, such as the direction of the network's e-sports coverage, the number of separate Website/YouTube channels it had, and how much to focus on [=YouTube=] and Twitch. As a result, when the new G4 made its TV debut with a soft launch in early 2021 and a full launch in November of that year, it immediately became apparent to employees that, despite the money that Comcast put into the network's lavish sets and production facilities, it had little direction beyond cashing in on nostalgia for the original incarnation of G4. Shows were {{retool}}ed in response to ratings so often that the people running the shows had whiplash trying to keep up with the changes demanded by management, and the network's shows never found a coherent voice. All the while, the network was consistently understaffed and its employees were underpaid and stretched to the bone, working roles that they were not hired for simply because there was nobody else to do the job. |
| 172 | ** G4 recruited numerous popular video game streamers to host its shows, paying six-figure salaries to hosts like Austin Show, Ovilee May, and Alex “Goldenboy” Mendez. They also dished out big money to other streamers to make guest appearances and launch "raids" on G4's Twitch channel in order to boost its viewership. Very quickly, it became clear that the streamers, and not the network as a whole, were the main draw, as the streamers' fans tuned in for them and ''only'' them and stopped watching the moment they were off the air, as opposed to sticking around for the network's other shows. |
| 173 | ** In March 2022, just four months after G4 debuted, Roberts left the network and left it even more rudderless than it had been under him. Decision-making was spread out across the executive board, which itself experienced churn and departures over the course of 2022. Russell Arons, who took over after Roberts' departure, was believed by many employees to have been merely set up to take the fall for Roberts' mistakes, and she ultimately quit in July following a raucous meeting that reportedly left her in tears. |
| 174 | ** And then came the controversies. In early 2022, Indiana “Froskurinn” Black called out supposed sexism in video game culture in an on-air segment and unintentially revealed that X-Play's hosts don't play or really review the games, but deliver pre-written reviews, which caused her and the show to receive a torrent of backlsh. G4's response to this was initially supportive, but when influencers who opposed Black's statements started attacking G4 itself for defending her, they backed off their support, told Black that there was nothing they could do about the harassment, and told her to file a police report. The incident inflamed tensions between Black and the rest of the network's on-air talent, who also experienced harassment as a result of her statements, and led to her being fired later that year. |
| 175 | ** By September, the network was announcing layoffs, and alums of the original G4 like Adam Sessler and Kevin Pereira announced plans to either scale back their involvement or outright quit. The network's internal communications channels like Slack and Google Drive were locked soon after, such that many employees only found out about G4's death through [[https://deadline.com/2022/10/comcast-pulls-plug-on-g4-tv-ending-comeback-try-video-game-network-1235145219/ an article]] in ''Deadline''. While the announcement was sudden, few of the network's employees were surprised when they got the news of its impending shutdown. |
| 176 | ** As a final nail in the coffin, clips from ''X-Play'' began to circulate across social media early in 2023 showing some ''very'' racist language used against Japanese games reviewed on the show, including jaw-dropping bits with Morgan Webb claiming Japan only became civilized ''after being nuked'' and later saying “[[YellowPeril I fear for the day that zany bean-curd-loving race finally rules over us]]”. Sessler defended these bits on social media, making wild claims [[https://twitter.com/AdamSessler/status/1632078967216959489 that overly-defensive consumers,]] [[https://twitter.com/AdamSessler/status/1632121484167757829 the alt-right and gamer culture]] were why he was being attacked for his comments on the show, ensuring that the channel's legacy would be OvershadowedByControversy. |
| 177 | * ''Series/TheGetDown'', the 2016 Creator/{{Netflix}} PeriodPiece about the birth of hip-hop by Creator/BazLuhrmann, had problems from the start. The project was in DevelopmentHell for so long that a joke name for the show on set was "The Shut Down". It ran massively over budget, eventually costing $120 million, due to the unusual approach to the show, making it one of the most expensive TV shows ''ever''. The music and dance elements added money, as well as securing the rights to the NothingButHits soundtrack. Additional problems were caused by Luhrmann's lack of experience in television. The show ultimately had the embarrassing distinction of being the very first Netflix show to be cancelled after just one season, after ''five years'' of all their shows getting at least two. |
| 178 | * The Dorne storyline in Season 5 of ''Series/GameOfThrones'' suffered badly from this. Just like many fans suspected, it was added very late in pre-production with the crew vastly overestimating how much screen time they'd be able to give it, resulting in a horribly rushed writing job. They also ran into trouble with the filming location where they were only allowed to shoot in a very limited area and also weren't allowed to go there at night. The result of this can be seen especially in the much-maligned big fight scene from "[[Recap/GameOfThronesS5E6UnbowedUnbentUnbroken Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken]]", which was intended to be a tense close-quarters brawl at night but was forced to happen in a wide open area in broad daylight, despite that not making any sense in context. |
| 179 | * Brett Butler's substance abuse problems and struggles to get clean caused a good deal of the production issues on ''Series/GraceUnderFire''. Jon Paul Steuer left after Season 3[[note]]This was due to Butler getting new breast implants and flashing them to everyone on the set---including the then-''12-year-old'' Steuer himself. Steuer's parents were rightfully incensed and the studio, wanting to avoid a PR disaster and embarrassing lawsuit, released Steuer from the show while paying him the full amount for the two years left in his contract.[[/note]] and Julie White left after Season 4.[[note]]Butler's antics proved to be too much for White to handle, leaving Casey Sander, who played Nadine's husband, Wade, without a wife for Season 5.[[/note]] In addition, during the first season, Butler constantly feuded with Creator/ChuckLorre over CreativeDifferences, which ultimately led to Lorre being demoted to creative consultant in Season 2 before leaving for good in Season 3. Tops of all, Brett's stay in rehab in 1997 delayed production for Season 5, which prevented new episodes from premiering until the end of November. Brett ended up relapsing again, which (combined with falling ratings) prompted Creator/{{ABC}} to cancel the show three months into Season 5. |
| 180 | * ''Series/GrowingPains'' started having problems when lead actor Creator/KirkCameron became a born-again Christian during the height of the show's popularity. He caused creative problems, objecting to the smallest suggestion of innuendo. He even got his co-star Julie [=McCullough=] fired because she had posed naked for ''Magazine/{{Playboy}}''. |
| 181 | [[/folder]] |
| 182 | |
| 183 | [[folder:H]] |
| 184 | * ''Series/HighlanderTheSeries'': |
| 185 | ** Creator/AdrianPaul dealt with a crazy stalker for a time and there was a period where filming locations and such had to be kept secret. |
| 186 | ** The costumes from "Band of Brothers" actually disintegrated after filming due to the actors rolling around in the sulfur piles the fight took place in. |
| 187 | ** All of the prop swords broke at times and multiple copies were always kept on hand. But Richie’s sword was notorious for breaking. Stan Kirsch begged for a new one for several years before Richie finally got one in “End of Innocence.” The trouble was that all of Richie’s remaining fight scenes were flashbacks from when he used the old sword. The new sword was only able to be used in his fight vs. Duncan [[spoiler:where he died]]. |
| 188 | * ''Series/HighlanderTheRaven'': |
| 189 | ** A SpinOff was conceived during Season Six after Paul left to pursue movies. There was internal pressure to keep the franchise going without any delays, despite the writers and producers being unsure of where to go from there. The last season was partly spent on a revolving door of potential Highlanderettes. (Paul was not contractually obligated to appear for the whole season, and six or seven episodes were fronted by his would-be replacements, none of whom stuck around.) They finally settled on the recurring character Amanda (Creator/ElizabethGracen) as "The Raven". |
| 190 | ** Unbeknownst to Bill Panzer or his staff, Elizabeth Gracen had quietly gone off the deep end, believing she was being shadowed by the U.S. government. (This was the real-life reason for Amanda's [[Music/{{Eurythmics}} Annie Lennox]] makeover: Gracen dropped off the grid for a while before filming and bleached her hair to avoid detection.) Gracen was being fed lies by her new "manager": he claimed to be "the Ambassador to the Cayman Islands from the Vatican", but was actually some kind of grifter. On top of that, her affair with UsefulNotes/BillClinton was coming to light along with the rest of that scandal. |
| 191 | ** The music director kept missing his cues and went out drinking. |
| 192 | ** The film crew handled the series in a regimented style which prolonged shooting. |
| 193 | ** To appeal to the European market, the French co-producers wanted ''{{Series/Moonlighting}}''-style light comedy. The showrunners wanted to stay true to the tone of ''Highlander''. |
| 194 | ** Amanda wasn't believable as a crime-fighter and discovered that her past thievery had accidentally led to the deaths of over a hundred people. |
| 195 | ** The male co-star, Creator/PaulJohansson (''Series/OneTreeHill'') was gradually downgraded to Amanda's bumbling sidekick (i.e. Diet Richie), to his dismay. |
| 196 | ** Amanda's roommate, originally written as a girl in her twenties, was changed to an old matron so as not to upstage Gracen; this resulted in Amanda's apartment being decorated like a retirement home. |
| 197 | ** The two leads detested each other, killing any romantic chemistry between the characters. |
| 198 | * In its final years, the original run of ''Series/TheHollywoodSquares'' taped in UsefulNotes/LasVegas. According to WordOfGod, these episodes were troubled because center square Creator/PaulLynde was upset with the lodging accommodations, and his mood was bringing down everyone else; he eventually got booted out (it wasn't the first time; he'd been fired late in the Creator/{{NBC}} run as well). Also not helping was that the celebs, George Gobels in particular, would rush off to gamble, and since they were taping in Vegas, many of the contestants were tourists (which didn't help since the entire season was one long tournament), and some were drunk. |
| 199 | * ''Series/TheHoganFamily'' is another show affected by infamous cast shuffling problems. The show was originally titled ''Valerie'' for the first couple seasons, and was a vehicle for star Creator/ValerieHarper, who was fresh off her success with ''Series/TheMaryTylerMooreShow'' and ''Series/{{Rhoda}}''. After Harper got into a dispute with show producers over the direction of the series, she was fired, and her character was killed off in a car accident. The show was then titled ''Valerie's Family: The Hogans'', with Creator/SandyDuncan replacing Harper as the main character, taking over as the aunt of the family. After another season, the series was again retitled ''The Hogan Family'' after enough time had passed since Harper's departure. The show [[ChannelHop channel hopped]] from Creator/{{NBC}} to Creator/{{CBS}} in 1990, where it lasted for one final season. |
| 200 | * Creator/DouglasAdams described the creation of the TV version of ''Series/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy1981'' as "not a happy production. There was a personality clash between myself and the director. And between the cast and the director. And between the tea lady and the director." Said director, Alan Bell, puts the blame on Douglas, claiming they used to make lists of his ridiculous unfilmable ideas, to which Adams would reply that Bell "cheerfully admits he will say what suits him rather than what happens to be the case. And therefore there's no point in arguing." John Lloyd, the producer and co-writer of the radio show, was annoyed that he was made "associate producer" (he felt that the fact his credit ''explodes'' in the ending credits was a comment on how meaningless it was) and thought Bell was too concerned with getting things done efficiently, rather than getting them done ''right''. The second series simply didn't happen: Adams wouldn't do it without Lloyd or Geoffrey Perkins; Bell wouldn't do it with them. It was suggested that Perkins could be script editor (since this would minimise his interaction with Bell), and he viewed the possibility of [[ScheduleSlip trying to wring scripts out of Adams]] under these conditions with horror. Adams then suggested replacing Bell with Pennant Roberts, who had directed several of his scripts on ''Series/DoctorWho'', but this was declined on the grounds that a writer having any say in the choice of director (or, for that matter, a drama director handling what was classed as a sitcom) simply wasn't done in those days. Nobody would back down, so... |
| 201 | * Filming of the sixth season of ''Series/{{House of Cards|US}}'' was interrupted by the wave of sexual harassment accusations of 2017, namely, Creator/AnthonyRapp's accusation that Creator/KevinSpacey molested him 30 years earlier when Rapp was only fourteen. Creator/{{Netflix}} quickly announced that this would be the show's final season, though this had been decided well before the accusation arose, and shortly afterward shut down production indefinitely as similar stories about Spacey came pouring in. He was then sent for an unspecified "evaluation and treatment," throwing further doubt on whether the season would be completed. And then ''eight'' crew members came forward with accounts of Spacey's predatory behavior which made them deeply uncomfortable around him. Spacey was fired a week later. In the end, production on Season 6 resumed with Creator/RobinWright becoming the sole lead, and the season's first two episodes, already filmed with Spacey, were reshot. |
| 202 | [[/folder]] |
| 203 | |
| 204 | [[folder:I]] |
| 205 | * Production for ''Series/TheIdol'', a drama series by ''Series/{{Euphoria}}'' creator Sam Levinson for HBO, went off the rails in a very ugly way if [[https://www.rollingstone.com/tv-movies/tv-movie-features/the-idol-hbo-next-euphoria-torture-porn-the-weeknd-sam-levinson-lily-rose-depp-blackpink-jennie-1234688754/ this]] ''Rolling Stone'' article is to be believed. |
| 206 | ** In June 2021, pop singer Abel Tesfaye, better known as Music/TheWeeknd, announced that he would be creating, executive producing, and co-writing ''The Idol'' alongside Levinson, with Creator/AmySeimetz attached as director. HBO ordered a first season consisting of six episodes and gave the production a budget of between $54 and $75 million. |
| 207 | ** However, things started taking a turn in April 2022 when Seimetz, having shot 80% of the series thus far, suddenly left the production. While HBO claimed at the time that the turnover was due to the series getting a "creative overhaul", reports suggested that The Weeknd had objected to the "feminist lens" of the plot and Creator/LilyRoseDepp's character getting all the attention, while Seimetz had been "set up to fail." Levinson subsequently stepped in as director. |
| 208 | ** With Levinson's taking of the helm came the decision to reshoot the show from scratch, with the previous $75 million budget wasted, in what one cast member called "the most egregious [spending] I've ever witnessed in this business." Seimetz's storyline -- of a starlet who falls victim to a predatory industry figure and struggles to reclaim her agency -- was retooled into what crew members termed an offensive "rape fantasy" which included (unfilmed) disturbing sexual content. |
| 209 | ** Crew members also complained of being kept in the dark over when the show would debut, or even what the final product would look like, since reshoots and rewrites were apparently still ongoing at the time the ''Rolling Stone'' article dropped, not helped by what were termed "near-impossible expectations" from HBO. |
| 210 | ** The series dropped in June 2023 to a very negative reception from both fans and critics, with Tesfaye's performance being singled out for ridicule. It was cancelled two months later. |
| 211 | * The first season of ''Series/{{Iron Fist|2017}}'' had a shooting schedule so insanely tight that Creator/FinnJones was often given his fight choreography just ''fifteen minutes'' before filming started[[note]]Learning the choreography right before shooting a scene isn't unique to ''Iron Fist''; Creator/CharlieCox and Creator/ElodieYung have discussed how they had to learn fights pass by pass as they shot ''Series/{{Daredevil|2015}}'' Season 2 because of the fast turnaround time. The differentiating factor is that Charlie Cox has a background in stage combat, plus had plenty of time to train and prepare in general building on his training from ''Daredevil'' Season 1, and Elodie Yung is a black belt martial artist, so their combined experience shows in the final product. With Finn Jones in ''Iron Fist'', the time between him landing the role and starting production was ridiculously short, and he didn't have as much fight training/background to fall back on, on top of the general difficulties the stunt team had with the creative team on executing their vision.[[/note]] This certainly helps explain the many complaints about his unconvincing fighting. Fortunately, ''Series/{{The Defenders|2017}}'' would greatly redeem many of the reservations people had about Danny's skill due to being helmed by Marco Ramirez and Doug Petrie, the showrunners from Season 2 of ''Series/{{Daredevil|2015}}'', instead of the notorious Scott Buck. |
| 212 | * The short-lived 1983 Creator/{{ABC}} sitcom ''It's Not Easy'' was originally supposed to debut in the 1982 season. The series (about a divorced couple living across from each other to make visitation easier on the kids) was originally intended to star Creator/GeraldMcRaney (who was available because his show ''Series/SimonAndSimon'' was on the bubble in terms of possible cancellation) and Larry Breeding. The pilot was shot, but soon after Creator/{{CBS}} announced they were picking up ''Simon and Simon'' (thus removing [=McRaney=] from the production, with former ''The White Shadow'' star Ken Howard replacing him) while the series was taken off the fall schedule. Then, on September 28, 1983, Larry Breeding was killed in a car accident, with the show held back until the 1983 season (by which time game-show host Bert Convy had replaced Breeding). |
| 213 | [[/folder]] |
| 214 | |
| 215 | [[folder:J]] |
| 216 | * In the late summer of 1993, with Music/MichaelJackson having just launched the Asian leg of his ''Music/{{Dangerous|Album}}'' tour, the rest of the Jackson family was preparing a ''Jackson Family Honors'' pre-taped television AwardShow[=/=]charity benefit for December that would feature most of the family (plus other acts like Dionne Warwick and Music/CelineDion) performing their hits and presenting a pair of humanitarian awards to Berry Gordy and Creator/ElizabethTaylor. And then... |
| 217 | ** The family's press conference announcing the show doubled as a show of public support for Michael in the wake of a 13-year-old boy accusing him of child molestation. In the wake of this, Creator/{{NBC}} postponed the show to the following February, while Michael prematurely ended his tour due to drug problems that necessitated an overseas stay in rehab. Michael returned to the US at the end of '93 and settled out of court with his accuser in January 1994. |
| 218 | ** The show was set to go at the MGM Grand Hotel and Casino in UsefulNotes/LasVegas rather than the originally announced Atlantic City, UsefulNotes/NewJersey. While this was something of a step up (the MGM Grand being a shiny-new venue at the time), there were issues with the guest list. The Jacksons wanted Creator/OprahWinfrey, who had interviewed Michael for a blockbuster Creator/{{ABC}} special the previous February, to host the show, but she turned them down. And La Toya, who claimed that she'd seen evidence suggesting Michael ''was'' a pedophile, wanted to participate. She claimed she was barred from the event and her husband Jack Gordon threatened to sneak her into it, but that didn't happen. (Years later she recanted her claims and was accepted back into the family.) |
| 219 | ** Neither Michael or Music/{{Janet|Jackson}} were willing to lodge with the rest of the family; each stayed elsewhere on the Strip. In fact, she only performed one number at the show and promptly left the venue altogether. |
| 220 | ** The show was held in the hotel-casino's arena; according to the Christoper Andersen book ''Michael Jackson Unauthorized'' the tickets, priced as high as $350, sold so poorly that 3,500 freebies were given away. Even then, hours before showtime the organizers rounded up young people to act as seat-fillers and Michael supporters via [[AstroTurf premade placards]]. |
| 221 | ** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vvKINVYmUg Interview footage with two attendees]] reveals that the show started 90 minutes late due to an extensive security check at the doors to the arena that kept audience members from getting to their seats. |
