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Older American TV Writers Find Work in China

by ScreenCraft Staff - updated on September 16, 2019

American writers who were at their glory scripting older shows like The Mary Tyler Moore Show are now rejuvenating their careers for Chinese television.

E! Entertainment co-founder Larry Namer, who is also the CEO of Chinese production company Metan, has created Metan Wen Zhi Ku ("Writing Mastermind"), a collective that aims to bring the talent and style of unemployed scriptwriters to China. The company has recruited about 2,000 older writers to create content for the country.

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"While China's media business is developing at a rapid pace, core skills of storytelling are lacking," Namer told The Hollywood Reporter. "We believe Metan Wen Zhi Ku will fill this void."

The deal fills a void for the older writes, too. In 2010, many of the new Metan Wen Zhi Ku recruits were part of a class-action lawsuit that settled for $70 million. The 165 TV writers who brought the suit claimed they were shut out of jobs because of their age. But now they're finding new opportunities in the Chinese market, which calls for scripts that are less Breaking Bad and more The Golden Girls.

The themes in older American TV is exactly what Chinese media are looking to produce. According to The Hollywood Reporter, "Strict censorship rules mean edgy urban tales of corruption or erotically charged thrillers don't make it to the small screen in China, but the country's media watchdogs are just fine with the more innocent themes of, say, The Golden Girls. Although U.S. shows from the 1970s and '80s do not play in China and are not widely known, their themes resonate among China's new breed of content-hungry TV executives."

The older writers are between the ages of mid-40s to 70s, and many are Emmy and Oscar winners. They include Marilyn Anderson, who worked on The Jeffersons and Fame; Michael Elias, a writer on The Jerk, Head of the Class and The Bill Cosby Show; and Eric Estrin, who worked on Miami Vice and Murder, She Wrote.

"Our writers went from being marginalized to being entirely appropriate for the largest market in the world. It is a lovely, ironic consequence," said Namer's team member, Art Eisenson, to The Hollywood Reporter. "The parameters for Chinese television are very similar to what my generation did in network television back in the '70s and '80s."

According to THR, after establishing work in China, Metan Wen Zhi Ku plans to expand to India, Brazil and Russia, among other territories.

In other Hollywood news, Argo screenwriter Chris Terrio has signed with WME.

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