Creator

Prof. Pettigrew shares his five best university movies ever

Last Friday I had the opportunity to talk to Shawn Ryan, creator of The Chicago Code, a very promising new drama that premieres next Monday. Ryan, one of the many impressive TV writer-producers who cut his teeth on Nash Bridges, has become a very impressive and prolific writer-producer, creating The Shield and acting as showrunner on The Unit, Lie To Me, and most recently Terriers. The new show is a sort of epic cop show starring Jason Clarke and (after previously appearing as a recurring character on Lie To Me) Jennifer Beals. It’s one of a number of recent shows, most famously The Good Wife, that tries to infuse the so-called procedural form with a more epic quality by presenting a setup that is much bigger than one case; in this show, the idea is to incorporate crime drama, family drama, and politics. Ryan was nice enough to answer a few questions about the show, plus one about Terriers, and he even patiently answered a question he must be getting a lot lately — about titles.

Earl Pomerantz, in the latest of his great posts about his year with Major Dad, says that he envied people like fellow Canadian Bernard Slade, who was able to create shows without having to run them: