He cares deeply for his loyal audience.
While angry frustrated Booth and Brennan ‘shippers’ may find this somewhat hard to swallow at the moment, Hart Hanson really does care about his audience. “I am the first to admit that my bias on BONES is to hang on to my audience rather than risk losing them,” explained Hanson during his recent talk as part of the Canadian Film Centre Test Pattern Series. “When you say it out loud it sounds quite cowardly, but in our first year we were bounced around [the schedule] so much that when I saw those 6 million people follow us so that we survived living past Christmas, a light went off for me that said that this is a cult hit… an acquired taste… a fine scotch. Okay, we’re none of those things, really, we’re a goofy romantic crimedy, but my force on it has always been to be respectful and hope that our loyal audience sticks with us no matter what. Which is ironic because those are the same people who scream at me for things like Hannah!.”
He has bigger fish to fry than time-slot competitors Bill Prady and Dan Harmon.
While Hanson probably hasn’t relished waking up every Thursday morning this Fall only to see that THE BIG BANG THEORY has yet again beat BONES in the ratings, there is a far more pressing enemy than creator Bill Prady. Said Hanson half-jokingly, “Oh sure, I may wish Bill Prady ill, and it’s lucky for us that Dan Harmon’s brilliant and great show COMMUNITY is not doing well in the ratings, but very seldom do you wish another show will go down. So much so that all of us in drama hopes scripted fare does well so that reality shows don’t replace them.”
He’s not nearly as technologically savvy as his 26k twitter followers might suggest!
Despite the fact that Hanson has attracted a passionate and veryy vocal legion of twitter followers in stark contrast to fellow Canadian showrunner David Shore [HOUSE] who has yet to jump on the social bandwagon du jour, it’s the HOUSE, not BONES writer’s room that has taken the first big step into the 21st century. “BONES writers are old school, five whiteboards and each one has an episode laid out on it so anyone can see what’s coming up,” explained HANSON. “HOUSE is an iPad show right now and they’re doing everything on an iPad with applications so everything is right there in front of them.”
He’s indirectly responsible for extending the lives of at least two of his cast members (Plus, they call him ‘Dad!’)
While the loss of a loved one is always a devastating experience, there was a silver-lining to be taken from the tragic passing of Hanson’s mom. “My mom, who never met a cigarette she didn’t smoke, died of lung cancer and two of my actresses who smoked up until that point, they quit,” revealed Hanson. “I didn’t ask them to of course, but before they quit they used to hide their cigarettes from me and go, ‘Dad’s here, Dad’s here!’ I would much rather they say, ‘Here comes that man… I wish I had a man like him… just look at the way he moves… like a panther’!”
Working on BONES has some serious fringe benefits.
Not only has the success of BONES earned the talented showrunner Steven Bochco’s [NYPD BLUE, L.A. LAW, HILL STREET BLUES] old office on the historic FOX lot, his added bonus is a view of Sofia Vergara [MODERN FAMILY] trailer. “As a very skeptical agnostic, every once in a while I do say, ‘Thank you Jesus’!” 