| 222 | ** The big climax was effectively Michael's presentation of Elizabeth Taylor's award. Trouble continued there -- a heckler asked why he'd paid his accuser off, a comment that was edited out for the television broadcast. Then the whole segment went awry when she explained to the audience, who was clamoring for him to perform, that he didn't have anything prepared. She then had to discourage them from booing, all of which ''was'' included in the broadcast version. He did participate in the most-of-the-family finale, but that was it. |
| 223 | ** According to a ''Los Angeles Times'' article, the show raised $4.5 million, but only $100,000 of it went to charity. Several hundred thousand dollars' worth of the ticket money had to be refunded to upset patrons who paid full price for tickets that were heavily discounted by showtime. The Jacksons were also slow to pay the people who put the show on, and MGM Grand officials claimed to have been stiffed on the room service, wardrobe, and limousine bills they racked up. |
| 224 | * In its first season, the ''Series/GoldRush'' SpinOff ''Jungle Gold'', was a huge hit, with the Creator/DiscoveryChannel ordering six more episodes than were originally expected. In its second season, that order was cut to six and the series was canceled. [[http://www.buzzfeed.com/jedlipinski/how-jungle-gold-went-from-boom-to-bust#.ncqKAVEyP This story]] in ''Website/BuzzFeed'' explains why. |
| 225 | ** It began when Scott Lomu and George Wright, two Utah Mormons who'd been trying their luck mining for gold in Ghana after losing their shirts when the housing bubble burst came home, started watching ''Gold Rush'', and found it much duller than their experience. They got in touch with the producers and told them that there was more drama in one day in Ghana than there was in a week in Alaska. The producers were sold, and soon they were headed back to Ghana flush with new investment. |
| 226 | ** At the time, gold mining in Ghana was booming. Most of those running the mining operations, however, were Chinese who did so illegally, without even getting permits, and paid no attention to environmental or labor laws. Miners also ran the risk of getting robbed by armed gangs. Lomu and Wright hoped their show could show that foreigners could make money in Ghanaian gold mining ''and'' follow the rules. |
| 227 | ** It didn't start off well. When Lomu went back to get the show started, he found the tribal chief he'd paid thousands to keep their claim secure had instead let the Chinese come in all over it. That had to be written off while a new mining location was found. |
| 228 | ** An attempt to avoid one set of UnfortunateImplications instead wound up creating another one. Ghanaian law forbids foreigners from mining claims 25 acres or less, although they can invest in companies that do. Since Lomu and Wright wanted to avoid the impression of two white men looking on while black Africans did backbreaking work, they often faked doing work for the cameras. However, the episodes, when aired, didn't explain this, leaving many viewers with the impression that the two were mining illegally. By the end of the first season, ''three'' separate online petitions were asking Discovery to cancel the show, and Ghanaians living in the United States were criticizing their government back home for allowing the show to be produced. Permits for starting the next season were thus delayed for weeks longer than had been expected. |
| 229 | ** During that second season, the first season began airing in Ghana. Viewers were outraged at the way their country was depicted and gave government officials an earful. Many, including an investigating journalist, came to believe from one scene, a highlight of the first season in which Lomu chokeholds into unconsciousness a cocoa farmer who confronted the mining crews after they flattened some of his crop, that they had killed the man. The two heard that an armed militia was coming for them, and saw news reports that a warrant was out for their arrest on murder charges. Very soon producers had the helicopter they had contracted to do aerial shots fly them to the international airport in Accra, where they quickly left the country, supposedly for good. |
| 230 | ** Back home, Discovery did its part by [[ScrewedByTheNetwork moving the show from Fridays to Sundays]], when its core demographic was mostly watching football instead, and dropping the order to six episodes. Before those had even finished airing, the decision was made to cancel the show. The second season has never been shown in Ghana. |
| 231 | ** It actually worked out well, mostly. The warrant, if it had ever existed, was dropped, and Lomu and Wright were able to return to Ghana on several occasions and retrieve their equipment (and, eventually, get jobs with another mining company working claims in ''Guyana''). Many of the villagers they worked with said the two had treated them well. The government used the furor to deport many of the Chinese miners. However, the communities where the mining took place have suffered economically in their absence. |
| 232 | * Production on ''Series/JupitersLegacy'' [[https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/jupiters-legacy-canceled-netflix-season-2-1234965510/ wasn't entirely smooth.]] |
| 233 | ** Netflix greatly underestimated the amount of money needed for a superhero TV show, initially budgeting $9 million per episode[[note]]for comparison, Marvel's shows have been known to cost $15-20 million per episode[[/note]], but production quickly went overbudget and behind schedule. |
| 234 | ** Showrunner Steven [=DeKnight=] left halfway through filming due to CreativeDifferences, putting production behind schedule even further due to the temporary shutdown. Sang Kyu Kim was brought in to take over as showrunner and reworked the episodes already shot to fit his own vision for the show, adding to the costs and delays. |
| 235 | ** Post-production dragged on through 2020. Louis Letterier, who had a good track record at Netflix with ''Series/TheDarkCrystalAgeOfResistance'' and ''Series/Lupin2021'', was brought in at the last minute as a creative consultant, but he couldn't do much to help as everything was so far along. |
| 236 | ** In post-production, a new Netflix head of TV was put in charge who was not impressed with the show, as it was an expensive flop they were not responsible for. As such, the series was cancelled after its first season received poor ratings. |
| 237 | ** In the wake of the cancellation, Netflix tried to spin the bad press and poor reviews by claiming they wanted to continue working with Millarworld on future projects by announcing production on ''Anime/SuperCrooks2021'' and ''The Magic Order'' and trying to weld them to the ''Jupiter'' brand despite the originals not sharing a universe. |
| 238 | [[/folder]] |
| 239 | |
| 240 | [[folder:K]] |
| 241 | * ''Franchise/KamenRider'' has had its fair share of troubles, and in fact became a magnet for this in the mid-2000s. |
| 242 | ** As a general example, most Heisei era shows and onwards see an increasing reduction in the actual motorbikes that the Kamen Riders, well, ''ride.'' This is because new laws in Japan meant that usage of the bikes became much more restricted due to safety requirements. It reached its height in ''Revice'', where no Rider even ''uses'' a motorbike, and the main character uses a hovercraft that is usually CGI -- and even then, he only rarely used it -- or even ''a pedal bike'' in his civilian life. |
| 243 | ** The [[Series/KamenRider original series]] had a [[NoBudget shoestring budget]], and lead actor Creator/HiroshiFujioka did all of his own stunts, which backfired when he was injured in a botched bike stunt. For a handful of episodes, the crew worked around [[FakeShemp outtakes of Fujioka]] dubbed over by voice actor Rokuro Naya, until the introduction of Hayato Ichimonji as Kamen Rider #2. |
| 244 | ** ''Series/KamenRiderHibiki'' suffered from [[MerchandiseDriven low toy sales]] and skyrocketing production costs, due to [[SceneryPorn exotic location shoots]] and overbearing script demands -- like massive CGI monsters and [[TheMusical musical numbers]] when no one at Creator/{{Toei|Company}} had any experience with that. As a result, the last third of the show suffered from an infamous [[ExecutiveMeddling executive-mandated]] {{Retool}} right when the show was turning the corner, which was universally hated by most cast members and staff, and so disorganized that the final episode's script was reportedly still being [[WritingByTheSeatOfYourPants written while it was filmed]]. |
| 245 | ** Thanks to poor foresight and unfortunate casting decisions, ''Series/KamenRiderKabuto'' suffered from a [[RevolvingDoorCasting revolving door of main characters]]. At least two actors were popular {{Idol Singer}}s who had to take a break to record and promote new albums, and the female lead had to be PutOnABus because the actress was diagnosed with cancer. |
| 246 | ** In comparison, ''Series/KamenRiderDenO'' got off easy: the female lead was afflicted with anemia due to on-set stress, and when she inevitably left the show, her character was [[TheNthDoctor de-aged]] to make up for it. |
| 247 | ** ''Series/KamenRiderGhost'' suffered from having resources abruptly diverted to the ''Series/KamenRiderAmazons'' project, resulting in suits for that show being prioritized over ''Ghost''’s suits. Additionally, head writer Takuro Fukuda mentioned during the press release for ''Series/KamenRiderSaber'' that his work on Ghost was heavily reduced because of his busy schedule leading to him missing out on meetings with other writers and leaving them to fill in large swaths of the story themselves. |
| 248 | ** Production of ''Series/KamenRiderZeroOne'' was put on hiatus due to the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic. To fill in during the hiatus, a series of [[RecapEpisode Recap Episodes]] aired in place of normal episodes. |
| 249 | ** ''Series/KamenRiderSaber'' also suffered from this due to the pandemic. Namely, the first 12 episodes were hastily re-written, and restrictions on filming meant it was a struggle to actually get the show made, as evident by the high amount of scenes clearly filmed with a green screen. |
| 250 | ** ''Series/KamenRiderRevice'' had issues with two of its characters who just so happened to be its two [[EnsembleDarkHorse most popular]]. |
| 251 | *** Hiromi Kadota very quickly became the uncontested fan favourite of the entire fandom ''and'' production staff, but his actor, Junya Komatsu, was already preparing for his role in the musical adaptation of ''Ouran High School Host Club''. In order to accommodate, his character was written out of the show for much of its run, before returning in the last quarter, forcing the writers to scramble together ''something'' to fill in the time. This became painfully obvious when Hiromi's Demons Driver was passed around between no less than ''three characters'' before Hiromi's return, all of which amounted to filler. |
| 252 | *** The other fan favourite, Aguilera, had a much more negative instance of this in regards to why and how it happened; Actress Yui Asakura was sexually harassed on set by one of her male co-stars (whose identity is still unknown), and the production team removed planned scenes they would have shared so that the actors would not have to be on set together. At the same time, Asakura was dealing with a stalker, which her talent agency did nothing to help with, forcing her to stay with a friend for safety. It's a wonder Aguilera ended up with one of the better-paced and structured arcs on the show, all things considered. |
| 253 | * After the cancellation of ''Series/KimsConvenience'' in its fifth season, cast members Simu Liu and Jean Yoon stated that the show suffered from behind-the-scenes [[https://time.com/6072074/kims-convenience-racism/ writing issues]], with largely white writers writing for almost entirely Korean characters. For example, Yoon discussed on her Twitter how much of the Korean food presented was inaccurate and other details were insensitive or racist before cast objections. Simu Liu also stated that their pay was low due to the lack of stars in the cast. |
| 254 | [[/folder]] |
| 255 | |
| 256 | [[folder:L]] |
| 257 | * When ''Series/LastManStanding'' premiered on Creator/{{ABC}} in 2011, it was pitched as simply being a show about a man (played by Creator/TimAllen) trying to maintain his masculinity in a world of women. In essence, it could be seen as [[SpiritualSuccessor update]] of Allen's prior sitcom ''Series/HomeImprovement'' if Tim Taylor had three daughters instead of three sons. The show was created by ''Series/ThirtyRock'' writer Jack Burditt, and he might have eventually made something of it. However, Burditt left the show due to a family tragedy. He would return for a brief period, but he knew he wouldn't be able to lead the sitcom much longer, so ''Series/{{Reba}}'' vet Kevin Abbott took the helm. But Abbott had already sold another pilot to ABC and had to leave to focus on ''that'' show, so the start of the second season brought the third official showrunner, Tim Doyle of ''Series/RulesOfEngagement''. Starting in Season 2, the show (which by now was moved to {{Friday|NightDeathSlot}}s) began focusing on politics. In essence, what both Doyle and Allen wanted to do was [[{{Retool}} make the show]] more like ''Series/AllInTheFamily'', albeit with a conservative slant [[SpiritualAntithesis as opposed]] to the liberal/humanist bent of the earlier sitcom. Another change was the [[TheOtherDarrin recasting]] of Mike Baxter's eldest daughter Kristin (Alexandra Krosney had the role in Season 1; Amanda Fuller has had it from Season 2 onwards) due to the dreaded "CreativeDifferences". Doyle stuck around as showrunner for three years before passing the baton to Matt Berry, who ran the show until its cancellation by ABC.[[note]]One speculated reason behind ABC cancelling ''LMS'' was due to the show being owned by [[Creator/TwentiethCenturyStudios 20th Century Fox]], who received all of the syndication money (ABC only got the advertising revenue). this was before Disney owned both ABC and what was then called 20th Century Fox[[/note]] Allen alleges that it was cancelled for being a conservative-leaning sitcom that did not fit with the liberal-leaning ones the network airs, like ''Series/ModernFamily'' and ''Series/BlackIsh'', even though they greenlit a number of conservative-leaning programs the next season, including a revival of ''Series/{{Roseanne}}'' which reflected star Creator/RoseanneBarr's pro-[[UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump Trump]] leanings, and censored or banned episodes of ''Black-ish'' that criticized the Trump administration. [[ChannelHop Fox]] later [[UnCancelled revived]] ''LMS'', with Season 7 airing during the 2018-2019 season. Consequently, ''LMS'' endured another recast with middle daughter Mandy going from being played by Molly Ephraim to Molly [=McCook=], and the character [[DemotedToExtra demoted]] to recurring status. |
| 258 | * Though it was ultimately a huge success, ''Series/LawAndOrder'' had a bit of a rough start. |
| 259 | ** One of the major problems was actor Creator/GeorgeDzundza's dissatisfaction with the show; Dzundza had believed he was to be the show's singular main character and was disgruntled to find himself as part of an ensemble main cast, reinforced by the fact that his character was often important only in the first half of an episode. Dzundza departed the show after the first season, alleviating much of the conflict. |
| 260 | ** Creator/MichaelMoriarty, who played the original district attorney Ben Stone, also caused difficulty for his co-stars and the producers. Among other things, Moriarty had a habit of publicly ranting and name-calling at public figures, most famously calling then-Attorney General Janet Reno a "psychopathic Nazi" for her attempts to cap violence on television; when the producers asked him to tone it down, he responded by quitting the show. [[note]]Moriarty did later admit that he had had an alcohol problem during his time on the show, although it's unclear if this was related to his behavior, as he continued to be known for his bizarre and unusual political rants long after he claimed he was sober.[[/note]] |
| 261 | * The Fox News docudrama series ''Legends & Lies'' had many production problems and setbacks. During production of ''The Patriots'' season (about the Revolutionary War), new scenes were frequently rewritten the night before they were to be shot, and the show's production was halted for a while after they ran out of funding. Several local crew members opted not to return for Season 3, citing "drama." Also, Season 3 (''The Civil War'') was completely filmed, but there was doubt that it would ever see the light of day due to producer and commentator Creator/BillOReilly's sexual harassment allegations and subsequent termination from Fox News. It finally aired a year and a half after production with O'Reilly's involvement completely stripped. It's also very likely that Season 4 (supposedly about World War I) will never go into production at all. |
| 262 | * ''Series/LethalWeapon2016'' (a TV remake of the [[Film/LethalWeapon original film]] and its sequels) premiered to great fanfare for Creator/{{FOX}}, buoyed by the BuddyCopShow dynamic between its two leads Creator/ClayneCrawford and Creator/DamonWayans. Unfortunately, on-set tensions between the stars, ExecutiveMeddling, and production problems led to Crawford being fired at the end of the second season and replaced by Creator/SeannWilliamScott for the third. A [[https://variety.com/2018/tv/news/lethal-weapon-clash-shakeup-firing-video-1202822990/ damning report]] by ''Variety'' laid out some of the problems that plagued the series. |
| 263 | ** The series went into pre-production with both leads being unsure if they wanted to take on the project indefinitely. In an [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dn9wk7vp_js interview recorded after his firing]], Crawford claims he was told that Wayans wanted to be involved in the series, then learned after the fact (during the interim between the first and second seasons) that Wayans had pitched a different series to FOX president Joe Roth as a CareerResurrection vehicle. As filming of the pilot got underway, Crawford claims he immediately ran into friction with the show's producer and lead writer, Matthew Miller, over disagreements about lead character Martin Riggs' storyline and its focus compared to the action and BuddyCopShow scenes. |
| 264 | ** The show's first season ended without major incident, though tensions were rising behind the scenes due to production delays. Depending on which source is to be believed, Wayans either refused to sit for table reads or there ''were'' no table reads at Wayans' insistence. During a press appearance in UsefulNotes/{{Paris}} to promote the second season, Wayans reportedly apologized to Crawford for his behavior, but the situation didn't improve. This was supposedly caused by a lack of management on set, which Crawford claims forced him to step up and start acting as quality control, doing everything from rewriting scripts to overseeing some aspects of the production. |
| 265 | ** During a scene set within a church, Wayans reportedly refused to walk inside, saying he was a devout Jehovah's Witness and it would be an affront to his religion.[[note]]Ironically, Wayans criticized Creator/StevenSeagal for claiming the exact same thing during production on the opening scene of ''Film/TheGlimmerMan''.[[/note]] As a result, production had to work around Wayans' absence from production (largely by using stand-ins) until a replica was built on a soundstage in the FOX production lot. |
| 266 | ** During production of the second season's fifth episode, "Let It Ride", guest director Eric Laneuville ran afoul of Crawford and other actors for "butting in" on the production process, alongside their need to [[ThrowItIn improv during shooting]]. According to a source in the ''Variety'' article, one actor even expressed a desire never to work with Laneuville again. |
| 267 | ** The second season's ninth episode, "Fools Rush In" (also directed by Laneuville), became a powder keg when filming of a crucial scene (Riggs attempting to talk down a suicidal man) ran for more than ten hours and was delayed by constant background noises interrupting the shot. Crawford subsequently began screaming at an assistant director to solve the situation by getting a group of children who were playing nearby to "shut the f*** up". The exchange was recorded by staff on-set and, according to Crawford, used as [[{{Blackmail}} leverage]] to keep him in check, while the assistant director resigned on the spot. The next day, Laneuville left the production after a disagreement with Crawford and a stunt coordinator over filming of a car crash, which led the show's editor, Matt Barber, to finish directing the episode in an uncredited capacity. Crawford was forced to take anger management courses, give part of his salary for the episode to Barber, and (by his own admission) was escorted to and from the set by a security guard. |
| 268 | ** FOX also responded by posting security guards to the set and hiring a veteran producer to handle the high-stress situation, but things came to a head during production of the season's 20th episode, "Jesse's Girl". During filming of a scene that involved an explosion, Wayans was struck in the back of the head with a piece of shrapnel and later claimed (in a since-deleted Website/{{Twitter}} post) that he suspected foul play due to the "shrapnel" hitting him on the opposite side from where the explosion was taking place. Crawford lost his temper the following day and began arguing with Wayans, with both of them insulting and swearing at each other repeatedly. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCB_bG5ZDsA The ensuing exchange was recorded]], and things escalated even further when Wayans refused to shoot a subsequent shootout scene and Crawford got into an argument with Wayans' personal assistant. In an [[https://www.instagram.com/p/Bh9zLf8H7A3/ Instagram post]] written shortly after rumors about the altercation emerged, Crawford expressed remorse for his behavior. |
