After seven years of watching the Peacock Network mishandle, not to mention unceremoniously cancel our beloved SCRUBS, creator Bill Lawrence knows a thing or two about bumbling NBC executives.

Which is probably why he summed up his reaction to Conan O’Brien’s current situation in a media scrum following the “Comedy Showrunners Panel” at the Television Critics Association Press Tour in Pasadena with one simple word: “Schadenfreude!”

“Whether you’re a Jay [Leno] fan or not, it just really makes you cross your fingers and hope that Conan finds some success and make them [NBC] pay for it,” said the always opinionated and equally entertaining Lawrence.

“I thought it was a short-sighted move from an entity [NBC] that doesn’t love television, when they should love television if that’s what they’re in the business of.” He continued. “From a straight business standpoint, Jay Leno doing THE TONIGHT SHOW, doing the numbers he used to pull in and hopefully continuing to beat Letterman is what’s best for now. Do I think it’s best for the long term? Not personally, but I understand the move. [That said] as a writer, you look for the light at end of the rainbow, or whatever the cliché is. [At least now] there are going to be opportunities on NBC for scripted TV and the bar has been set fairly low so you’ll be reading press blurbs like, ‘This new drama outperformed the same night last year by 1000 percent!”

While not a close enough friend of O’Brien’s to personally phone him up, Lawrence did say that he feels compelled to send an email of support.

“Comedies writers are all talking about this today. For a lot of us it made us question, if we essentially would have the balls to do the same thing because we all have faced similar situations,” explained Lawrence. “Conan O’Brien is too talented and too good a guy to have to pay for somebody else’s mistake. He deserved his shot and I think I would have been disappointed as a fan had he kind of walked back with his tail between his legs because he didn’t deserve this.”

And just how would the writer in Lawrence handle tonight’s hotly anticipated TONIGHT SHOW WITH CONAN O’BRIEN monologue?

“I would attack, I would be as self-deprecating as possible because you certainly don’t want to get into a fight that you can’t win,” said Lawrence. “Conan’s comedic strength is taking shots at himself, that’s why I love the guy. He’s as humble a talk show host as you’ll see out there. I just think the drag is in the scheme of things, the amount of time that he had to find the show and get it going was not fair. Just not fair.”

Kind of like how ABC is currently burning off episodes of SCRUBS. But we’ll save that post for another day.

If laughter is indeed the best medicine, Bill Lawrence may in fact be America’s answer to the heath-care crisis. Since bursting onto the scene as the co-creator of SPIN CITY and his little medical-drama-series-that-could follow-up known as SCRUBS, Lawrence has been consistently delivering three CC’s of laughter — and as an added bonus, enough music recommendations to fill up two iPods — to this TV Addict for the better part of two decades now. Which is why, it was such a thrill to be given the opportunity to talk with the showrunner in an all-too-brief interview yesterday.

But before we get to the SCRUBS goodies — complete with Lawrence’s defence of an overcrowded hospital Medical School which we’re saving for Tuesday — we thought, in honour of tonight’s brand new episode of COUGAR TOWN, we’d share Lawrence’s take on everything from Travis’ sexuality (We hope you’re happy @rural_juror) to Tiger Woods.

As COUGAR TOWN has evolved into more of an ensemble, I’ve really started to dig the series. Particularly the episode a few weeks back where Travis pretended to be gay to torture Grayson. But here’s the thing, myself (along with more than a few fans) were already sort of under the impression that Travis was in fact gay. Was there ever any talk in the writer’s room about going in that direction?
Bill Lawrence: [Laughs] First of all thanks for saying the nice stuff. I feel like we’ve gotten a real chance to find the show, especially as the show has become less the journey of one woman week-in-and-week-out struggling to survive being forty and single and more of an ensemble show about a dysfunctional family, which is essentially what it is at its core, I think we’ve gotten more successful with it. But No… Dan’s [Byrd] character, we always thought of him as a straight guy on this particular show. If we didn’t, it would have been a series of talks with the actor just to tell him, “Hey, I know we never talked about this when you got the part… but…”

Over the years many of your actors, including SCRUBS stars Donald Fiason and Dave Franco who I recently had the opportunity to interview have mentioned that one of the reasons they enjoy working with you so much is your “No Douchebag Policy!” Without naming any names of course, what inspired you to create such a welcome (and rare among Hollywood circles) philosophy?
When you start working on television shows I always had this philosophy of you do what you have to to get to do what you want to do. Which means you’ll work as hard as you can, deal with any situation to hopefully get to an opportunity where you get to create your own shows and make your own rules. Anyone that’s worked in Hollywood for more than a few years has at least fifty stories about some horrible human being — and not just actors — that they had to work for and cater to. It can be anybody from an executive producer to a film director, to an actor, to anybody that has power and doesn’t behave down very well. One thing that got burned into my head from personal experience is I am not going to ever work with or promote the careers of people that act shitty to people who are beneath them on the totem poll.

