Amazon Pilot Season: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

By Spencer Coile 

Each year, Amazon releases a handful of their pilot episodes for Prime members to stream. This is a unique twist on determining the worth of new series -- viewer feedback factors prominently into Amazon's pickup decisions. Recent Amazon hits such as Transparent, Mozart in the Jungle, and recently The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel have all weathered Amazon pilot season to become full fledged series. 

Yet while this trend is potentially on its way out the door, we were still offered a fresh batch of pilot episodes to help get us through fall of 2017: The Climb, Love You More, and Sea Oak. But which of these three (if any) have the most potential for receiving a full series pickup?...

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Stage Door: A Hellavu "On the Town" Revival

New York, New York, a helluva town.
The Bronx is up, but the Battery's down.
The people ride in a hole in the groun'.
New York, New York, it's a helluva town! ♪ ♫

On the Town, the 1944 stage musical by Betty Comden & Adolph Green, most famous in its 1949 big screen incarnation with Gene Kelly & Frank Sinatra, is back on the boards. (Just in time for Green's centennial this December. What a songwriting pair those two were.)

I always thought the '49 film was somewhat forgotten, at least in comparison to Anchors Aweigh (1945) the first Kelly/Sinatra sailors musical but maybe that's because I'm an Oscar freak and the first pairing was a much bigger Oscar deal in its day with 5 nominations and a win. So I was surprised some years ago that On the Town made the AFI's 25 greatest musicals list at #19 . I always thought of it as very stage bound so I shouldn't have been surprised that it's so utterly delightful on the stage. [more]

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