| 269 | ** According to Crawford, a FOX executive called him at his home and (within earshot of his family) ordered him to apologize to Wayans or lose his job. At the same time, Wayans (who deleted his Twitter account shortly thereafter) released a series of tweets alleging that Crawford was a nightmare to work with, who had a "file of infractions" held by FOX and had production staff so angered that they produced decals that read "Clayne Crawford is an Emotional Terrorist". |
| 270 | ** The hammer finally dropped when Crawford went on vacation with his family and subsequently learned from social media posts that he'd been fired from the show and been replaced with Seann William Scott (the second-season finale has [[spoiler:Riggs get fatally shot at a cemetery by his brother while mourning for his father]]). According to ''Variety'', more than 100 production staff members were let go, with it rumored that the departures were done to people who were loyal to Crawford. This also resulted in Jordana Brewster (Dr. Cahill) choosing to depart the series as well after the first five episodes had been shot. |
| 271 | ** Shortly before Season 3 began airing, Wayans announced that he too would be leaving the show halfway through the season, citing that he wanted to spend more time with his family (issues which had been exacerbated by his playing devoted family man Murtaugh), and pulling out his character's famous CatchPhrase "I'm too old for this shit." FOX managed to coax Wayans back by altering his work schedule, but the show wound up getting cancelled at the end of that season. |
| 272 | * RealityTV series ''Life of Kylie'', about Kylie Jenner, faced this in July 2017 when they were ScrewedByTheLawyers after a British artist complained about the logo being a [[SerialNumbersFiledOff very close copy of her artwork]]. More about it [[http://www.dailystar.co.uk/showbiz/633205/Kylie-Jenner-lip-sued-Sara-Pope-logo-reality-show at this article]]. Then there were accusations of Kylie being ThePrimaDonna and you can start to see how this show's production is starting to go. |
| 273 | * The original 1980s version of the game show ''Series/{{Lingo}}'' was put out by a production company that failed to pay most of its contestants due to financial difficulties. Host Michael Reagan also bailed due to the production issues, causing executive producer Ralph Andrews to take over for the last few weeks. The same financial issues also killed Andrews' other game show that he had on the air at the time, a game show loosely based around ''Yahtzee'' and hosted by ''Series/TheHollywoodSquares'' host Peter Marshall. That show underwent a downgrade in venues from Trump's Castle to the Showboat Hotel and Casino, and like ''Lingo'', many staffers and contestants never got paid. Andrews [[CreatorKiller never produced another television series]] after ''Yahtzee'' fizzled out. |
| 274 | * ''Series/TheLordOfTheRingsTheRingsOfPower'': Filming of the first season in UsefulNotes/NewZealand was stopped for several months in 2020 due to the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic. The series was one of seven film and television productions that were granted exemptions to allow cast and crew members to enter the country while its borders were closed to non-New Zealanders due to the pandemic. |
| 275 | * The shooting of the pilot episode of ''Series/{{Lost}}'' was interrupted by constant rain, resulting in their set getting flooded and some of the equipment washed away and/or waterlogged. They had to drive to the nearest town, which was something like half an hour away, to buy hairdryers to dry off the cameras. In addition, natural rain doesn't show up properly on camera, meaning they had to fake rain all over their poor actors at the same time as trying to keep equipment from getting washed away. Then there was the other problem they had just before shooting; Creator/EvangelineLilly, who is Canadian, had some problems with getting her work visa, causing them to delay her scenes and almost have to recast the female lead in the middle of shooting. And it was all nicely bookended when Creator/MatthewFox was almost killed during filming of the series finale when Creator/TerryOQuinn was mistakenly given a real knife for their climactic fight scene. |
| 276 | * ''Series/LovecraftCountry'': It came out in 2024 that the show's production was challenging for the cast and crew; not only was the dark subject matter emotionally gruelling and the shoots often long and complex due to the {{cosmic horror}} elements, but there were also issues with star Creator/JonathanMajors being [[HostilityOnTheSet demanding and aggressive towards crew members]], mostly women. Several crew members reported that Majors' attitude made it difficult for them to do their jobs, with assistant director Lisa Zugschwerdt quitting after a few episodes due to Majors' behaviour towards her and another assistant director Jessica Pollini being reduced to tears when Majors tried to intimidate her into leaving the role; female employees reportedly warned each other to tread carefully around Majors. When three women (including Pollini and Zugschwerdt) complained to HBO, Majors was ordered to apologise, though Pollini stated Majors treated it more as a misunderstanding. The 2021 non-fiction book, ''Tinderbox: HBO’s Ruthless Pursuit of New Frontiers'', also discussed rumours that several writers on ''Lovecraft Country'' had a miserable time due its "toxic and hostile work environment", to the point it may have been a factor in the show getting cancelled after just one season. |
| 277 | * ''Series/Luck2011'' was the most personal project of Creator/DavidMilch's career, playing into his lifelong love of horse racing. Unfortunately, what seemed like a match made in heaven on paper when Creator/MichaelMann was brought in as the primary director quickly went south. Exact details are scarce, but Richard Kind and Creator/NickNolte have both testified that the two had very different ideas for what the show should be, and they were also both very used to getting their own way with the creative process by this point. And if that wasn't enough, despite numerous precautions while filming the actual horse race scenes, three horses were killed over the course of filming. HBO execs quickly canned it after a single season thanks to that public relations nightmare. |
| 278 | [[/folder]] |
| 279 | |
| 280 | [[folder:M]] |
| 281 | * ''Series/FamilyFeud'' was not the first time that Creator/MarkGoodson and Richard Dawson had butted heads. Before ''Feud'' first hit the air in 1976, Richard Dawson was a recurring panelist on ''Series/MatchGame'' starting in 1973. Once he got the ''Feud'' gig, Dawson started to become noticeably detached from his surroundings (likely stemming from his ego -- why play second fiddle on one show when he had top billing in another?), as he began giving blunt one-word answers to every question, stopped joking around with the other panelists (important on a comedy-driven format), and refused an on-air demand from host Gene Rayburn to smile. Also souring Dawson's mood on ''Match'' was a format change: initially, contestants playing the Head-to-Head Match segment of the BonusRound were allowed to pick any of the six celebrities, but [[ComplacentGamingSyndrome nearly all of them chose Dawson]] because he seemed to have an uncanny knack for matching the contestants' answers. To thwart this, the producers added a wheel that was spun in order to randomly select from among which of the six celebrities would be matched. Although its very first spin ironically landed on Dawson, it ultimately played a major role in his leaving ''Match'' entirely in 1978. |
| 282 | * ''Series/TheMatchGameHollywoodSquaresHour'' was this, especially for Gene Rayburn who hosted the former segment. He disliked working with co-host Jon Bauman (best known as Bowzer of Music/ShaNaNa) who emceed the ''[[Series/TheHollywoodSquares Hollywood Squares]]'' portion instead of venerable host Peter Marshall and, according to [[TheAnnouncer announcer]] Gene Wood, was "dragged kicking and screaming" into the show. The latter segment was also plagued by Creator/MarkGoodson not "getting" the long-standing format of ''Squares'', resulting in convoluted either-or questions with the celebrities not allowed to give one-liners and bluff answers, as ''Squares'' is famous for. Since they were also not given the answers beforehand, many were forced to pull answers out of thin air, as noted by Rayburn. Longtime Goodson-Todman producer Ira Skutch quit working for Mark Goodson after it was cancelled. |
| 283 | * The hugely successful ''Series/{{Moonlighting}}'' was fraught with production delays and on-set issues, to the point that its problems were lampshaded by Creator/{{ABC}} in an ad campaign: |
| 284 | ** While it was being produced, the series was one of the most expensive television programs ever made. As a result of overlapping, fast-paced dialogue between the main characters, the scripts often ran up to 120 pages, it cost more than $1.5 million to film each episode, and production was almost always behind schedule (not helped by the fact that series creator Glenn Caron would often rewrite dialogue on-set during filming). |
| 285 | ** The well-known episode "The Dream Sequence Always Rings Twice" cost a then-unheard-of $2 million to film and took 16 days to shoot, largely due to Caron's insistence that the filming use actual black-and-white film instead of shooting in color then decolorizing it. Even then, ABC was displeased with the episode and, fearing backlash from fans who wouldn't understand the concept, had a disclaimer run before the episode informing viewers of the filming change. |
| 286 | ** Creator/CybillShepherd (who played Maddie Hayes) was reportedly burned out by the long filming times and production issues, coupled with the fact that she would be receiving new script pages the day they were to be filmed. Not helping matters was the fact that Caron blamed ''her'' for the delays in production, referring to her as a star who "already reached the top of the mountain". Things got to the point where, in the fourth season, Caron reportedly left the production for good because of the tension between Shepherd and himself, arguing that he believed the network would pick her over him if it came down to a corporate decision. |
| 287 | ** Creator/BruceWillis (who played David Addison), by contrast, started out the series being very friendly to Shepherd and the production crew. However, once ''Film/DieHard'' became a smash hit, he realized he was meant for a movie career and became detached from the job, as well as had a strained working relationship with Shepherd. |
| 288 | ** The production delays were so severe that ABC ran an ad campaign showing network executives waiting for new episodes to appear at their company headquarters. Further production delays (including Shepherd leaving production to give birth to twins and Willis suffering from a skiing accident) only exacerbated the problem. |
| 289 | ** When Shepherd returned from her post-pregnancy break, the writers forced her character into a storyline where she spontaneously married a random man she met on a train (in a bid to recreate the tension between David and Maddie), despite Shepherd herself vehemently protesting it. This led to a further ratings decline and the series' eventual cancellation at the end of its fifth season. |
| 290 | * ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'' isn't perfect, being a series that brings big laughs with a small budget, but they do have some very interesting incidents. |
| 291 | ** Back in Season Two, there was ''Film/TheSidehackers''. Prior to this episode, Best Brains would choose a movie, someone would watch over part of it and if was worthy to riff, they'd go through it. When Frank Conniff found it, he thought it was good enough to riff on and the rights were acquired for it. Imagine their shock and horror when, partway through, there was a ''rape and murder scene.'' Unable to pull back, Best Brains ended up lopping out the entire scene, and Trace, as Crow, added in a throwaway line mentioning what happened to the girl who suffered that fate. Not surprisingly, the production team decreed that they would watch the ''whole'' film before committing themselves to shooting an episode based on it in future. |
| 292 | ** The blooper reel ''Poopie!'' does show a number of incidents in which the Crow, Tom, and Gypsy puppets malfunction in some way, mostly by Tom losing his dome or Crow's headnet falling off. One incident from the movie ''Film/DangerDeathRay'' had a scene where Tom shoots Crow with a ray gun and Crow's seen lit up. As the scene comes to an end, Crow bursts into flames! The scene was actually kept in! |
| 293 | ** Another ''Poopie!'' blooper from ''Film/TheHellcats'' episode showed that Frank couldn't say "I don't fink on soul brother" with a straight face. It was so bad that they grabbed the best take and cut just before he and Trace burst out laughing. |
| 294 | ** The [[Creator/{{Syfy}} Sci-Fi Channel]] years suffered heavily from ExecutiveMeddling. Sci-Fi executives demanded a recurring storyline, much to the crew's chagrin, and initially limited their movie output to Creator/{{Universal}} titles. The restrictions were relaxed somewhat for the final season. |
| 295 | ** The 2017 Creator/{{Netflix}} revival suffered from a very rushed production schedule compared to what the show had been like before, including a new method of recording the theater segments that worked off time stamps rather than actually having the movie playing in front of them, which leads to the odd joke's timing being a tad off. |
| 296 | ** The reason Gypsy appears so sparingly during the original ten seasons is that the puppet was very heavy, and Jim Mallon and Patrick Brantseg both started to suffer back problems if they worked with it for too long. The Netflix revival revamped her design to be operated from above, and her role is noticeably expanded. |
| 297 | ** Prior to the release of Season 12, Joel admitted that he'd forgotten just how much work went into making a top-quality episode of the show, and the crew were stretched very thin on the fourteen episodes of Season 11, hence its decidedly mixed reception. Season 12 was thus reduced to just six so each one could get the same kind of attention the best parts of the original run had. The show was not renewed for a season 13 on Netflix but served as the launching pad for a new streaming service, the Gizmoplex. |
| 298 | ** While making Season 13, the crew suddenly lost the rights to the film they were planning to use for their much-hyped holiday special which would feature all three hosts (they've declined to say what film it was). Also, the rights holders for ''Film/GameraVsJiger'' were just as ornery as when Joel tried to get the rights during the show's original run, and ultimately only agreed to let it be used if the ''entire'' film was featured, preventing their typical editing work to make the jokes flow better. |
| 299 | [[/folder]] |
| 300 | |
| 301 | [[folder:N]] |
| 302 | * Creator/{{NBC}} News and its sister outlets endured one throughout TheNewTens, with its reputation and its previous ratings dominance taking hits in a series of increasingly disastrous episodes: |
| 303 | ** The controversial firings of Creator/KeithOlbermann and Ann Curry led ratings for both MSNBC and ''Series/{{Today}}'' (which had been the #1 morning news show for almost 20 years until that point) respectively to suffer. David Gregory, the longtime NBC political correspondent whose run on ''Meet the Press'' had been marred by gaffes and unfavorable comparisons to predecessor Tim Russert, was also fired under strange circumstances. |
| 304 | ** MSNBC went through [[HighTurnoverRate a whole series of hirings and firings]] which led to a prolonged game of musical chairs with its schedule. Between 2011 and 2015, Ed Schultz's show changed time slots no less than ''five times'' before it was cancelled. The network also made some controversial new hires such as Ronan Farrow (Creator/{{Mia|Farrow}}'s son), who was given a weekday show solely on the basis of his social media presence. His show was cancelled after one year. |
| 305 | ** And [[FromBadToWorse it didn't stop there]]. In 2015, ''NBC Nightly News'' anchor Brian Williams was caught embellishing his involvement in a firefight during the Iraq War. An internal review by NBC reportedly discovered eleven other examples of fabulism by Williams. While he was not fired, in mid-June it was announced that he had been effectively demoted to serving as "breaking news anchor" for MSNBC while Lester Holt was promoted to lead anchor. (Fortunately for Williams, he would soon have a CareerResurrection as anchor of ''The 11th Hour''.) |
| 306 | ** Things seemed to improve when Andrew Lack became NBC News chairman and ratings for ''Today'', ''Meet the Press'', ''NBC Nightly News'', and MSNBC began to rebound. But this was offset by Lack's decision to hire former Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly, who was given a Sunday newsmagazine show and a special hour of ''Today'' -- both of which tanked in the ratings. Kelly herself was fired after a year when she made offensive comments [[https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/23/media/megyn-kelly-blackface/index.html defending blackface]]. |
| 307 | ** In 2016-17, NBC was accused of sitting on two bombshell stories related to sexual assault. First, ''The Washington Post'' scooped NBC on an infamous audiotape of then-presidential candidate Creator/DonaldTrump behind the scenes on NBC's syndicated show ''Access Hollywood'', bragging about being able to sexually assault women and get away with it; this led to the firing of ''Today'' co-anchor Billy Bush. Then, Farrow wrote a ''New Yorker'' story detailing decades of sexual abuse by producer Harvey Weinstein, with Farrow and his former NBC producer eventually alleging that [[ExecutiveMeddling top-level NBC executives conspired with Weinstein's camp to kill the story]], necessitating them taking it to ''The New Yorker'' to publish. |
| 308 | ** The sexual abuse angle got even worse when -- as part of a cascade of revelations about media figures following the Weinstein story -- Matt Lauer was suddenly fired after twenty years of co-hosting ''Today'' after several accounts of sexual misconduct by former female subordinates. In 2019, Farrow released a book in which a former NBC employee alleged that Lauer had raped her in his hotel room; that senior NBC executives, including Lack, had tried to downplay/discredit her story before Lauer was fired; and that Weinstein's camp had knowledge of Lauer's misconduct and used that as leverage to kill Farrow's story. Lack would ultimately get the boot in May 2020 as part of corporate restructuring at Creator/NBCUniversal. |
| 309 | * The 1968-73 [[Creator/{{ITV}} Granada Television]] sitcom ''Nearest and Dearest'' starred Jimmy Jewel and Hylda Baker as Eli and Nellie Pledge, a pair of bickering siblings who inherit their late father's pickle business. Even at the time, it was widely known that the enmity between the characters didn't so much spill as flood into Jewel and Baker's offscreen relationship, which has been described as [[HostilityOnTheSet one of the most toxic in British sitcom history]]. |
| 310 | ** The series was originally conceived by writers Harry Driver and Vince Powell as a vehicle for their friend and regular collaborator Jewel, with Nellie envisioned as a supporting character. However, during rehearsals for the third episode, which involved Eli PlayingSick while Nellie keeps the factory running, Baker complained that she was "in and out ... like a fart in a colander" and demanded a bigger share of the funny lines. Jewel's opinion of Baker permanently soured as a result, as he had been hoping the series would allow him to emerge from the shadow of his 32 years as part of a double act with his cousin Ben Warriss. Baker had likewise made her name as part of a more unconventional double act (her partner, "Big Cynthia", was played by various men in drag and never said a word during their routines) and was looking to strike out on her own. Instead, they found themselves becoming another double act. |
| 311 | ** The friction got worse during the first studio recording. When Baker realised that Jewel got the last laugh of the episode, she ordered the recording halted (to the confusion of the audience) and summoned Powell and Driver backstage to re-write the scene so that she and Jewel shared the final laugh. Baker further angered Jewel by insisting that aspects of her stage persona, particularly her {{Malaproper}} nature, be woven into the character of Nellie to generate more laughs. |
| 312 | ** Recordings soon deteriorated into constant attempts by Jewel and Baker to upstage or undermine each other, each convinced ''they'' were the true star of the show. If Baker found herself in the background of a scene focusing on Jewel, she would improvise visual gags to draw audience attention to herself. Jewel retaliated by sabotaging the cue cards Baker used to remember her more complicated, malapropism-laden lines; in one episode in which Eli brings home two portions of fish and chips, Baker's lines were written on the newspaper used to wrap Nellie's supper, but Jewel swapped the props before setting them on the table. Baker simply snapped "Wrong fish and chips!" when she discovered the sabotage and swapped them back, puzzling the audience but allowing the scene to continue. |
| 313 | ** After four series, ''Nearest and Dearest'' was adapted for the stage for a summer 1970 run in Blackpool. On the first day of the trial run in Bristol, Vince Powell found Baker standing on a chair outside the theatre with a tape measure, double checking that her name was at least as high as Jewel's on the poster. When told by Powell and the show's director that Jewel would begin the traditional closing speech to the audience on behalf of the company while Baker would finish it, an incensed Baker said that ''she'' was the star and ''she'' should begin the speech; unfortunately for Powell and the director, Jewel heard them through his dressing room wall and threatened to quit the show if they gave in to her. They were instead left to their own devices - and surprised the crew on opening night by cordially delivering the final speech with Jewel opening and Baker closing. However, during the ensuing celebratory dinner, a drunk Baker claimed that the show was only destined to be a hit because she had substantially re-written it, sparking another argument with Jewel. |
