Small Screen Roundup: 1/29/08 Edition

Spider-Man director Sam Raimi is teaming with Disney-ABC Domestic Television and ABC Studios for the live-action weekly series Wizard’s First Rule, writes The Hollywood Reporter. The show will be based on Terry Goodkind’s best-selling epic fantasy series The Sword of Truth.

Starz Entertainment is turning to Crash to find inspiration for its first ever original drama series. The feature, winner of the Oscar for Best Picture, is being developed into a series, with involvement from such key members of the film as Paul Haggis, Bobby Moresco, Bob Yari, Don Cheadle, Mark R. Harris and Tom Nunan. Coming Soon has the Starz press release.

Ain’t It Cool News has learned some of the dates for the 2008 Paley Fest events, held at the ArcLight in Hollywood. The complete schedule for the Paley Fest will be announced on February 4, when premium ticket packages will go on sale to museum members. Individual tickets will become available February 7, while non-members will have to wait until February 10 to purchase any remaining tickets.

Reuters reports that CBS has ordered two more editions of Survivor to be broadcast during the 2008-2009 season. Jeff Probst will return as the host for those editions.

Looking to produce scripted content while the Writers Guild of America is on strike, CBS Paramount Network TV is uniting with Canada’s CTV to produce at least 13 episodes of the police drama Flashpoint. Variety notes that the scripts for the series were written by Canadian scribes.

Apparently several studios have suggested that they are reducing the amount of pilots they produce. Marti Noxon, an executive for ABC’s Private Practice, explains to NPR how a such a movie may affect audiences, TV writers and the studios.

DVDActive has the specs for the direct-to-DVD films What Love Is, starring Cuba Gooding Jr.; Conspiracy, starring Val Kilmer; and Pistol Whipped, starring Steven Seagal and Lance Henriksen.

29Jan2008 | Josh E Armstrong | Continued