NBC is continuing the strategy of adopting as many new comedies as it can to fill the void in its life, just like a bachelor who suddenly becomes the hilariously inept dad to three redheaded girls, in the premise that we’re now pitching to NBC. You can call it Ginger Dad House! And once our deal is finalized, it could join some of the other shows NBC has recently acquired, including two pilot orders from The Office’s Greg Daniels—one for that previously reported show starring Craig Robinson as a middle-school music teacher, slowly working his way through all the single moms, and another as-yet-untitled show about a twentysomething guy and his twentysomething pals who date other people in their twenties, which is indeed a very comedically rich time to date.
The network has also ordered pilots for Assistance (not to be confused with Fox’s To My Assistant, even though it will be) from Will Ferrell and Adam McKay’s production company, about a young executive assistant who’s torn between her fiancé and her “work husband;” and Donor Party, a show described as “In New Normal fashion”—as that is a thing now—about an irresponsible guy who meets the sperm donor kids he never wanted, then slowly devours them over the course of a harsh winter. (Just kidding: He loves them in New Normal fashion.)
It’s also cast Party Down’s Ken Marino and The Daily Show’s Asaf Mandvi as two of the leads for The Gates, its adaptation of the British comedy about parents commingling around the “social landmine” that is their kids’ elementary school drop-off gate, with Marino’s boundless puppy-dog enthusiasm clashing with Mandvi’s “superdad” pushiness in a constant battle of outsized personalities. Just by playing the odds, at least some of these have to pan out—and if not, just know that we have Ginger Dad House ready to roll. You could cast Carrot Top!
UPDATE: And here's another one: John Mulaney is partnering with his Saturday Night Live producer Lorne Michaels, who will reward his past work on Weekend Update not by just giving him that segment, but instead producing a multi-camera sitcom loosely based on Mulaney's own life. TV Line reports that it will follow a group of young people and their hijinks," because it is a requirement that all TV projects be given the worst loglines humanly possible, so your expectations are low for when they finally hit the air.