| 314 | ** Things got even worse when the stage show transferred to Blackpool. Baker arrived first and promptly claimed the best dressing room; Jewel insisted that ''he'' was the star, so ''he'' should get the best dressing room, forcing the theatre to create an identical dressing room for him. They studiously avoided each other unless absolutely necessary, and each turned on crew members whom they suspected of siding with the other. Their sabotage on stage escalated to cruel levels, with Jewel deliberately performing music hall routines behind Baker to drown out her lines with audience laughter, or stepping to the front of the stage to draw attention to blown lines; soon, they were more focused on knocking each other off balance with improvised lines or bits of physical comedy than on following the script, to the point that whole performances would go off the rails. Surprisingly, the spite-fuelled ad libs were accepted as AllPartOfTheShow, and the stage show was a success with both critics and audiences. |
| 315 | ** As such, Jewel and Baker went back into the studio to make a fifth series for TV, by which time they refused to speak to each other except through third parties and refused to look at each other unless the cameras were rolling. The rest of the cast and crew lived in fear of being perceived to take sides and sparking one or the other of the two stars to walk out. When Granada announced a sixth series, Baker gave an interview in which she declared herself the true star of ''Nearest and Dearest'' and claimed that she was pressing Jewel to be replaced by her stage co-star, Ken Platt. However, Jewel needed the money, so he signed on for the new series, and the Granada executives made it clear to Baker that the series would only continue with Jewel as Eli. |
| 316 | ** Unfortunately, Baker's trouble remembering her lines (now believed to be an early symptom of dementia, with which she was formally diagnosed in the 1980s) was getting ever worse, slowing down the pace of rehearsals and necessitating frequent retakes and creative distribution of cue cards during recordings, all to the negligible patience of Jewel, who finished each recording by storming off the set, shouting about how unprofessional and impossible to work with Baker had become. |
| 317 | ** But as the series was still drawing significant audiences, it was [[TheMovie adapted for the big screen]] by [[Film/HammerHorror Hammer Film Productions]] in 1972. Norman Mitchell, cast as Nellie's love interest, got an immediate taste of what he was in for on the first day; when he introduced himself to Baker and said he hadn't yet met Jewel, she sarcastically told him "You've got a big treat coming!", while when he introduced himself to Jewel and said he had already filmed a scene with Baker, Jewel asked if she had killed his laughs. Surprisingly, Mitchell was able to get on with both performers, keeping the production on track even as Jewel and Baker themselves only communicated through director John Robins, and the film, like the stage show, was a modest success with critics and a box office hit. |
| 318 | ** And so Granada ordered a seventh series, but with both leads lining up projects at other ITV affiliates, it was announced as the last series. Baker organised an end-of-series party at the Midland Hotel in Manchester after the final episode aired in February 1973, but it was sparsely attended, as most of the cast and crew were so burned out by the five-year battle between Jewel and Baker that they just wanted to move on. The two actors never saw or spoke to each other again. |
| 319 | * Venezuelan screenwriter Ibsen Martinez was infamous for having walked off the production of his soap ''Por Estas Calles'' in the mid-nineties because of intense ExecutiveMeddling. After two decades away from TV, he wanted to have a return to form by penning ''Nora'', a co-production between Televen, Telemundo, and Cadena Tres, but after all the trouble behind the scenes, he should have walked off this one too. |
| 320 | ** The trouble began even before filming. The soap was originally promoted under the name ''Nora la emprendedora'' ("Nora The Enterprising"), but it was changed because they realized it was ripe for joking/being confused with ''[[WesternAnimation/DoraTheExplorer Dora la exploradora]]''. It was announced around 2011, but production didn't fully begin until October 2013 because there was no national network willing to finance or broadcast the program, due to both Martinez's fame and Venezuela's economic situation. |
| 321 | ** The main actress, Colombian Carla Giraldo, was very temperamental and didn't get along with most of the Venezuelan production staff and cast, but to her merit, she tried to be professional and amiable during promotional stints. Still, there was enough of the drama leaking that Martinez felt forced to give a press release declaring that no, he wasn't going to walk off ''this'' soap, and yes, there were problems but they were working on them. |
| 322 | ** The troubles with Giraldo increased when she was revealed to be pregnant during the production, so filming had to be rushed to get all her scenes in before the pregnancy showed too much. By the time she went on maternity leave they had advanced so much into filming, the production decided to film the rest of the soap before premiering because why not, conveniently forgetting that the last time someone in the country filmed a soap fully,[[note]]''De Oro Puro'' by RCTV in 1995, coincidentally the soap that followed Martínez's previous work.[[/note]] the resultant product bombed in the ratings. |
| 323 | ** Complicating matters were the famous protests of early 2014 in Caracas, where the soap was filming, which greatly disrupted the filming schedule as many of the protests were on the roads midway between the studios and the homes of the cast and crew. |
| 324 | ** Because Giraldo went back to her country to give birth and then decided not to come back to finish filming, Martinez was forced to rewrite the plot to get Nora out of the story and reform a villainesque character into a suitable love interest for the male protagonist. |
| 325 | ** The soap finally premiered in September 2014, to tepid reception, mixed critics, and low ratings. |
| 326 | [[/folder]] |
| 327 | |
| 328 | [[folder:O]] |
| 329 | * ''Series/OnlyFoolsAndHorses''' 1986 Christmas Special "[[Recap/OnlyFoolsAndHorsesS5E07ARoyalFlush A Royal Flush]]" had a very troubled production: |
| 330 | ** Creator/DavidJason, Creator/NicholasLyndhurst, and Buster Merryfield left production in Dorset to make an appearance at the Royal Variety Performance, putting the episode behind schedule. Jason lost his voice and needed three days off to get it back. This was the only time Jason ever called in sick on an episode of the show. As soon as he recovered, Lyndhurst came down with the flu, throwing the production into a panic. |
| 331 | ** There was no more time for edits so it couldn't be played before a studio or live audience, leaving the episode with no laughter track and no music. It got so close to the deadline that the final scene was nearly broadcast live on Christmas Day, 1986, a nerve-wracking prospect, what with performing the scene to 19 million viewers, and would have wrecked the cast's Christmas plans. Whenever anyone asked questions during the production chaos, the answer they got was "Fuck knows!" |
| 332 | ** It was finished at the very last minute with editing continuing into the early hours of Christmas morning. Jason likened it to Santa's elves on amphetamines to get the episode finished on time. In the end, he thought it was patchy, but he was not surprised, just relieved it got made. |
| 333 | ** When the episode aired, it got widely negative reactions which would have long-term repercussions for the series. The following year's Christmas Special, "[[Recap/OnlyFoolsAndHorsesS5E08TheFrogsLegacy The Frog's Legacy]]" ended up being written as a [[SeriesFauxnale potential finale]] due to concerns that the show was running out of steam, and while the decision was made to carry on, the show got a major ReTool. Most of the cast and crew would go on to consider "A Royal Flush" to be the show's worst episode, with series creator John Sullivan openly admitting in a 2003 interview that writing the episode was his biggest regret about his time on the show. |
| 334 | * ''Series/OurFriendsInTheNorth'' spent a decade languishing in DevelopmentHell, largely because certain characters were based on real people. Then the first episode had to be completely reshot and rewritten after the original director left. In addition, Creator/MalcolmMcDowell's scenes had to be shot in one continuous block due to his limited availability and because he lived in UsefulNotes/{{America}} and rarely did television. |
| 335 | * ''Our Little Genius'', a game show featuring child prodigy contestants, was yanked days before airing and never spoken about again. Eight episodes were filmed, but executive producer Creator/MarkBurnett asked Creator/{{Fox}} to postpone them upon getting "information" from his staff. While this was never officially clarified, audience members eventually came forward with what went on during the tapings. The show allowed some contestants to try again after missing questions on the first tier, blaming the events on "technical difficulties". Then, an FCC complaint alleged that a staffer gave a contestant what he "needed to know" for a subject he wasn't sure about. Yes, you read that correctly--this show tested the powers that be 50 years after the quiz show scandals. Burnett in light of this shelved the episodes for good yet still paid the contestants their undisclosed winnings. Somehow, no one involved in producing this travesty ever had their careers tarnished. |
| 336 | [[/folder]] |
| 337 | |
| 338 | [[folder:P]] |
| 339 | * Various crew members on ''Series/PersonOfInterest'' revealed to the ''Podcast/QAnonAnonymous'' podcast that Creator/JimCaviezel caused a ''lot'' of HostilityOnTheSet, leading to a lot of changes just to accommodate him. |
| 340 | ** Caviezel behaved recklessly, often going off-script and manhandling others without prior warning, causing injuries to quite a few guest stars and stunt performers. Production had to switch to non-firing prop guns because he misused blank-firing guns so much; action scenes with gunplay usually had his character, John Reese, wearing a balaclava to allow a stunt double to take over. Even worse, Caviezel was banned from driving on set after blowing through a red light and nearly killing four pedestrians not associated with the production -- not during an action scene, but in a scene where Reese was driving out of a parking garage. |
| 341 | ** Caviezel envisioned Reese as a lot more aggressive and violent than he really was. He kept begging to have Reese torture or kill people, even though that was against his character, and he justified the red light incident by claiming it's what Reese would have done. |
| 342 | ** The dog Bear (portrayed by Graubaer's Boker) ended up replaced because Caviezel kept pulling on the dog's leash against all warnings, causing Boker to [[TheDogBitesBack bite him]]. (Graubaer's Boker is a Belgian malinois, a highly intelligent breed trained to stay calm and focused in high-stress situations, which should indicate just how poorly he was being treated.) As a result, Bear was paired more with Finch and Shaw in later seasons. |
| 343 | ** Caviezel flaunted his conservative views constantly, leading to frustrations. He refused to have Reese enter a relationship with Joss Carter because he was against interracial relationships (which offended her actress Creator/TarajiPHenson so much that she left the show and made them kill off Carter entirely), and only did a scene where Reese protects a same-sex couple because someone convinced him that "it's what the firefighters on [=9/11=] would do". Crew members were often cornered with passionate right-wing rants with no room to leave, a practice the crew called "getting sucked into the Cavortex". He also spoke positively of UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler unprompted so often that his agent had to tell him to cut it out. |
| 344 | ** Finally, Caviezel rarely remembered his lines (while claiming, almost certainly truthfully, that he'd sustained a brain injury - he was [[https://www.cheatsheet.com/entertainment/jim-caviezel-struck-lightning-filming-the-passion-of-the-christ.html/ struck by lightning]] while filming ''Film/ThePassionOfTheChrist'', although he would sometimes tell different stories about where the injury originated) and demanded constant cue cards around the set to prompt him, even if it was a single word (some of the crew even recalled an incident when he actually got through a scene with no issues, only for them to learn he had taped a cue card to the face of his scene partner since they never faced the camera). A lot of the time, production had to just move on from a scene due to time constraints, requiring editors to carefully splice various takes together to create a coherent performance; and writers eventually learned how to write Reese around Caviezel, with short sentences, simple words, and no TechnoBabble. |
| 345 | * ''Phyllis'', a spin-off of ''Series/TheMaryTylerMooreShow'' starring Creator/ClorisLeachman as Mary Richards' landlady Phyllis Lindstrom, already had a problematic premise since Phyllis was written as somewhat [[UnsympatheticComedyProtagonist unsympathetic]] and a minor antagonist to Mary in the parent series, but it was also cursed by insanely [[BornUnlucky bad luck]]. Barbara Colby, who played the owner of the photographic studio that Phyllis worked at, was randomly shot and killed on the streets of UsefulNotes/LosAngeles after the third episode had been filmed. They [[TheOtherDarrin recast her part]] quickly (with Liz Torres now assuming the role), but they couldn't really get a rhythm going for the work scenes without Colby (who had [[EnsembleDarkhorse genuine comic talents]]), so they [[{{Retool}} scrapped]] the work scenario. They also consequently [[PutOnABus fired]] Richard Schaal, who played a well-meaning but [[BumblingSidekick bumbling]] photographer at the studio. At the start of the second season, Phyllis was [[NewJobAsThePlotDemands instead working]] for the city of UsefulNotes/SanFrancisco. The scenes with Phyllis at home with Judith Lowry (who played Sally "Mother" Dexter, mother of Phyllis' late husband's stepfather) were hilarious, and Jane Rose (who played Phyllis' mother-in-law Audrey Dexter) had a marvelous sense of comic timing, but both women were [[{{Elders}} very old]], and Lowry died at the end of the second season at the age of 86. Not only that, but Burt Mustin, whose character, Arthur Lanson, married Mother Dexter, also died within a month of the airing of their wedding, at the age of 92. Soon after, Jane Rose was diagnosed with terminal cancer,[[note]] She died two years later, but continued working to the very end, even making a guest appearance in fellow ''Mary Tyler Moore'' spin-off ''Series/{{Rhoda}}''[='=]s final (half-)season in 1978.[[/note]] so they decided to pack the show in even though it was still drawing respectable audience figures;[[note]]For the first season, the show ranked #6, but in the second year it dropped to #40.[[/note]] coincidentally, the final episode of ''Phyllis'' aired the same week as the series finale of ''Series/TheMaryTylerMooreShow'', in which Leachman made a guest appearance. |
| 346 | * ''Series/PinkLadyAndJeff'' owes its reputation as the [[GenreKiller death blow]] to the American VarietyShow in large part to this trope: |
| 347 | ** Pink Lady's "Kiss Me in the Dark" had been a ''very'' minor hit in the UsefulNotes/{{US}} during 1979, but it had cracked the Top 40 all the same, a rare accomplishment for any Japanese act. So, Creator/{{NBC}} president Fred Silverman, on the lookout for fresh ideas to boost the network's sagging fortunes, thought a show built around the duo might be worth a shot. He nixed the producer's original concept for something really weird and asked for "something like ''Music/SonnyAndCher''". [[Creator/SidAndMartyKrofftProductions Sid and Marty Krofft]] were assigned to make it work. |
| 348 | ** Only after Pink Lady was signed to do the show in the spring of 1980 did NBC learn that neither of the singers, Mie and Kei, spoke English very well. Either nobody had asked, or their fluency had been greatly overrepresented, depending on who tells the story. This meant that they had to learn their lines phonetically and would make late rewrites impossible... like one show that Creator/LorneGreene agreed to be on only four hours before air time. |
| 349 | ** To offset this, NBC hired comedian Jeff Altman to sort of co-host the show. In actuality, he wound up carrying it due to the stars' linguistic limitations. This led to strife between him, the network, and Pink Lady's management. Altman wanted the show to have his name in the title; Pink Lady's manager refused. NBC compromised, promoting the show in print ads and on-air promos as ''Pink Lady & Jeff'', but the show's credits always only read ''Pink Lady''. |
| 350 | ** NBC went to great lengths to get name guest stars and musical guests. Sometimes Pink Lady didn't even appear in any sketches at all. They sang, but NBC insisted they only sing English-language songs familiar to an American audience. Again this involved a considerable stretch on their part, as their familiarity with English, bad as it was, was much better than their familiarity with the songs they were asked to perform. |
| 351 | ** The writers tried to work around Pink Lady's limitations, by making most of the sketches they ''were'' in rely on their unfamiliarity with American culture. But then NBC decided that wasn't good enough ... that the writers needed to write the two women as distinct personalities. Not only was this extremely difficult given the aforementioned language problems, it went against Mie and Kei's philosophy that the two of them ''not'' be seen that way. |
| 352 | ** The first show ended with a tuxedo-clad Altman being pulled into a hot tub where Mie and Kei were already lounging. Altman thought this was funny ... once. It soon became a RunningGag that [[EveryEpisodeEnding ended every episode]], and he hated it. However, it was kept because it allowed the show to show Mie and Kei [[{{Fanservice}} in bikinis]]. That, and other risque bits in the show, drew the ire of the sort of MoralGuardians who would later, motivated in part by seeing such things taking over broadcast TV, help sweep Creator/RonaldReagan into the White House later that year. |
| 353 | ** After five episodes, NBC pulled the plug. The format wasn't the only casualty, however ... Pink Lady had had to take so much time away from UsefulNotes/{{Japan}} and touring there that they lost a lot of their audience.[[note]]It didn't help they had previously turned down an appearance on the ''Kouhaku Uta Gassen'', an annual New Year's Eve variety special which is usually coveted by Japanese musical acts, in order to do their own special, which was a ratings bomb. And that the band's managers had exploited students from a school for the blind to promote said special. And that Kei was having a highly publicized affair with actor Goro Noguchi.[[/note]] Later that year they broke up and wouldn't reform for several years. |
| 354 | * ''Series/{{Pitfall}}'', a short-lived game show hosted by Creator/AlexTrebek. The parent company, Catalena Productions, had trouble paying contestants their winnings and stiffed Alex on his salary. Until his death in November 2020, he had the bounced check from Catalena framed in his living room, as a stark reminder of how his fellow Canadians shafted him. |
| 355 | * Once he became executive producer of ''Series/ThePriceIsRight'' in 1988, host Creator/BobBarker was often at odds with the models, having fired six of them for various reasons. All six of them sued him for sexual harassment. He also barred longtime announcer Rod Roddy from appearing on-camera towards the end of his in the early 2000s due to a salary dispute, which led to Creator/FremantleMedia [[LyingCreator covering up]] by saying that they'd enacted a policy to keep announcers from appearing on camera… even though only a few years later, his successor Rich Fields began appearing on-camera regularly. Barker also placed an embargo on any {{Rerun}} on which a fur coat or other animal-derived prize was offered, thus meaning that the very first episode from [[LongRunners September 1972]] is among many that [[KeepCirculatingTheTapes may never be rerun]]. |
| 356 | ** The very first telecast of ''Price'' on November 26, 1956, was riddled with problems. The tote screens on the contestants' panel desk would malfunction (as they would occasionally on the series' run--the models had to use giant sketch pads to write down the contestants' bids) and then as the turntable spun around, Bill Cullen's mic cord nearly strangled him. Creator/{{NBC}} wanted to buy out the show's contract and cancel it then and there, but creator Bob Stewart asked for a leap of faith--13 weeks, and if the show didn't get the ratings then NBC could cancel it. The leap of faith paid off: ''Price'' found its following and was beating Creator/{{CBS}}'s ''Arthur Godfrey Time'' at the 11 AM (ET) time period. |
