It took 13 years, but CBS has decided that, yes, it would like to work on a sitcom with Louie C.K., who has finally gotten the green light for a script he wrote with Seinfeld writer turned late-night talk show host Spike Feresten in 1999, after both proved themselves to the network by spending over a decade becoming way more famous. The duo—who worked together previously on The Late Show With David Letterman and The Dana Carvey Show—originally pitched the multi-camera series Boomtown as a starring project for C.K., basing it on the experiences of him and his friends as late-twentysomethings struggling to make it in their respective creative fields amid a tough economy. But of course, CBS passed, preferring to focus at the time on more solid, slightly hipper conceits, like a show about Bette Midler or one with that talking baby from the commercials.
Fortunately for C.K. and Feresten, the economy has only gotten worse while the number of young people who are absolutely convinced that they’re going to be famous has increased, meaning the series remains timely enough to dust off and give it another shot. And so, after undergoing a rewrite—swapping all the “America Online” jokes for “Twitter,” taking out the World Trade Center gags, maybe adding a rapper?—C.K. and Feresten are now all set to give Boomtown another go, albeit with C.K. now solely behind the camera in an executive producer’s role alongside Feresten. And not to mention the role of “rare reason for the people who typically regard CBS comedy with disdain to tune in anyway and try to overlook the laugh track.”