Are you ready for gay and grey hilarity and hijinx in a show modeled after The Golden Girls — overseen by two of the collaborators behind the classic TV sitcom?
In an exclusive, Variety reports that a production company called Super Deluxe is teaming with producers and writers James Berg and Stan Zimmerman to develop series for television called Silver Foxes.
Described by Variety as a single-camera half-hour show, the series is said to revolve around two gay men of, ahem, advanced years and and a “twink,” (described as the lover of one of the men) who liberate a friend from an assisted living facility where’s he’s been “forced back into the closet.” Once ensconced in their Palm Springs home, the quartet forge a fast and “fabulous family of friends.” Turner Broadcasting, the parent company of Super Deluxe, intends to push the show forward to find an eventual home as an ongoing streaming or cable TV series.
Silver Foxes creators Berg and Zimmerman are longtime collaborators responsible in part for such small screen landmarks as Roseanne, Gilmore Girls and of course, The Golden Girls. As a duo. they are also responsible for Rita Rocks, a 2008 comedy that aired on Lifetime, and worked together on the film A Very Brady Sequel.
Variety says the team got their inspiration from a documentary about LGBTQ seniors coping with discrimination in nursing homes called Gen Silent. Last year, Berg and Zimmerman held a much-publicised gathering to read the pilot with a cast of professionals including Leslie Jordan, George Takei, Bruce Vilanch, Todd Sherry, Daniele Gaither, Cheri Oteri and Melissa Peterman.
At that time, Zimmerman told The Huffington Post that ““In all my years in television, I’ve never seen a script reading get so much attention. I think this proves that there’s a great interest in seeing a sitcom like ours come to life. Ageism and homophobia are not only keeping the show from getting picked up, but from even being read by a major network.”
It’s possible those obstacles have now been surmounted. And if that doesn’t say something about the rise of daddies in gay culture, there’s another show called West 40s, which foucses on a group of gays over 40 working out their midlife crises in Hell’s Kitchen, where the pilot recently completed shooting.