| 357 | * ''Series/ThePrisoner1967'' has an off-screen history that is almost as convoluted and paranoia-filled as the actual show. The co-creators of the series, Creator/PatrickMcGoohan, and screenwriter George Markstein, almost immediately began to clash over what the series should be. George Markstein has gone on record stating that his idea for the series came about while [=McGoohan=] was making the [[SpyFiction spy thriller series]] ''Series/DangerMan'' and that the premise would be what would happen if [=McGoohan's=] character, John Drake, resigned and was sent to a special resort-type prison similar to a kind used to crack POW's in UsefulNotes/WorldWarII. [=McGoohan=] on the other hand maintains that the two characters are different and that the two shows are completely independent. Beyond the question of the central character's identity, it seems that Markstein wanted to keep the series rooted in the espionage genre, with Number Six's character as a spy imprisoned by (probably) his own side because he knew too much, while [=McGoohan=] saw the show from the start as a much more abstract surreal allegory about the relationship between the individual and society. It is likely that both creators went into the project with their own notions of what the "truth" was, and both interpretations influenced the writing and the acting. Beyond the characterization, many of the details of who created what and when were contested between [=McGoohan=] and Markstein, with the preponderance of the evidence supporting [=McGoohan=], but not completely invalidating Markstein's claims nor his influences in writing the series. Once [=McGoohan=] won his power struggle with Markstein and the show started to get seriously freaky, ExecutiveMeddling made things even more troubled. There are even conflicting claims from all concerned about how many episodes were originally planned, and whether the show was cancelled prematurely or not. Certainly, there are reports from many actors and crew members that the final episode, "[[Recap/ThePrisonerE17FallOut Fall Out]]", was made in completely chaotic circumstances, with [=McGoohan=] still working on the script during recording breaks, Kenneth Griffith (who played the President) being asked to write his own dialogue, and as much of the production as possible having to be recycled from previous episodes. |
| 358 | [[/folder]] |
| 359 | |
| 360 | [[folder:R]] |
| 361 | * ''Series/HighlanderTheSeries'' had its own spin-off: ''[[Series/HighlanderTheRaven The Raven]]''. The show went through a lot of mutations, beginning as an unrelated script and eventually settling on a DistaffCounterpart played by one of ''Highlander''[='=]s supporting characters (Amanda Darieux, played by Creator/ElizabethGracen). A combination of pressure from the producers (Creator/AdrianPaul was in a hurry to leave), poor casting choices, a healthy dollop of MoodWhiplash, and a lack of direction marred the project. In the DVD featurette, the creative genesis of ''Raven'' is a fog: No one had an idea where to take Gracen's greedy thief, a strange fit for a selfless heroine. Problems mounted as antagonism grew between the two leads: Gracen had gotten involved with a French "Ambassador" who later turned out to be a fantasist (and a bad boyfriend, to boot) and convinced her that she had become a target in the [[UsefulNotes/BillClinton Monica Lewinsky]] scandal and that her co-workers were all UsefulNotes/{{CIA}} spies. And that's not even addressing the music composer who spent his days hitting bars instead of working, foreign investors who insisted on a LighterAndSofter tone for a series about lopping off heads, etc. The series wrapped up after 21 episodes, with a cliffhanger no less. |
| 362 | -->'''Bill Panzer (Executive Producer)''': I will take my share of the blame. [[DeadpanSnarker I hope there are others]] who will stand up next to me. |
| 363 | ** The producers might have known something was up when Gracen came in to audition: her black hair had been cropped and dyed white, making her look like a Music/{{Eurythmics}}-era Annie Lennox. No one thought twice about it, thinking it would be a good look for the character. (In actuality, Gracen had been disguising herself to elude the CIA.) |
| 364 | * ''Series/ReBootTheGuardianCode'' suffered a massive case of this, according to [[https://www.google.ca/amp/s/amp.reddit.com/r/ReBoot/comments/7zu164/possible_rainmaker_insider_sheds_light_on_reboot/ an insider report]] that was leaked just before the ten-episode first "season" premiered on Creator/{{Netflix}}. |
| 365 | ** Pre-production on the show began in 2013, when Rainmaker Entertainment CEO Michael Hefferon announced that his company wanted to create a sequel to the [[WesternAnimation/{{Reboot}} original cartoon series]] that took place 20 years afterwards and showed how technology and the world had changed in the interim, noting that the original characters would be limited to cameo appearances. According to the insider account, Rainmaker (which had achieved great success with shows like ''WesternAnimation/BeastWars'', numerous DirectToVideo ''Franchise/{{Barbie}}'' films, and other associated projects) decided that they wanted to create the first CG-rendered show on television made using the Unreal Engine. In actuality, ''Series/{{Lazytown}}'' was the first series to utilize the Unreal Engine -- albeit an older version of it -- a fact that seemingly went unnoticed by the team, but despite this, the team was allegedly told by Hefferon to continue promoting the show as if this fact were true. |
| 366 | ** Despite his need to render the show in the Unreal Engine, Hefferon hired a programmer who was allegedly unfamiliar with the software and struggled to render graphics, along with a rotating series of art directors who quit due to behind-the-scenes problems. The struggles can be seen in the finished product, where most of the backgrounds and environments are based on static concept art. Additionally, programmer reportedly assured Hefferon that lighting would be handled by Unreal Engine's internal shaders; this didn't work, and the production was forced to hastily hire lighting artists out of post-secondary institutions once it became clear that the lighting in the first few episodes were much darker than normal. |
| 367 | ** According to the leaker, Hefferon [[ExecutiveMeddling meddled]] in the production process and treated it as his own personal passion project, leading him to integrate ideas and suggestions despite the rest of the team's reluctance. Hefferon reportedly brought his young son into meetings to give story notes, and himself admitted that he hadn't seen much more than a couple episodes of the first season of the original cartoon. |
| 368 | ** Production seemingly went [[https://www.rebootrevival.com/?p=2251 silent for months]], with fans speculating that the show may have been put on hold and retooled in response to a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8B5dqjsZUs disastrous reveal trailer]] in early 2017. Social media feeds (including the project's Facebook page) also inexplicably went offline for most of February 2018, with the only reason given by the production staff being it was done to "upgrade" the page. The show premiered to mixed-to-negative reviews, with the final episode of the season's first half ("Mainframe Mayhem") receiving significant backlash for including a TakeThatAudience in the form of a [[BasementDweller basement-dwelling fanboy]] who is obsessed with the original cartoon ([[ShowWithinAShow which exists as an actual program in this continuity]]), seemingly in response to fans who complained about the show. |
| 369 | * ''Series/TheRedGreenShow'': |
| 370 | ** In season one, the production crew was only given a very limited amount of studio time and they had to do some marathon shooting sessions to film everything. Steve Smith (Red) praised Patrick [=McKenna=] (Harold) for his ability to go through all that material. [=McKenna=] himself [[DisabilitySuperpower credited his Attention Deficit Disorder]], which he said allowed him to give laserlike focus to each script for a short time. He would lose mental interest in a script after it had been shot, and by then he was eager to start on the next one. |
| 371 | ** In season two, Smith repeatedly butted heads with CHCH-TV executives who demanded that the show be more like a sitcom. [[ShaggyDogStory Then the same executives who forced Smith to change the show cancelled it anyway.]] Notably, [[CreatorBacklash this is Smith's least favourite season of the show and one he nearly kept off the DVD releases.]] |
| 372 | ** Season three only happened when the show was UnCanceled due to a wave of fan protest. Even then, Smith had to find another home for the show after that season. |
| 373 | ** In season four, Smith made a deal with Creator/GlobalTelevisionNetwork for them to air the show, but they wouldn't finance it. Smith & Smith Productions had to buy its own time slots on Global. They had to scramble to find additional funding to meet the show's budget, and even then Smith had to take a second mortgage on his house to cover it. |
| 374 | ** Fortunately, Global was so impressed by Smith & Smith's efforts, and the show's rapidly increasing popularity in the United States due to airing on PBS, [[EarnYourHappyEnding that they agreed to finance seasons five and six.]] (The show would later move to the Creator/{{CBC}} for seasons seven through nine.) |
| 375 | * On its first day of airing, PAX (now Creator/IonTelevision) had a movie-based quiz show called ''The Reel to Reel Picture Show'', hosted by [[Series/TheHollywoodSquares Peter Marshall]]. 200 episodes were ordered, but only 25 were made before the production company went bankrupt. Peter, the celebrity guests, and the staff never got paid, and many contestants didn't receive their prizes. |
| 376 | * During the final dress rehearsal on Creator/{{Fox}}'s 2019 TV production of ''Theatre/{{Rent}}: Live'', actor Brennin Hunt, who played Roger, badly injured his ankle and couldn't perform for the live show. This might not have been a problem... if Hunt had had an understudy. [[NoPlansNoPrototypeNoBackup Which he didn't.]] This left Fox scrambling to find a way to get their heavily-hyped live musical production on the air, ultimately resorting to pre-taped footage from the dress rehearsal -- which was filmed without anybody expecting it to actually be aired on TV, with bad sound mixing, a live audience that was cheering like they were at a rock concert rather than a musical, and actors who were singing more quietly than normal in order to save their voices for the live show. [[https://www.vox.com/2019/1/28/18200484/rent-live-review-pretaped-original-cast Audiences were not happy,]] and the show met a scathing response. The worst part? Hunt ''was'' able to perform for the live portions that they did air, albeit while in a wheelchair, making people wonder why they didn't just air that. |
| 377 | ** In addition, original cast members were brought out for the final number, with Creator/JesseLMartin visibly suffering the effects of a back injury which had also caused him to be sent offscreen for much of the current season of ''Series/TheFlash2014''. |
| 378 | * Season 2 of ''Series/{{Riverdale}}'' got some bad buzz before it even started when Creator/KJApa fell asleep while driving home from filming and crashed into a pole, causing some controversy over the long hours the younger actors were being put through, including an anonymous source outright saying "Someone is going to die." Luckily things didn't get that far, but the season still suffered the loss of several cast members which forced some very contrived writing decisions. Most damagingly, they lost the actor for the character planned to be revealed as TheDragon in the season finale, and rather than alter their plans, we were treated to a quite amusingly pathetic attempt to wrap the story up without him ever appearing onscreen, including news of his death in a massive shootout. Luckily, they were able to negotiate his return for a single episode the following season to give the story proper closure. |
| 379 | ** Season 3 was sent into chaos with Creator/LukePerry's sudden death from a stroke, with three episodes remaining to be filmed with very little time to figure out how to deal with Fred's absence. Ultimately Creator/MollyRingwald was brought back to reprise her role as Fred's ex-wife and fill his intended role in the episodes (with just a single line vaguely saying Fred is "away," a big sign of just how quickly this had to be thrown together), and the following season was promoted to a series regular despite initially only signing on for a very occasional recurring role. |
| 380 | * The third series of ''Series/RobotWars'' was seriously affected by an incident where a robot was dropped whilst being moved, causing its weapon to fire and stab a crew member in the leg. The ensuing investigation caused several side events to be scaled back or cancelled altogether, with the Pinball and Football tournaments being shorter than planned and events such as Tag Team and Sumo being completely dropped; many robots would never be seen on television as a result. The alternative weight classes' championships were also scrapped, save for the Middleweight tournament which was reduced to a single battle; this had the biggest impact as non-Heavyweight robots would never really take off again. The injury which caused all this was the culmination of a seriously lax attitude to health and safety, and although things improved the following series, it was too little too late for Rex Garrod (one of the most talented roboteers), who boycotted the show in response. |
| 381 | [[/folder]] |
| 382 | |
| 383 | [[folder:S]] |
| 384 | * ''Series/SamAndCat'' ran into [[http://www.deadline.com/2014/04/future-of-nickelodeon-series-sam-cat-in-limbo-amidst-behind-the-scenes-drama/ many problems]] during its short run. Spun off from two of Creator/{{Nickelodeon}}'s more popular shows, ''Series/{{iCarly}}'' and ''Series/{{Victorious}}'', and featuring two of their more popular stars, Creator/JennetteMcCurdy and Music/ArianaGrande, the show was a hit from the word go, despite controversy (namely the show resulting in the cancellation of several other shows on Nickelodeon's schedule). |
| 385 | ** The problems seemed to start when, instead of being renewed for a second season, the series had its ''first'' season episode order doubled from 20 to 40. This is an unheard-of number for a scripted show; most American series don't exceed 24 episodes a season, with cable shows often having far fewer. (Even in the 1950s, when it was not uncommon for series to have upwards of 30 episodes per season, this would have been unheard of.) This meant that the cast and crew didn't get a break from their schedule and also didn't get to possibly renegotiate contracts between seasons. |
| 386 | ** This grueling schedule put a strain on everybody, with [=McCurdy=] and Grande both reportedly ready to move on. Both stars began showing up late on set, and [=McCurdy=] did not appear at the Kids Choice Awards in 2014, saying point-blank on Website/{{Twitter}} the reason why was her treatment by Nickelodeon. There was also the ContractualPurity of being young adults working at the kid-friendly Nickelodeon; Grande's music career has taken off, and [=McCurdy=] was struggling with personal problems, including her mother's death in late 2013 and the leak of several racy (though not explicit) photos. |
| 387 | ** Amidst all of this, the show wasn't renewed for a second season and instead was placed on "permanent hiatus", with all crew members let go apart from post-production to finish the episodes already filmed. Nick then [[http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/nickelodeons-sam-cat-canceled-718195 officially cancelled]] the show. |
| 388 | ** Years later, [=McCurdy=] [[https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/03/books/jennette-mccurdy-memoir-mother.html revealed]] in her autobiography ''I'm Glad My Mom Died'' that she had been sexually abused during her time working at Nickelodeon. Specifically, she recounted being photographed in a bikini while she was underage during a wardrobe fitting by an intimidating man who she referred to as "the Creator", who also encouraged her to drink alcohol. While she didn't name who "the Creator" was, many people suspected that he was none other than Creator/DanSchneider, the ShowRunner of ''iCarly'' and ''Sam & Cat'' (among other Nickelodeon {{kid com}}s) who had long been the subject of rumors that he was a pedophile. [=McCurdy=] also said that her superiors prevented her from pursuing career opportunities outside of Nickelodeon, a restriction that did not seem to apply to Grande and her music career. TheLastStraw for [=McCurdy=] came when Grande told her that she had spent the previous night playing charades at Creator/TomHanks' house. According to [=McCurdy=], Nickelodeon offered her $300,000 to sign an agreement never to publicly speak about her experiences working there, an offer that [[ScrewTheMoneyIHaveRules she refused]]. |
| 389 | * This trope is why ''Series/SeaQuestDSV'' managed to last only three seasons[[note]]and to some of those involved, that was longer than they thought possible[[/note]]: |
| 390 | ** The first season went off generally smoothly, with the end segments where Robert Ballard, the show's technical advisor, explained the concepts behind the episode's plot. The 1993 earthquake ''did'' cause some production difficulties, but that's not really the show's fault. The show still had to hold its breath waiting to see if it got a second season, requiring a season finale that could have been read as destroying the ship if it hadn't. |
| 391 | ** In the second season NBC forced some cast changes to appeal to a younger audience, and the cast handled the end segments rather than Ballard. Production was relocated to UsefulNotes/{{Florida}}, costing the show Stacy Haiduk, who had spent most of the last five years there shooting ''Series/TheAdventuresOfSuperboy'' and did not want to go back so soon; Stephanie Beacham also reportedly was cool to moving to the Sunshine State but has said the tensions between the producers and the network were her main reason for not returning. |
| 392 | ** HostilityOnTheSet began to grow, not so much between the castmembers as between them and the producers (who already had their own issues with the network) as many began to dislike the directions their characters were taking—Ed Kerr was so upset with the storyline of "Alone" that he walked off the set and thus isn't in the episode despite being credited. Creator/RoyScheider, more professionally, stayed on the set but, increasingly dismayed by the more fanciful, less realistic plot lines that had been the show's attempted selling point during its first season, culminating in a season finale where the ''seaQuest'' and its crew were abducted by aliens,[[note]]again, driven by the uncertainty the show would be renewed since it wouldn't have to be resolved[[/note]] asked out of the show for the next season. |
| 393 | ** Creator/MichaelIronside took his place[[note]]But only after making the producers agree that he wouldn't have to do certain storylines, like the sort that Scheider had increasingly blanched at[[/note]] in the next season,[[note]]Scheider agreed to appear in a few episodes[[/note]] which the producers attempted to shake up by having the ship returned to Earth [[TimeSkip ten years in the future]] and renaming it ''seaQuest 2032'', to better change the show's plots from the kind of sci-fi that had dominated the first two seasons to a DarkerAndEdgier background of international intrigue and conflict; the end-credit educational segments were dispensed with entirely. |
| 394 | ** This also brought with it more cast changes; however, no one, old or new, got any happier with the show's direction. NBC sensed that this was not going well and, after [[ScrewedByTheNetwork repeatedly pre-empting the show for sports broadcasts]] in the first half of the season, finally lowered the boom and announced the show had been canceled at midseason. The series finale aired six months later, after the end of the regular TV season. |
| 395 | * When ''Series/SexAndTheCity'' first debuted on Creator/{{HBO}} in 1998 it was a game changer. While Carrie, Samantha, Miranda, and Charlotte were best friends on-camera, [[https://nypost.com/2017/10/07/inside-the-mean-girls-culture-that-destroyed-sex-and-the-city/ a different story happened off-camera]]. |
| 396 | ** Creator/KimCattrall, who signed on as man-eater Samantha, was the biggest name among the cast in the beginning. She was a bonafide movie star, having headlined ''Film/{{Mannequin}}'' and ''Film/BigTroubleInLittleChina.'' According to a 2008 book proposal shopped by Clifford Streit, the real-life inspiration for the show's character Stanford Blatch, tensions on set began because Cattrall was "a natural comedienne, and a scene-stealer in the best possible sense — the camera went right to her." This was, it seems, a problem, given that Creator/SarahJessicaParker was playing the show's heroine, Carrie. |
| 397 | ** A clique began to form, leaving Cattrall out in the cold. Parker and Creator/CynthiaNixon (Miranda), who'd known each other since their days as preteen actresses on Broadway, gravitated toward each other and pretty quickly included co-star Creator/KristinDavis (Charlotte) in their group. For the first couple of years, Cattrall had a real ally on set in the form of series creator and producer Darren Star. But when he left after the second season and was replaced by Parker's friend Michael Patrick King, Cattrall was completely isolated.[[note]]Star and Cattrall have remained close, with him appearing at an event honoring her career in 2022, and gushing that he would ''love'' to have her guest star in ''Series/EmilyInParis''.[[/note]] Running up to the end of the series, there were stories filtering into the tabloids, such as the ''New York Post'' and ''Daily News'', on an almost weekly basis about the on-set tensions. By the end, no one would talk to Cattrall. |
| 398 | ** Cattrall reluctantly signed on for the first follow-up movie in 2007. Despite the tension, the movie was a hit — making $415 million worldwide. Producers, including Parker, were eager to replicate the financial boon and wanted to make a second movie as soon as possible, but Cattrall held back. Soon, gossip started circulating about her "diva demands." She eventually signed on, after demanding, and receiving, more money. Even with more money, by the time filming started, things were awkward. |
| 399 | ** Reports surfaced in the fall of 2017 that Cattrall wasn’t interested in participating in a ''Sex in the City 3'' movie. Citing unnamed sources, a ''[[UsefulNotes/BritishNewspapers Daily Mail]]'' "exclusive" blamed the botched sequel plans on Cattrall's "ridiculous demands." Cattrall categorically denied that, tweeting that she had made clear she didn’t want to do a third ''Sex and the City'' movie back in 2016. In a subsequent interview with Piers Morgan, Cattrall also said she and her co-stars had "never been friends," despite their on-screen bond. |