Which in truth, is not only one of the reasons I gravitate to your shows, but why I’m more inclined to give you a second, third and fourth look. I like love the idea of supporting people who seem like genuinely decent human beings.
It also by the way helps creatively. I did it just out of not wanting to work with assholes anymore. And the cool thing, in television specifically which is so much about chemistry is that if you put a cast together of good people that are friendly and get along with each other, like on SPIN CITY or other people’s shows like FRIENDS or HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER where you can tell that the folks like each other, it shows through and audiences pick up on it when they watch. And when they don’t, they can see it too. I really believe that.

I can’t help but notice that golf has played a fairly substantial role in COUGAR TOWN. With the recent “Tiger Woods” incident, any thoughts to boosting ratings by jumping on the bandwagon with a ripped-from-the-headlines gag?
I’ll tell you the toughest thing with single-camera comedy, especially around the headlines is that any joke we write now won’t be on television for two months. So it’s really hard on a week-to-week comedy show to do in the moment stuff so I don’t think we’re going to go at it too much. Plus, you can’t beat reality with that, it’s getting crazy!

I just thought golf clubs, SVU’s, relationships, the jokes practically write themselves!
It’s getting insane, hey, if we can think of a timeless gag after its past for a second I’ll probably go for it, but to try and make headline grabbing jokes, it’s kind of tough.

And finally, when you’re not running two shows and have a little free time in your life, any thought to doing something for the internet where you can retain absolute creative control?
I would do it in a heartbeat. I tried once before, I gave it a real shot with NOBODY’s WATCHING and I get great amounts of pleasure that you can still go on YouTube and see some of the internet stuff we did and there is still the occasional person who thinks those guys were just putting up videos on their own. That said, let me give you my cynical vision of the television business. The television business is clinging to the side of a cliff and holding on with one hand. The old way of doing business which was to put a show on network TV, sell advertising and then try to get to syndication is still the best way to monetize creative stuff and until somebody figures out how to make money on the internet it is more something you do for fun on the side. The problem is that TV is always the last to the game and usually the industry only picks up on trends about a year after the trend has died. The only one who has come close to figuring out a way after working his ass off the internet is Joss Whedon. But he had to write a f*cking musical and sell songs on iTunes. Otherwise your engaged in a hobby, but I would love to figure out a way to do it.

Well I for one look forward to that day. Continued success with both COUGAR TOWN and SCRUBS.
Daniel thanks for giving a sh*t about all these TV shows, I really appreciate it.

COUGAR TOWN airs Wednesday nights at 9:30PM on ABC (CityTV in Canada)

Good News: The first episode of Mindy Kaling’s (THE OFFICE) new web series HOUSE POOR is guaranteed to put a smile on your face. Bad News: There’s something terribly wrong with Network TV when Kaling’s three minute and eleven second video illicits more laughs than almost every comedy currently on TV. [See Video Above]

Good News: Wednesday’s episode of PUSHING DAISIES saw its ratings climb 16 percent to 6.6 million viewers. Bad News: Yet still managed to finish fourth in its timeslot up against Obama, Obama and yes, you guessed it, more Obama. [Source]

Good Great News: SCRUBS creator Bill Lawrence is teaming up with ex-FRIEND Courteney Cox for COUGAR TOWN. A new comedy set to air on ABC revolving around an attractive and newly single 40-year-old mother and her teenage son. Bad News: Ummm… Bill Lawrence and Courteney Cox teaming up for an ABC Comedy… the only bad news there is that it most likely won’t hit the airwaves until Spring 2009! [Source]

Apparently delivering stellar comedy for six seasons wasn’t enough of a challenge for SCRUBS creator Bill Lawrence — he just had to take on Broadway. In its sixth [and possibly final season] Bill Lawrence, with the help of the brilliant creators of Broadway’s AVENUE Q present SCRUBS: THE MUSICAL!. The episode, airing in five weeks, revolves around an actual medical case of a woman who had an aneurism that resulted in her seeing everything as a musical. While there is no doubt that the episode will be a hit, this TV Addict thinks the bigger question is how long until some enterprising producer decides to stage an actual version of SCRUBS: THE MUSICAL? After-all, in a recent interview with theTVaddict.com, Zach Braff [a self-proclaimed theatre nerd himself] said, “At some point in my career I’d like to sing ‘Corner of the Sky’ on Broadway.”

Bill Lawrence: First and foremost on that list is that network executives have no clue as to what they’re doing when it comes to comedy. When we started doing promos for SCRUBS, the network insisted that we add a studio audience laugh track. Back then, the belief was that classic studio sitcoms were the way to go.

Now the very same executives are more then happy to say that nobody likes multi-camera sitcoms — it’s a dead medium. Of course the reality is that it’s not that multi-camera sitcoms don’t work, it’s that people don’t like crap. There are so many options out there with TiVo and 150 channels. My goal is to just not make crap.

You would think that when you go pitch a show as a comedy writer, a network executive would say, we obviously have no idea how it works, we should do what you want. Yet for some reason what ends up on the air is yet another comedy with a fat husband and a thin hot wife.