| 400 | ** Lest there was any shred of remaining doubt about Cattrall's feelings toward Parker, an Instagram post put the matter to rest after Cattrall's brother Chris died in February 2018. Parker had expressed sympathy for Cattrall's family at a red-carpet event, telling magazines that "we all send her our love and condolences" while, in the same interview, not ruling out the possibility of a third ''Sex and the City'' movie but without Cattrall. [[https://www.instagram.com/p/BfBIPebAmFX/?utm_source=ig_embed Cattrall fired back on Instagram]], "Your continuous reaching out is a painful reminder of how cruel you really were then and now. Let me make this VERY clear. (If I haven’t already) You are not my family. You are not my friend. So I'm writing to tell you one last time to stop exploiting our tragedy in order to restore your 'nice girl' persona." Cattrall would end up being notably absent when ''Series/AndJustLikeThat'' debuted on Creator/HBOMax in 2021. |
| 401 | ** ''And Just Like That...'' didn't escape its production unscathed either. Shortly after his character Mr. Big was [[SuddenSequelDeathSyndrome killed off]] on the show, four women came forward with allegations that Creator/ChrisNoth had sexually assaulted them. The scandal quickly threatened to [[FranchiseKiller end the franchise]], with discussions for a second season of ''AJLT'' reportedly being put on hold.[[note]]On a side note, Noth had filmed a non-integral cameo for the finale, and while the allegations played a role in the cameo being scrapped, the producers confirmed it wasn't the only reason.[[/note]] |
| 402 | * It's a wonder that "[[Recap/SherlockS01E01AStudyInPink A Study in Pink]]", the PilotEpisode of ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'', wasn't both the beginning ''and'' end of the series. |
| 403 | ** It was originally shot as a 60-minute one-off movie, supposedly at a cost of almost a million pounds. There were rumors the BBC was going to junk it, and they did... by asking Creator/MarkGatiss and Creator/StevenMoffat to turn it into a series pilot instead. But that required making it longer, and they didn't think they could maintain a consistent feel since they couldn't get their original cinematographer back. So ''they shot the whole thing over''. |
| 404 | ** The reshoot didn't go smoothly. It turned out to be during the coldest winter in Britain in 30 years, with many scenes taking place outdoors (and at night as well). Creator/BenedictCumberbatch came down with what he thought was just the flu but turned out to be potentially life-threatening pneumonia, for which he had to be hospitalized. Not to be outdone, Creator/MartinFreeman fell while getting out of his ride to the set one day and broke his wrist, requiring that his hand be placed in a cast between takes. |
| 405 | * Before there was ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'', there was the 1960s ''Franchise/SherlockHolmes'' series. |
| 406 | ** Creator/TheBBC's 1964 anthology series ''Detective'' included an adaptation of "The Speckled Band" starring Douglas Wilmer as Sherlock Holmes and Nigel Stock as Dr. Watson. The Conan Doyle estate granted the BBC the rights to adapt a further four Holmes stories in 1965, with an option to choose another eight from among those for which the rights were not already claimed. Wilmer, a huge Conan Doyle fan, jumped at the chance to play Holmes on a regular basis, but soon regretted the decision, later saying the writers ranged from "brilliant" to "deplorable". He found some of the scripts so poor that he re-wrote them himself, sometimes having to stay up until 2am to finish them before shooting began. The production also struggled with a tight schedule and an even tighter budget, precluding the possibility of any effects shots. |
| 407 | ** Despite the troubled production, the series drew audiences of 11 million, and in 1968, the BBC began planning a second series. Stock signed on as Watson, but Wilmer refused to return as Holmes when he was told the rehearsal schedule would be cut. After John Neville proved unavailable and Eric Porter was passed over, the producers cast Creator/PeterCushing, another Holmes enthusiast who had played the role once before (in Film/HammerHorror's 1959 film of ''Literature/TheHoundOfTheBaskervilles'')[[note]] It was Hammer's adaptation that prevented the BBC from acquiring the rights to the story during Wilmer's tenure as Holmes; the rights only became available in late 1965.[[/note]] and was delighted at the prospect of showing Holmes' darker side. Sadly, after shooting of the two-part adaptation of ''The Hound of the Baskervilles'' ran over schedule and over budget due to persistent rain during location shooting, the series once again fell victim to time and money problems. Plans for guest villains including Creator/SeanConnery, Creator/GeorgeSanders, Creator/PeterUstinov, and Creator/OrsonWelles had to be scrapped for financial reasons, while "The Dancing Men" was forced to air before final editing could be completed. Cushing enjoyed working with Stock, but was disgusted with his own performance and later told Wilmer that he would rather sweep Paddington station for a living than go through filming again. The series still drew audiences of 15.5 million, but plans for a third series based on ''The Exploits of Sherlock Holmes'' by Adrian Conan Doyle and Creator/JohnDicksonCarr were ultimately abandoned. |
| 408 | * Even the acclaimed Granada ''Series/SherlockHolmes'' series struggled to adapt ''Literature/TheHoundOfTheBaskervilles'' due to behind-the-scenes problems. |
| 409 | ** The excessive expenses involved in the production of "Silver Blaze" and "The Devil's Foot" having dried up the series' budget, producers Michael Cox and June Wyndham-Davies believed that this episode could provide two hours of entertainment at a lower cost than the last episodes initially planned, if it were to be turned into an economy. This austerity policy led to the suppression of captivating but costly sequences such as the one in which Holmes and Watson chased the spy following Sir Henry in London. Even worse, it led to the filming in the studio of scenes where the set is essential and which require space, such as the final attack of the monster, thus depriving us of the spectacle of the immense moor gradually invaded by an evil fog and especially of the exciting race of Holmes and Watson flying to Sir Henry's rescue. The financial shortage even forced director Brian Mills to reuse shreds of previous episodes that turned his film into a disconcerting patchwork. |
| 410 | ** Due to a lack of money, the intended director, John Madden, could not be hired. He was replaced by Brian Mills who failed to create a fantastic atmosphere that was truly engaging. |
| 411 | ** The Hell Hound, the stumbling block in many adaptations before the era of computer-generated images, was here only a Great Dane coated with phosphorescent material, unable to provoke the slightest shiver of fear. |
| 412 | ** Cox notes that there's a lot of mumbling by the actors, as if they lack confidence in what they're saying. |
| 413 | * ''{{Series/Sliders}}'' exemplifies the former [[Creator/{{Syfy}} Sci-Fi Channel]]'s penchant for [[ScrewedByTheNetwork production problems]], along with hubris and arrogance on the cast's part, despite it being the channel's top-rated program at the time. Simply put, ''everyone'' on the cast or crew got screwed over at one time or another: |
| 414 | ** The first two seasons were fraught with behind-the-scenes battles between the Creator/{{Fox}} network and the production team. Fox wanted more episodes that had a greater emphasis on action and less continuity (so they could show them in any order they wanted), even putting the show on hiatus after the ninth episode of Season 1. The production crew responded by forcing a cliffhanger at the end of said episode, to Fox's dismay. Later on, Fox canceled the series at the end of Season 2, and it was only saved by a massive fan campaign. |
| 415 | ** Fox brass continually hounded co-creator Tracy Tormé throughout his tenure on the show. They tried to derail his plan to resolve the first-season cliffhanger, his input in Season 3 was ignored by the production team when the series moved primary filming to UsefulNotes/LosAngeles, and he eventually left the show at the end of the third season. |
| 416 | ** Creator/JohnRhysDavies' controversial death in "Exodus" (via having his brains sucked out, being shot, and then left to die on an exploding planet) was caused by behind-the-scenes issues. Rhys-Davies allegedly insulted then-producer David Peckinpah (while drunk) at a party hosted by Fox brass when the series first began. Later on, when Peckinpah was promoted and gained control of the series, he used this leverage to convince the network to fire the actor (via the release of his episode contract) and gave him the fate he endured in the episode. |
| 417 | ** Creator/JerryOConnell was originally planned to star in several episodes of the fifth season but held up production for months while he tried to negotiate for an Executive Producer credit. While the network had already given him more perks than any of the other cast members, O'Connell wouldn't budge, and after hearing that his brother Charlie wouldn't be able to appear in all 18 episodes (as Charlie's character, Colin, was contingent on Jerry's character, Quinn), the brothers walked away from the table. Things got worse when the production team attempted to figure out a way to explain Quinn and Colin's absence from the show -- Jerry wouldn't give up the use of his image or voice from the prior seasons, meaning that the producers had to make do with a pair of stunt doubles and a voice that is clearly not O'Connell's. |
| 418 | ** Creator/KariWuhrer's presence on the show in the third season caused massive friction between herself and Creator/SabrinaLloyd. During a script reading, Wuhrer made snide comments about Sabrina's engagement to one of the crew members, which caused her to break down and cry in her trailer, thus holding up production for hours. David Peckinpah (who first approached Wuhrer to star on the show) used this incident to spread lies about Sabrina costing the network money and eventually told her point-blank that he would support Wuhrer and not her (prompting her to leave the series). Even worse, Peckinpah later twisted the knife by [[PutOnABusToHell condemning Lloyd's character, Wade, to being raped in a Kromagg breeding camp]] -- the only reason it didn't come off looking even worse is that the production staff led a WriterRevolt to change the plot to something more meaningful (via the introduction of the Humaggs). |
| 419 | ** Peckinpah himself was demoted to a consultant by the network out of spite because he had taken on a concurrent job as executive producer with another Creator/{{Universal}} production called ''Turks''. However, he often visited the ''Sliders'' set and ended up influencing the direction of the fifth season just as much as the previous ones. |
| 420 | ** While renewal rumors were still up in the air at the end of Season 5, Sci-Fi discovered that they didn't have the cash necessary to pay the actors' contracts for another season, and when fans emailed the company asking for information, Sci-Fi representatives emailed back that the show was cancelled because the actors wouldn't sign back on, conveniently ignoring the monetary issue. |
| 421 | * The short-lived musical drama series ''Series/{{Smash}}'' inspired [[http://www.buzzfeed.com/kateaurthur/how-smash-became-tvs-biggest-train-wreck a long article]] on ''Website/BuzzFeed'' shortly before the second-season premiere about how the show's first season was a, uh, ''smash'' in another sense, requiring a major {{Retool}}: |
| 422 | ** The concept seemed great at first. Playwright and screenwriter Theresa Rebeck, who'd been a co-producer of ''Series/NYPDBlue'', had long tried to sell the idea of a TV series built around putting on a Broadway show. No one was interested until Robert Greenblatt, who's apparently also a theater geek, took over at Creator/{{NBC}}. The network's lagging ratings and need for something different made it likely her show would be picked up. Then he got Creator/StevenSpielberg interested. The $7.5 million pilot episode wowed audiences at the 2011 upfronts and was set to premiere in midseason. |
| 423 | ** Then things went to hell. Since Rebeck had never run a TV show before, the network and the studio brought in David Marshall Grant, who had the relevant experience, to be her assistant showrunner. She reportedly resented the idea that she needed help, and immediately got paranoid, believing Grant was being set up to replace her eventually. Soon she was fighting regularly with not only him but the executives at the network ''and'' the studio. |
| 424 | ** Rebeck insisted on writing the next two episodes by herself. She also eschewed having a writers' room, preferring to work with the writers individually and then rewrite to her pleasure, a process that's worked on other shows. However, during that time, she and the other executives became preoccupied with fending off [[ExecutiveMeddling Spielberg's move to replace Megan Hilty]]. |
| 425 | ** They kept her, one of the few things that kept the show's quality up, but meanwhile the writing went off in weird directions. A subplot involving Julia's attempt to adopt a sister for her teenage son, Leo, began taking up a great deal of the show. It was kept in because [[RealitySubtext it mirrored a similar event in Rebeck's own life]], and the network executives knew how personal it was to her and said nothing. Ellis, villainous assistant to Julia's writing partner Tom, [[CreatorsPet somehow became a major character]] (because Spielberg loved him), as did Leo (whose actor, Emory Cohen, also survived an attempt to recast him). The writers couldn't give Julia any serious challenges to overcome [[AuthorAvatar because she was based on Rebeck herself]], and the showrunener portrayed her as heroic even when she began having an adulterous affair that cost the character any sympathy she might have gained. Since there was no writers' room, and one hand didn't know what the other was doing, important character moments wound up being glossed over in episode after episode, to the point that the term "hatewatching" was used when people tried to explain why they tuned in. |
| 426 | ** By the time the third episode was done it was obvious that the show was going the wrong way in a big hurry. Yet Rebeck wouldn't listen to ''anyone'' and refused to make any changes, no matter how long and loud they fought with her. Yet the executives, particularly Greenblatt, continued to involve themselves in even minor aspects of production, like the fabric for the Creator/MarilynMonroe costume. His suggestions were actually, according to the writers and crew, useful, to the point that they were hoping Rebeck gave in. "You know it's bad when ''[[NetworkToTheRescue our last hope was the network]]''," said one. |
| 427 | ** Spielberg was the only one supporting her after a while, and when the two executives from Creator/DreamWorksSKG who'd been keeping him from finding out how bad things had gotten on the show finally let him on it, Rebeck lost even that. Shortly after the show was renewed, she was fired... [[SecondSeasonDownfall and things went]] FromBadToWorse. Season 2's premiere drew a dismal audience of [[http://www.buzzfeed.com/kateaurthur/smash-horrible-ratings-for-the-premiere 4.5 million]]. NBC lost patience and [[http://tvline.com/2013/05/10/smash-cancelled-nbc/ axed the series]] at the end of the season. [[http://www.buzzfeed.com/kateaurthur/smash-creator-theresa-rebeck-emailed-me And don't think Rebeck didn't notice]]; she publicly branded the second season a "disaster". |
| 428 | ** Looking back, it's hard not to sense art imitating life in the storyline itself. As part of the Season 2 retool, the show's perspective was evenly split between a) ''Bombshell'', the massively-promoted (but unwieldy) Marilyn Monroe piece which, judging by the near-constant backstage strife, will finally debut some time around the heat death of the universe, and b) ''Playlist'', a hot off-Broadway property with a YoungerAndHipper bent and creative backing from the ex-star and ex-director of ''Bombshell'', both of whom were exiled. The ''Bombshell'' storyline was representative of Theresa Rebeck's camp; the ''Playlist'' half (where most of the show's improvements were) represented her network enemies. |
| 429 | * ''Series/SquarePegs:'' Contributing to the series' demise were an inexperienced ShowRunner who feuded with cast and crew, inconsistent writing, and rampant drug use. Read all about it [[http://www.avclub.com/article/behind-scenes-chaos-derailed-square-pegs-new-wave--213886 here]]. |
| 430 | * It's not surprising that ''Series/TheStarlost'' ended up as a major case of WhatCouldHaveBeen when you look at how things went behind the scenes: |
| 431 | ** Originally, it was pitched as a [[Creator/{{Fox}}[=-=][[Creator/TheBBC BBC]] co-production but rejected by the BBC. The producers were able to salvage it by selling Creator/{{NBC}} and the Canadian Creator/{{CTV}} network on it (albeit at a lower budget than originally hoped for). An early potential problem -- a writers' strike that was set to begin before Creator/HarlanEllison could finish the show's bible -- was averted when producer Robert Kline negotiated an exception with the Writers' Guild since the show was being produced in UsefulNotes/{{Canada}} to take advantage of tax credits available there. |
| 432 | ** The first serious problem was a SpecialEffectsFailure. A camera system Douglas Trumbull was developing called Magicam that would have allowed moving shots of actors against a blue screen to be combined with models of the set simply did not work well enough to use. As a result, the show had to rely on standard (for the time) stationary camera shots of the actors against the blue screen, which were less exciting. |
| 433 | ** They couldn't use full-size sets either, as the Canadian studio space was too small, so they had to rely on partial versions of the sets. |
| 434 | ** To fully avail themselves of the Canadian subsidies and credits, Canadian writers had to be involved. Ellison, back in LA, wrote outlines that the Canadian writers then fleshed out into scripts. With this distance from the process and the low budget, it was inevitable that there would be changes at the production level—and that they would not be to Ellison's liking. Once he saw what was happening to the pilot episode, he quit and invoked the clause in his contract which allowed slapping his "Cordwainer Bird" pseudonym (meaning to all in the know that [[AlanSmithee he disowned the product completely]]) on the script and bible. Supposedly, this is his worst experience ever in TV and film, even more so than "The City on the Edge of Forever." |
| 435 | ** Ben Bova, hired as a science advisor, quit because he was peeved at being ignored, but couldn't take his name off the credits. |
| 436 | ** While the show was canceled after 16 episodes, Ellison and Bova salvaged something out of it. In the former's case, it was a Writer's Guild award for his original script for the pilot (novelized with a foreword by Ellison explaining just how badly the show was screwed up). Bova, after publishing a similarly-themed editorial in ''Analog'', got the last laugh when he wrote a TakeThat novel, ''The Starcrossed''. |
| 437 | * Season 3 of ''Series/{{Supergirl|2015}}'' was derailed halfway through by numerous sexual harassment accusations against writer and producer Andrew Kreisberg. He was fired after an investigation, but the show was left in the awkward position of being partway through a story that he'd been the major brain behind, which nobody was at all comfortable with continuing (plus this would mean they'd still need to pay him for the story ideas). Thus, the second half of the season suffered very noticeably from the remaining writing crew trying their hardest to pull an alternate second half of the story out of their ass, often being very obvious about it. |
| 438 | * In 1979, ''Series/{{Supertrain}}'' was one of the most expensive flops in television history. The series had elaborate sets and props[[note]]For instance, the model train built for long shots of the Supertrain going through landscapes was made from actual metal, not painted wood, and thus had cost a million dollars by itself to make[[/note]]. Not helping matters was one of the trains crashing during production and having to be rebuilt (making it a "train wreck" in more than one way). Creator/{{NBC}} did all it could to salvage the series but people were no longer interested. |
| 439 | * ''Series/SwampThing'' was done in not by meddling executives or behind-the-scenes scandals, but by the state of UsefulNotes/NorthCarolina. The state promised the production a $40 million tax rebate (roughly half the budget for the first season) but only delivered $14 million due to a paperwork error. By the time the error was fixed, Warner Bros. realized that they had been spending more money than they had thought and could no longer afford to produce a second season with the same level of quality as the first, thus deciding to abruptly cancel the show. |
| 440 | [[/folder]] |
| 441 | |
| 442 | [[folder:T]] |
| 443 | * The launch of TV-am, Creator/{{ITV}}'s breakfast television franchise in TheEighties, was turbulent to say the least, as covered in the third episode of ''WebVideo/ITVInTheFace'': |
| 444 | ** While morning television had long become a fact of life in other parts of the world (most notably ''Series/{{Today}}'' in the United States), the concept was considered radically new in the United Kingdom in 1982--so radical that the commercial broadcasting regulator at the time, the IBA, gave the franchisees eighteen months to prepare for their launch. Unfortunately, this gave Creator/TheBBC enough of a head start to beat TV-am to the punch by launching ''Breakfast Time'' on 17 January 1983. |
| 445 | ** TV-am panicked and launched their service two weeks early, on 1 February 1983. This had the knock-on effect of causing negotiations between the franchise and the actors' trade union Equity to break down, which in turn affected advertising rates when Equity actors were instructed to boycott the station. Early commercial breaks on TV-am often consisted of only a single bland advert, with no skilled actors (or even people) on the screen. |
| 446 | ** Content was also affected. TV-am had assumed that ''Breakfast Time'', like the rest of the BBC's news offerings, would consist of hard news and highbrow discussion, and tried to match this with similar content on their flagship programme, ''Good Morning Britain''. Instead, the BBC mimicked its American counterparts and made ''Breakfast Time'' fluffy and lightweight, making ''Good Morning Britain'' look boring by comparison. (For example, the debut episode began with Creator/DavidFrost conducting an eighteen minute interview with Conservative MP Norman Tebbit. As a former ITV executive noted, "at that time of the morning, the average person doesn’t want eighteen minutes of anything… much less Norman Tebbit!”) Within two weeks, viewership fell sharply to just under 300,000. |
| 447 | ** The talent on ''Good Morning Britain'' originally consisted of a 'Famous Five' of recognizable presenters: Frost, Michael Parkinson, Angela Rippon, Anna Ford and Robert Kee. However, an administration error sent the cheques to the wrong people, leading Rippon to discover that she was making substantially less than the younger Ford, while both women were making ''far'' less than Frost and Parkinson. |
| 448 | ** TV-am's troubles resulted in a boardroom coup on 18 March 1983, which saw a group of investors led by Jonathan Aitken, another Conservative MP, sack the station's chief executive, Peter Jay. Rippon and Ford supported Jay in the dispute, leading to their own sacking when Aitken's brother Timothy was appointed as the new chief executive in April. In a highly-publicised incident, Ford encountered Aitken at a party and threw a drink in his face; she and Rippon moved to sue TV-am, but the suit was dropped following an out-of-court settlement. Thus, just three months after its launch, ''Good Morning Britain'' lost two of its Famous Five (and came close to losing a third with Parkinson). |
| 449 | ** Low ratings made TV-am cash-strapped. A local newsagent stopped delivering papers to the station over non-payment, an official from London Electricity showed up at a press conference to hand the executives a final notice and presenters often failed to receive their monthly wages. A cross-promotional agreement with other ITV franchises and an increase in viewership did not resolve the situation, and by October 1983 it was speculated that TV-am was on the brink of collapse. It was only after a £4.5 million infusion by a consortium of shareholders in November that the station was saved from ruin.[[note]]Not that it helped in the long run, as more industrial actions in the latter-half of the decade would see TV-am lose its broadcasting rights to GMTV in ITV's 1991 franchise reshuffle.[[/note]] |
| 450 | * ''Series/TerraNova'', Creator/{{Fox}}'s notorious sci-fi flop from 2011, was among the most expensive TV shows in history. The pilot cost $16-20 million and the rest of the show was in the area of $4 million per episode, with hundreds of crew members and extras. It also suffered from [[http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748703954004576090300806854410 production problems]] that were indicative of the poor planning around the show. Locations for sets in Queensland were chosen largely on the basis of how they'd look on film, with almost no consideration to the weather or the task of moving equipment to and from the set. As a result, expensive sets were built in the middle of northern Queensland's wet jungles, where regular flooding would force cast and crew to hike through knee-deep mud to get to work, only to find themselves infested with leeches and ticks; they eventually had to build a bridge to solve this problem. A flash flood nearly killed a security guard while he was trying to save a power generator. Furthermore, production coincided with "schoolies week", the Australian version of spring break, forcing production to put up with swarms of drunken teenagers in the nearby town. All told, while the show was initially seen as holding promise, ratings dropped and reviews got more scathing as the show went on (though opinion did somewhat improve towards the end of its run), leading Fox to cancel what had become an expensive turkey after only a single 13-episode season. |
| 451 | * ''Series/ThreesCompany'' is so notorious for its on-set drama, a TV movie was made in 2003 about its troubled history. Actual line from Brian Dennehy as Fred Silverman: "The inmates are {{running the asylum}}!" |
| 452 | ** It was stuck in the pilot stage for a long time. Peter Stone wrote one pilot set in UsefulNotes/{{New York|City}} that was never filmed. Larry Gelbart wrote another one set in North Hollywood that ''was'' filmed (with Creator/JohnRitter, Valerie Curtain, and Suzanne Zenor), but not used when the show was ousted from Creator/{{ABC}}'s fall schedule. Creator/{{CBS}} then offered to take the show, but ABC backtracked and agreed to air the show mid-season if the pilot was rewritten and reshot with a new cast. Don Nicholl, Michael Ross, and Bernie West wrote a third pilot script set in Santa Monica, and it was shot with John Ritter as Jack, Joyce [=DeWitt=] as Janet, and Susan Lanier as Chrissy (taking over for Denise Galick, who was fired two days before shooting). Executives disliked Lanier's portrayal of Chrissy, and producers were so desperate to find a new one, they fast-forwarded through all the audition tapes for the character before eventually settling on Suzanne Somers ''one day'' before she was supposed to be on-set. However, John Ritter was almost fired before the pilot taped again, with executives believing his performance was too effeminate. ABC's Fred Silverman successfully fought to keep Ritter on the show, and the pilot was shot a third time before it was finally on the air. |
| 453 | ** Creator/SuzanneSomers [[HostilityOnTheSet didn't get along with any of her co-stars]], especially Joyce [=DeWitt=]. Partway through the series, a ''TV Guide'' cover showed Somers front-and-center, with [=DeWitt=] and Ritter in the background, infuriating them both. Once contract re-negotiations began in Season 5, she demanded a higher salary than her co-stars, feeling that her being MsFanservice was partly responsible for the show's success. When executives refused, her diva antics began. She frequently showed up on set late, and often not at all. It got so bad, the writers had to pen two versions of the scripts: one ''with'' Chrissy and one ''without'' Chrissy. This prompted producers to severely reduce her role in the show for the remainder of her contract. It was explained that her character had gone away to be with her sick aunt, and she only appeared in quick telephone scenes toward the end of each episode, shot alone at night/early morning with no studio audience, and away from her angry co-stars. Once her contract was up, producers refused to renew it, and [[ChuckCunninghamSyndrome her character completely vanished for the last few seasons with no explanation]], prompting Somers to sue ABC for $2 million, though she was only granted about $30,000. Somers' relationship with the rest of the cast and crew was severely strained, and she never spoke to Joyce [=DeWitt=] for over 30 years. |
| 454 | ** Somers' [[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute replacements]] for the rest of the show didn't have it much better. Jenilee Harrison was brought on as Chrissy's cousin Cindy as a quick fill-in for Somers. While she got along well with the cast and crew, she was only seen as a temporary character, and her role got smaller and smaller until she was off the show for good. Priscilla Barnes (who played permanent new character Terri) had a miserable and "uncomfortable" time on set, and she asked to be released from her contract after taping only a couple episodes. The executives refused, and she remained on the show until the end, later referring to it as the worst experience of her life. Despite this, however, she got along well with the cast and crew. |
| 455 | ** Norman Fell and Audra Lindley were screwed over when their characters were spun off into their own show, ''The Ropers'', following the third season, ''only'' because their British predecessors [[Series/GeorgeAndMildred had also gotten spun off]] from ''Series/ManAboutTheHouse''. Norman Fell was very uneasy about doing the spinoff because of the security he already had doing a regular sitcom. He came to a compromise, and he and Lindley were promised a return to ''Three's Company'' if ''The Ropers'' lasted less than a season. It did go on to last one successful (6-episode) season before getting ScrewedByTheNetwork and getting cancelled at the end of its second season for poor ratings. The Ropers made only one final guest appearance on ''Three's Company'', and they were permanently replaced with Creator/DonKnotts as Mr. Furley. |
| 456 | ** Ann Wedgeworth was brought on in Season 4 as a regular cast member named Lana Shields, a neighbor attracted to Creator/JohnRitter's character. However, her schtick got old quickly (John Ritter himself complained to the writers, wondering why a character as sex-crazed as Jack would repeatedly refuse the advances of a beautiful, sexually voracious woman; the only explanation the writers would give him is that Jack would be turned off by the fact that Lana was older than him, though only by about ten years). Writers found themselves with less to do with her character, and her role was reduced after just a few episodes. Insulted, Wedgeworth successfully asked to be released from the show. |
| 457 | ** In addition, the show's other spinoff/sequel, ''Three's a Crowd'', continued the story with Jack and his female roommate. Pre-production for the show was done in secret from the rest of the cast and crew, and auditions were held for Jack's roommate during the Christmas break. When Joyce [=DeWitt=] came in to set up her dressing room for the upcoming episodes, she accidentally walked in on the auditions. She and Priscilla Barnes felt betrayed by the goings-on, and [=DeWitt=]'s relationship with the producers and Ritter was strained for the rest of the show, although she reconciled with Ritter many years later. ''Three's a Crowd'', meanwhile, was axed after one season. |
| 458 | * Production of ''Series/TheTomorrowPeople1973'''s first story, "The Slaves of Jedikiah", was much troubled as the crew found they were unfamiliar with the technical demands of a science fiction drama. The first day in studio was disastrous with virtually no usable material getting made and there was some tension between the cast and Paul Bernard who was very authoritarian with them. Also Nicholas Young banged himself hard into a wall while working on the darkened entrance to the Lab which was being filmed inside the real disused tube station at Wood Lane (closed in the 1940s). Fortunately he was not badly injured and was able to carry on later that day after a recovery break. |
| 459 | * The 1990 revival of ''Series/ToTellTheTruth'' was hit hard with this. First, Creator/{{NBC}} accidentally aired the second {{pilot}} episode on the East Coast instead of the actual first episode. This was particularly notable as the pilot was hosted by Richard Kline instead of Gordon Elliott. Then once the show got rolling, Elliott was temporarily forced off American television due to salary disputes in Australia, so Lynn Swann replaced him as host. However, Swann was quickly hit with scheduling conflicts from [[Creator/{{ABC}} ABC Sports]], so Creator/AlexTrebek replaced ''him'', despite also hosting both ''Series/{{Jeopardy}}'' and ''[[Series/{{Concentration}} Classic Concentration]]'' at the time. ''Then'' Trebek's wife went into labor during a taping session, causing show creator Creator/MarkGoodson to fill in for two episodes until Trebek could return. Between the overcrowded market and the inability to hold down a host, it's no wonder that this version of ''Truth'' didn't make it past one season. |
| 460 | * Creator/TheBBC's ''Triangle'' foreshadowed some of the later problems it would have with ''Eldorado''. |
| 461 | ** It sounded like a great way to adapt ''Series/TheLoveBoat'' for the British market: the show would be set on the North Sea ferries, with a regular cast playing the crew and guests playing each week's set of passengers. Even better, advances in portable equipment meant that the crew could actually shoot on location on the ferries themselves for greater realism ... and at less cost since the videotape was cheaper than the film stock commonly used for TV production at the time. |
| 462 | ** Only on the water did the limitations of the show's concept begin to show. ''The Love Boat'' is set on a cruise ship that goes to beautiful, sunny, tropical locations. The North Sea ferries, by contrast, plod along across featureless open water under what are frequently gloomy and overcast skies. In the first episode, star Creator/KateOMara is seen sunbathing topless on what's clearly an otherwise cold and windy day. |
| 463 | ** Then the problems with using portable video cameras became apparent as well. They could handle both natural and artificial light convincingly ... but when it came to a mixture of both it threw off the color to the point that pretty soon they started leaving the ferry to film interior scenes on sets, thus negating the cost savings the producers had hoped for. And if the color problem hadn't made them do this, the cameras' lack of stability controls (an important thing when you're shooting in a large boat on rough seas) likely would have eventually. |
| 464 | ** The series was never the success it had first seemed to be, and the BBC canceled it in 1983. |
| 465 | * ''Series/TwoAndAHalfMen'' got this beginning with Season 7. |
| 466 | ** The show was put on hiatus after star Creator/CharlieSheen entered rehab for his drug addiction, but after production resumed and wrapped for the season, Sheen was rumored to be quitting the show because of pay concerns (he was making $1 million per episode), however he did sign on for two more seasons. Co-stars and crew members noted that Sheen had become increasingly difficult to work with, with him sometimes having a difficult time standing and remembering his lines. Halfway through Season 8, Sheen once again checked himself into rehab, putting the show on another hiatus. After he blasted the show creator Creator/ChuckLorre, Creator/{{CBS}}, and Creator/WarnerBros on various talk shows, he was fired from the show, with the rest of the season canceled, and its fate up in the air. This affected 200 employees and resulted in over $10 million in losses. The show returned for a ninth season, but with Charlie Sheen's character killed off and replaced with a new character played by Creator/AshtonKutcher. There had been buzz about Sheen possibly making another appearance in the show, but it never happened. |
| 467 | ** The show also ran into problems with Creator/AngusTJones, who became a born-again Christian by Season 10, publicly blasted the show for being "filth," and demanded people not watch it. He later apologized to show creator Chuck Lorre, but otherwise stood by his remarks. Due to his school schedule, he was bumped to recurring status by Season 11, although he did not make a single appearance. He was dropped from the show for Season 12 (the final season), although he did make one final appearance in the series finale. For Seasons 11 and 12, his character was replaced by a new character played by Creator/AmberTamblyn. |
| 468 | [[/folder]] |
| 469 | |
| 470 | [[folder:U]] |
| 471 | * ''Series/{{Ultraman}}'' went through a lot of trials to become one of UsefulNotes/{{Japan}}'s premier {{Toku}} shows, as detailed [[https://ultrablogdx.wordpress.com/2019/10/15/ultraman-1966-production-history/ here]]. |
| 472 | ** The series began production on a small budget, and Creator/TokyoBroadcastingSystem's demand to broadcast the show in color strained costs even further. Because of this, the crew had to cut a lot of corners: many fight scenes had to be cut down, some monster concepts were abandoned, and many monster suits were recycled from other productions (like the infamous Jirass, whose suit was modified from [[Film/MothraVsGodzilla two]] [[Film/InvasionOfAstroMonster different]] Franchise/{{Godzilla}} suits.) However, the first episode alone got 34% of Japanese households watching, which greatly increased funding from TBS. |
| 473 | ** Because the production team was smaller than most other TV shows at the time, special effects took longer than normal to finish and the production kept running behind schedule. To give Tsuburaya's crew more time to finish the show, the first broadcast "episode" of the series was a B&W TV special edited from a StudioAudience live show. It ''still'' cost a lot to put together, and the cheaply-made suits gave a lot of trouble to the suit actors; the entire crew was [[OldShame embarrassed by the special]], and writer Akio Jissoji asked to be credited with a [[AlanSmithee pseudonym]]. |
| 474 | ** There were heavy CreativeDifferences over the series' tone, which drifted from being lighthearted and comical to as serious as ''Series/UltraQ''. Infamously, Episode 34 ("A Gift from the Sky") is rumored to have caused a ''fistfight'' in the writers' room. |
| 475 | * The extremely LighterAndSofter ''Series/UltramanCosmos'' was held up by a RoleEndingMisdemeanor that didn't take. |
| 476 | ** In June 2002, lead actor Taiyo Sugiura was arrested on charges of assault and extortion from two years prior. With Sugiura's ContractualPurity busted open, Tsuburaya decided to UnPerson him from the series. The last fifteen episodes of ''Cosmos'' were pulled and re-edited into two {{compilation movie}}s; and ''[[TheMovie Ultraman Cosmos 2: The Blue Planet]]'', set for release in August, had [[TheOtherMarty all of Sugiura's scenes reshot]]. In the meantime, [=TBS=] aired ''Series/UltramanNeos'' to fill up ''Cosmos'''s timeslot. |
| 477 | ** Then at the very end of June, Sugiura's accuser went back on his story, causing him to be [[AllForNothing cleared of his charges]]. ''Cosmos'' finally resumed airing on July 20 [[OutOfOrder with five episodes skipped]] to make up for the lost time, and ''The Blue Planet'' was released in theaters in its original form. |
| 478 | [[/folder]] |
| 479 | |
| 480 | [[folder:V]] |
| 481 | * The final season of ''Series/{{Veep}}'' was delayed a year due to lead star Creator/JuliaLouisDreyfus being diagnosed with breast cancer, though she insisted on filming as much as she could in between chemotherapy treatments. The showrunners were also very frustrated to have the season cut down to just seven episodes, resulting in a very noticeably rushed set of stories they didn't have the time to properly play out. |
| 482 | * ''Series/TheView''. The talk show went pretty smoothly for 8 seasons, though a couple co-hosts left at various points to pursue other opportunities, it wasn't until Star Jones and Creator/MeredithViera left at the end of Season 9 that the show really began to get lots of attention for the regular on and off-screen problems it's known for today. |
| 483 | ** In June 2006, Star Jones announced her intention to depart the show on-air, shocking her fellow co-hosts. The next day, Creator/BarbaraWalters announced that Jones was now permanently gone from the show, and that she felt betrayed by her. Jones later claimed she was fired. It was at this time that a new co-host would join the show... |
| 484 | ** Creator/RosieODonnell! Her infamous season on the show included many on-screen fights with conservative-minded co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck. One of them got so bad, the show utilized a split-screen of Rosie and Elisabeth arguing, prompting Rosie to leave the show the next day. In addition, Rosie's insulting comments to UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump and Creator/KellyRipa, and her dabbling in 9/11 conspiracy theories, got the show lots of negative attention, and Walters and O'Donnell reportedly had many backstage feuds. |
| 485 | ** Creator/WhoopiGoldberg and Creator/SherriShepherd were hired the following season, and the show went back on track, save for the occasional on-screen argument and controversial comments. Then Hasselbeck and Creator/JoyBehar left after Season 16, and Creator/JennyMcCarthy was hired, known for her controversial views on vaccination. Then Walters left after Season 17, and everybody, minus Goldberg, was fired. The seasons since then are known for their revolving door of co-hosts (including O'Donnell briefly returning), and every other episode having some sort of bitch fest or controversial remark from one of the co-hosts (usually Creator/RavenSymone or Meghan [=McCain=]). |
| 486 | * Creator/{{Saban|Entertainment}}'s ''Series/VRTroopers'', sister series to ''Series/MightyMorphinPowerRangers'', has a fair share of headaches as well. |
| 487 | ** Originally a vehicle for former Green Ranger Creator/JasonDavidFrank, a short pilot using footage from the ''Metal Heroes'' series ''Choujinki Metalder'' called ''Cybertron'' was filmed with him alone. However, his immense popularity as Tommy led to Saban deciding to pull him back to ''Rangers'' As such he switched places with Creator/BradHawkins (who was originally supposed to be the White Ranger during the second season of ''MMPR''), who became Ryan Steele. This alone led them to believe the show was beyond hope, but because of commitments to broadcasters, they had to press on. |
| 488 | ** Since they didn't have Frank's Green Ranger star power to support the show, they decided to expand it, buying up a second ''Metal Heroes'' series, ''Jikuu Senshi Spielban'', hired two more actors, and made the show about a trio. Since the two series were completely unrelated, the only footage they had of all three Troopers together and morphed were things they filmed themselves, which they didn't have the time or budget to do a lot of, so the majority of episodes involved finding new and unique ways to split Ryan away from Kaitlyn and J.B. |