Hollywood loves to panick and make grand statements. One thing I always look at is that more people then ever are watching TV. Less people are watching network TV, so network TV has to evolve. We have to adapt and make television shows more fiscally responsible.

There are two ways to survive now. You can be the one in a trillion show that grabs the public as a whole, an across the board hit like AMERICAN IDOL or GREY’S ANATOMY. But that’s like catching lightening in a bottle, and good luck staying at the top, because it becomes a battle.

Or your other way of surviving is to become a cult show. BUFFY was one of the first. Your fan base is so loyal that you might have to go that extra mile, do something online, interact with them, provide them with extra material. But if you can keep that loyal group hooked, surviving time-slot change after time-slot change, you can survive in perpetuity. SCRUBS is not a giant hit, but we’re in for six years. The decision to survive for a 7th year is kind of in our own lap.

Click here for yesterday’s feature on SCRUBS featuring star Zach Braff and Bill Lawrence

Check back tomorrow as Zach and Bill talk about how important music is on SCRUBS

The Laughs Are Back as MUST SEE TV returns

There was a time when Thursday night TV meant only one thing: NBC’s Must-See line-up, which featured such powerhouse hits as SEINFELD and THE COSBY SHOW. But somewhere along the line, things took a very unfunny turn as the classic sitcoms faded away and were replaced by dreck such as VERONICA’S CLOSET and THE SINGLE GUY. This Thursday, however, the network does its darndest to reclaim the night from such stiff competition as GREY’S ANATOMY and UGLY BETTY by presenting a two-hour comedy block filled with shows that are actually funny.

That’s right, for the first time in many years, NBC may once again claim (and truthfully, this time) that its Thursday night lineup — MY NAME IS EARL, THE OFFICE, SCRUBS and 30 ROCK — is Must-See TV.

And the only person happier about that than we are is SCRUB’s creator Bill Lawrence. “I love that we’re on Thursdays on NBC in the midst of the entire industry crapping on comedy,” he says. “We’re part of a night of four great comedies, and I think it’s cool to be there. Sure it’s our 150th time slot, but I’m psyched about it”.

While the show’s latest time slot puts the comedic docs up against the bed-hopping surgeons of GREY’S ANATOMY and CSI’s morgue squad, Lawrence isn’t complaining. “We used to wake up and look at the ratings for the first three years. But after six years in this creepy deserted hospital, the networks are down to ten live-action comedies. Frankly, I’m surprised and happy that we still have jobs.”

Star Zach Braff is more than ready to see his alter ego take on McDreamy and company. “No matter where they move us — Saturday before cartoons or Sunday after the preacher — we’re always going to have the same loyal core audience,” he says.

Those fans needn’t worry that the recent baby-to-be boom which found three (count ‘em… three!) characters pregnant at the same time will result in the show morphing into a hospital-bound version of FULL HOUSE. “In the beginning,” explains Lawrence, “we really were going to have two characters be pregnant. But then my wife [Crista Miller, who plays Jordan] got pregnant, so we said ‘Screw it, we’ll have three babies.’” But don’t expect the show to suddenly focus on the hospital’s maternity. “People say kids always change a show, but on EVERYBODY LOVES RAYMOND, I think I saw those kids eight times in seven years.”

Instead, expect to see more of the same… including the return of such popular past guest stars as Tom Cavanaugh, Freddie Rodriguez, Elizabeth Banks, Michael Weston and Cheryl Hines. Lawrence would also love to see Scott Foley return to throw a monkey wrench into the love life of Sarah Chalke’s Dr. Reid. And don’t be surprised if Masi Oka — better known as the aptly named time-travelling Hiro on a little show you may have heard of called HEROES — slips back into the lab coat he wore as SCRUBS’ lab tech, Franklyn.

One thing Lawrence says fans shouldn’t look for is a revolving door of big-name stars. “Stunt casting is a sham,” he declares, citing one of his own network’s past hits as an example. “This week on WILL & GRACE: Osama Bin Laden! The [networks] feel that when they have a ‘name’ they have to promote it with a thousand commercials,” he explains. “I think the reality is that people would watch the show if they just ran the thousand commercials without touting Special Guest Star Carrot Top.”

In the end, neither Lawrence nor Braff have any delusions about taking down the competition, insisting that attracting a new audience isn’t their number-one priority. “We pretty much make the show for ourselves and for our fans,” Braff concludes. “Bill could very easily write more sex or love triangles, and the ratings might go up. But it’s really about staying true to the vision, not catering to what everybody wants.” But should the network suddenly apply pressure to make the show a bit more like its rival, the actor has a very ANATOMY-like triangle in mind. “J.D., the lawyer and the janitor,” he says with a smile. “Stay tuned!”

Be sure to check back all this week as theTVaddict.com celebrates the return of TV’s best comedy. Tuesday — Thursday will feature more questions and answers with creator Bill Lawrence and star Zach Braff.