| 489 | ** While filming the show, they noticed several new problems. Alongside the fact that the ''Metal Heroes'' footage was almost a decade old (unlike ''Sentai'' footage, which is never more than a year or two old, ''Metalder'' and ''Spielban'' were from 1987 and 1986), the shows in question also used a lot of '''unmorphed''' battles, meaning the usable footage was thin to begin with. StockFootage was abused, with the same scenes of a drill driving through the wall of an underground lab seeming to be in almost every episode. Despite all this, the show was a hit and a second season was ordered. |
| 490 | ** The second season had the ''Metalder'' footage (Ryan's armor) run out fast, so they had him get an upgrade to new armor, this time from ''Space Sheriff Shaider'' (an even '''older''' series). The second season limped along with its endlessly repeated StockFootage, until, by the end of the season, both ''Shaider'' and ''Spielban'' footage had run dry. They bought up a '''fourth''' ''Metal Heroes'' series, ''Juukou B-Fighter,'' but rather than run the risk of alienating kids by overhauling ''everything'' at once (''Series/PowerRangersZeo'' hadn't happened yet, so Saban wasn't sure if a complete visual overhaul would work; until that point, even though ''Rangers'' got new zords each season, the suits were still the same familiar ones from ''Zyuranger''), they decided to finally chuck ''Troopers'' in the bin and instead turned ''B-Fighter'' into ''Series/BigBadBeetleborgs.'' |
| 491 | [[/folder]] |
| 492 | |
| 493 | [[folder:W]] |
| 494 | * ''Series/TheWalkingDead2010'' has been a massive hit for {{Creator/AMC}}, but significant production issues and a rotating stable of showrunners also made it a magnet for controversy: |
| 495 | ** During production of the first season, Frank Darabont reportedly fired his entire writing staff, including executive producer Charles Eglee. While executives with the production were quick to deny the story, sources indicated that Darabont wanted to use freelance writers, but pushback from AMC and possible issues with the Writer's Guild of America convinced him otherwise. |
| 496 | ** The house that was intended to be used as the Hershel residence in Season 2 was initially denied usage by the religious family that owned it, as they saw the series and thought was going to be shown in something that would be trashing religion. It took Darabont stepping in personally to smooth out the matter after the owners couldn't come to an understanding with the production crew. |
| 497 | ** The second-season premiere, "[[Recap/TheWalkingDeadS02E01WhatLiesAhead What Lies Ahead]]", was so fraught with problems that it was [[http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/walking-dead-creator-frank-darabonts-852491 described by later showrunner Glen Mazzara]] as a potential "show-killer" years after the fact in an unsealed deposition. Filming began in earnest during a particularly hot summer, which reportedly caused director Gwyneth Horner-Peyton to suffer from heat stroke and turn in reportedly-unusable footage to AMC (the deleted scenes shown on the DVD and in trailers appear to disprove this claim, as they are mostly well-shot). According to Darabont's own words, he went to Suzie Fitzgerald (AMC's VP of scripted programming) and told her that production would be delayed by three weeks, but she reportedly lied about having the conversation while speaking with cast and crew. Due to the contentious shooting schedule, Darabont attempted to re-edit Horner-Peyton's footage himself, going so far as to use a pseudonym ("Ardeth Bey") in the final cut. Two-thirds of the episode was lopped off in the editing room and the remaining footage was re-edited into the following installment. Additionally, the production crew had to go back and reshoot at least one scene, as evidenced by Rick inexplicably wearing his full sheriff's uniform during the scene where he attempts to radio Morgan. |
| 498 | ** As a result of the contentious season premiere, Darabont was [[http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/walking-dead-what-happened-fired-221449 fired as showrunner]] midway through production of the episode "[[Recap/TheWalkingDeadS02E06Secrets Secrets]]" (and just three days after appearing at Comic-Con 2011). His departure reportedly caused strife and uncertainty on-set, with all of the cast members staying quiet due to a fear of losing their jobs if they spoke out. Numerous reasons were given for his sacking, some of which he spoke about years later after he sued AMC for unpaid royalties related to his contract: |
| 499 | *** Robert Kirkman has explained in interviews that he was unhappy with how the episode "[[Recap/TheWalkingDeadS01E06TS19 TS-19]]" turned out, and reportedly ran into conflict with Darabont because the latter tried to give a scientific explanation for TheVirus and hinted at events that were going on elsewhere in the world. |
| 500 | *** According to Darabont's unsealed deposition in 2016, he immediately butted heads with Joel Stillerman (AMC's head of scripted programming) right after joining the series, and that budget cuts and the contentious season premiere were used as an excuse to fire him. |
| 501 | *** Articles written at the time of Darabont's departure also lay blame at the feet of AMC themselves, who were showing favoritism towards ''Series/MadMen'' creator Matthew Weiner by giving him an increased budget for his series while short-shifting others. |
| 502 | *** The suit, which dragged on for years and saw various legal arguments put forward by Darabont's lawyers (including accusations of funny accounting regarding profit-sharing agreements and claims that AMC kept the show's tax credit - given for filming in Georgia - while simultaneously cutting the show's budget by 25%) eventually resulted in the matter being settled out of court in July 2021, with Darabont being given an astounding $200 million and future royalty payments. |
| 503 | ** Jeffrey [=DeMunn=] (who played Dale) was incensed by the network's decision to cut Darabont and asked to be written out of the show. He later reconsidered but by that time the writers had his character killed off near the end of the second season and had no intention of changing their stance. |
| 504 | ** Showrunner Glen Mazzara (who took over production duties from Darabont) left at the end of the third season, which confused many fans who enjoyed the third season's jump in quality. This move was reportedly due to creative differences between Mazzara and AMC over various parts of the episodes. According to [[http://io9.gizmodo.com/5974585/apparently-glen-mazzara-left-the-walking-dead-tv-show-because-robert-kirkman-made-him one article]], Mazzara stalled production several times due to a lack of material to work with, and Kirkman reportedly forced him out at the end of the season. |
| 505 | ** Half of the third-season finale, "[[Recap/TheWalkingDeadS03E16WelcomeToTheTombs Welcome to the Tombs]]", was reshot months after filming wrapped due to a perceived lack of suspense regarding [[spoiler:Andrea's fate]] (originally, [[spoiler:Milton would be shot by the Governor, and would do more to try and free her. Tyreese eventually discovered the undead Milton taking a bite out of Andrea and saved her, but she asks for a gun to kill herself with]]). It is unknown if this was the incident that caused Mazzara's departure from the production. |
| 506 | ** [[http://www.onlocationvacations.com/2015/11/18/some-senoia-ga-residents-are-so-over-the-walking-dead/ Residents in Senoia, Georgia]] (where the Alexandria Safe Zone scenes are filmed) eventually got so fed up that the production crew had taken over a large chunk of town (along with curious fans and on-set spies showing up to sneak video and photos away from the set) that they repeatedly complained to the local city council about it, causing some strife between the town and the production crew. |
| 507 | ** The show had continuous problems with sensitive information and character deaths being leaked months in advance, with efforts to stem the leaks often being for naught. [[spoiler:Shane Walsh's]] death in the second season was spoiled weeks before its airdate by the description of a DVD boxset, while spoilers and speculation ran so rampant on the seventh season premiere (with [[spoiler:both Abraham and Glenn falling to Negan's baseball bat]]) that AMC [[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/tv/2016/10/21/the-walking-dead-scripts-leak-major-character-death-revealed-by/ attempted to level cease-and-desist orders]] on groups like The Spoiling Dead Fans. [[StreisandEffect It didn't work]], and in an effort to stem the leaks, AMC shot multiple death scenes for ''all'' of the characters in Negan's lineup, as well as having [[spoiler:Creator/MichaelCudlitz (Abraham)]] attend set long after his death scene was shot in an apparent bid to throw off the trail. |
| 508 | ** Filming on Season 8 was suspended when stuntman John Bernecker was killed during a fall gone wrong, landing on a concrete floor on his head. And at the exact same time, some of Darabont's emails from the time he left were leaked to the public and showed him to be shockingly furious and profane over what he suspected was deliberate sabotage to get him off the show. AMC, for their part, quickly started pointing to this tone as evidence of the erratic behavior that caused them to want to get rid of him. |
| 509 | ** Midway through the eighth season, it was revealed that Creator/ChandlerRiggs (Carl Grimes) had been let go from the show by producer Scott Gimple, which caused no end to fan complaints. Aside from the manner in which his character leaves the show ([[spoiler:Carl is bit in the abdomen while rescuing a side character who only debuted in the mid-season finale]]), the move was seen as a shocker that wasn't helped by the fact that Carl becomes the de facto lead character in the comics. Though it was originally suggested that Riggs quit the show because he wanted to move to UsefulNotes/LosAngeles and become a DJ, it was then revealed ([[http://www.eonline.com/ca/news/899461/the-walking-dead-star-chandler-riggs-father-slams-showrunner-scott-m-gimple-for-firing-his-son in a Facebook post by his father]]) that Riggs was fired after the producers promised to extend his contract for three more years. |
| 510 | ** The conclusion of the eighth season was marred by a number of controversial developments. Both Creator/AndrewLincoln ([[TheHero Rick Grimes]]) and Creator/LaurenCohan (Maggie) opted not to renew their contracts for the following season and only star in six episodes, with the former reportedly wanting to spend more time with his family and the latter accepting a role on the ABC series ''Whiskey Cavalier''. After significant fan complaints about story developments, showrunner Scott Gimple was KickedUpstairs while Angela Kang took over as showrunner. Amidst these changes, it was revealed that Creator/JeffreyDeanMorgan (like Creator/JoshMcDermitt during production of Season 7) had been dealing with death threats from fans, while Creator/ChrisHardwick (the host of the ''Talking Dead'' aftershow) was effectively removed from his job after an ex-girlfriend accused him of sexual and emotional abuse. While the allegations were seemingly disproven after an internal investigation at AMC and Hardwick was rehired, one of ''Talking Dead''[='=]s executive producers and a handful of staffers quit in response. |
| 511 | ** Creator/ScottWilson passed away from complications caused by cancer, shortly after shooting a dream sequence for Season 9. |
| 512 | ** The tenth season was cut short an episode early due to the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic halting the final stages of post-production on the season finale. The fifteenth episode “The Tower” was forced to become the season finale, while the following episode and true season finale, “A Certain Doom”, was delayed to air later in 2020. |
| 513 | * ''Series/WarOfTheWorlds1988'' had ongoing internal issues that persisted through its lifespan, not helped by a writer's strike and an infamous {{Retool}} that took place in the second season. |
| 514 | ** Jared Martin (Harrison Blackwood) [[TheOtherMarty replaced actor Michael Nouri]] at the last minute, after filming had already begun on the pilot episode. |
| 515 | ** Script delays were a constant source of struggle throughout the first season due to the 1988 Writers' Strike. Brothers Greg and Sam Strangis (who were both producers on the show and members of the Writers' Guild and Director's Guild, respectively) often found themselves at odds over what to do, and thus the first three episodes shot after the pilot were written under [[AlanSmithee pseudonyms]]. As a result, scripts were written and rewritten at breakneck speed -- the episode "Goliath is My Name" was hastily cobbled together just so the show could stay in production, and the writers had to rush another concept together when Creator/{{Paramount}} vetoed a script at the last minute. |
| 516 | ** ExecutiveMeddling reared its head in Season 2. According to an article in ''TV Zone'' Magazine, the show's ratings were sliding and barely above that of ''Series/FridayThe13thTheSeries''. To that end, Paramount fired Greg Strangis and hired Frank Mancuso Jr. to oversee production. Mancuso jettisoned the present-day mentality of the first season, changing to a near-apocalyptic ravaged landscape that was set TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture, culled several cast members, and made the material ''much'' DarkerAndEdgier. To say this didn't go over well with fans is an {{Understatement}}. |
| 517 | ** Several key production changes meant there was a little-to-no sense of continuity through the episodes. Executive script consultant Jeremy Hole only oversaw five episodes before being hospitalized and never coming back. Story editor Jim Trombetta left his post two months after being hired. It got so bad that Jared Martin and Creator/AdrianPaul acted as de facto story editors for a stretch of episodes. |
| 518 | ** Mancuso Jr. was reportedly angered that the show wasn't changing fast enough (even beyond its shift between seasons). Although the ratings did eventually stop their slide, it came at a very late point and funders pulled their backing. Though the show was cancelled soon after this, it did come early enough that (unusually for any show that is cancelled) the creators had time to wrap up several story arcs and have a proper ending. |
| 519 | ** Even the fallout from the show stained several of its [[ArtistDisillusionment actors for many years]]. Creator/CatherineDisher (who played Mana) still refuses to attend fan conventions or speak about her time working on the show, as she received angry and threatening letters from irate fans during production. |
| 520 | * ''Series/WetHotAmericanSummerFirstDayOfCamp'' had a hell of a time dealing with the large cast's various schedules, as many of them had become much bigger stars since doing the film and had a lot of other stuff going on. Creator/BradleyCooper caused the most problems, with all his scenes having to be filmed in a single day (funnily enough, this means he experienced the show's story in real time) and the character still having to spend some time as another actor wearing a ski mask. Luckily, the show's parody nature meant they could easily just pass this off as another joke. |
| 521 | * The second season of ''Series/TheWitcher2019'' ran into trouble as it began production just before the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic hit. Filming was suspended after new castmember Creator/KristoferHivju tested positive for the virus (he thankfully made a full recovery). The lockdowns implemented shortly after this meant that production couldn't resume until August, a change that meant the role of Eskel had to be [[TheOtherMarty recast]] from Thue Ersted Rasmussen to Bill Eidenbenz as the former could not attend the new filming dates. Production was interrupted again after four crewmembers tested positive which required a two-week quarantine. On top of these issues, series star Creator/HenryCavill injured his leg forcing the crew to film scenes focusing on other characters until he'd healed enough. |
| 522 | [[/folder]] |
| 523 | |
| 524 | [[folder:X]] |
| 525 | * A few particular episodes of ''Series/TheXFiles'' became associated with production problems, leading to mixed results: |
| 526 | ** Several of the show's first season episodes succumbed to cost overruns, despite being conceived as [[BottleEpisode Bottle Episodes]]. [[Recap/TheXFilesS01E09Space "Space"]] became the most expensive episode of the season thanks to the construction of a NASA Mission Control set. Production was also delayed so that the crew could take turns with a flight simulator. "Space" is reportedly Creator/ChrisCarter's least favorite episode. |
| 527 | ** [[Recap/TheXFilesS01E03Squeeze "Squeeze"]] had the misfortune of being directed by Harry Longstreet, who didn't obtain additional camera coverage and failed to shoot one scene, leading to re-shoots in order to complete the episode. Creator/DavidDuchovny and Doug Hutchinson (Tooms) also complained about the direction Longstreet gave them, which Hutchinson later called "ridiculous." Despite these problems, "Squeeze" was well-received and is considered to arguably be a classic episode. |
| 528 | ** [[Recap/TheXFilesS01E14GenderBender "Gender Bender"]] went through several rewrites over the sexual content of the script; this resulted in an abrupt and much-criticized TwistEnding. Other issues involved a failed attempt to illuminate scenes with lantern light and a physically encumbering catacomb set which necessitated an extra day of filming. |
| 529 | ** [[Recap/TheXFilesS01E20DarknessFalls "Darkness Falls"]] was plagued by poor weather and explosive CabinFever between director Joe Napolitano and first assistant director Vladimir Stefoff, resulting in Napolitano's departure from the series. The weather problems meant that pick-up shots and inserts had to be filmed at a later date, which meant more time-wasting commutes to the inaccessible shooting locations in Lynn Valley, British Columbia. |
| 530 | ** The second season episode [[Recap/TheXFilesS02E19DodKalm "Død Kalm"]] was blighted by low temperatures making the cast and crew uncomfortable, the cramped environment of the ship's interiors making shooting difficult (despite Chris Carter's assumption that shooting aboard a real naval vessel would give everyone a "great rest"), and the makeup used to make Mulder and Scully appear aged taking hours to apply, resulting in substantial delays. Director Rob Bowman later dubbed it the "episode from hell". |
| 531 | ** The third season episode [[Recap/TheXFilesS03E18TesoDosBichos "Teso Dos Bichos"]] called for Mulder and Scully to be attacked by a horde of feral house cats in the climax, but that was nixed because Creator/GillianAnderson was allergic to cats. The cats were also lazy, leading the crew to improvise with unconvincing shots of a single, fake-looking monster cat. Director Kim Manners took issue with the fact that the cats became the culprits of the episode when the teaser segment alluded to a leopard spirit and begged Carter to shift the focus back to that plot point. Add in the constant rewrites, and it's no wonder Manners nicknamed the episode "Teso Dos Bitches". |
| 532 | ** Season 7's [[Recap/TheXFilesS07E10SeinUndZeit "Sein Und Zeit"]] burned through its allotted budget faster than expected, forcing the crew to improvise several scenes near the end of the shoot. In particular, they weren't able to film a scene involving a news report on Amber Lynn's kidnapping until one of the producers reached out to Robert Penfold, an LA-based Australian reporter (and fan of the show) who agreed to do the cameo for nothing. One member of the crew also made the mistake of carrying a folder of production documents, including the ransom note used in the episode, home from work and left it in a public phone booth. When he realized his mistake, he went back to retrieve it and was arrested by police who had discovered the note and didn't realize it was a prop. |
| 533 | ** Season 7 as a whole was where the notorious HostilityOnTheSet between David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson reached a low point, and things didn't go so well between Duchovny and Chris Carter either. This was largely due to a lawsuit Duchovny had filed against Fox for underselling the show's rights to its affiliates and thereby screwing him out of millions of dollars. Despite the lawsuit being settled, the fallout led to Duchovny's (albeit temporary, as it turned out) decision to leave the series. |
| 534 | ** Filming for the eighth season premiere "[[Recap/TheXFilesS08E01Within Within]]" was marred by a freak accident in which a power cable struck and electrified a 15-story scaffold on set, injuring six crewmen and killing one. |
| 535 | [[/folder]] |
| 536 | |
| 537 | [[folder:Y]] |
| 538 | * ''Series/{{Yellowstone}}'' became the subject of much gossip during its fifth season, with persistent rumors--amplified by articles in ''[[https://deadline.com/2023/02/yellowstone-show-end-franchise-continues-matthew-mcconaughey-1235251400/ Deadline]]'' and ''[[https://puck.news/casualties-of-the-costner-yellowstone-crossfire/ Puck]]''--of there being [[HostilityOnTheSet bad blood]] between showrunner Creator/TaylorSheridan and star Creator/KevinCostner. Reportedly at issue was Costner's demand to schedule only a week of shooting for his scenes in the season's second half, as well as his demand to be paid extra for promoting the show. The dispute between Costner and Sheridan proceeded to drag on for months, leading many to doubt that the show would make it to a sixth season or that, if it did, Costner would still be involved. Eventually relations between the two became so poor that when Sheridan's other show ''Series/TulsaKing'' debuted, Costner's assistant personally attacked him in a since-deleted Instagram post. (For his part, Costner has repeatedly denied rumors of any conflict with Sheridan through his lawyers.) It was eventually announced that the series would end with Season 5 and that an announced sequel series would not involve Costner. |
| 539 | [[/folder]] |
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