Like the end of a slow-motion musical montage on the beach,”Baywatch» The reboot has found a home: Fox has reached a script + penalty deal for a new version of the long-running surf-sand-and-saviors series from Fremantle.
Fox and Fremantle appealed Lara Olsen (“Spinning Out”) to serve as showrunner for the new “Baywatch,” originally created by Michael Berk, Douglas Schwartz and Gregory J. Bonann. Starring David Hasselhoff, “Baywatch” originally aired from 1989 to 1999, then was revamped as “Baywatch 'Hawaii' from 1999 to 2001.
Olsen, Berk, Bonann and Schwartz will serve as executive producers on the hour-long drama, which comes from both Fremantle and Fox Entertainment. Here's the new logline: “The daring sea rescues, pristine beaches and iconic red swimsuits are back, with a whole new generation of Baywatch lifeguards, who lead complicated and messy personal lives in this action-packed reboot. action that demonstrates that there is the family that you have. You are born and the family you find.
This isn't Fox's first visit to the lifeguard cabin: The network also aired the TV reunion film “Baywatch: Hawaiian Wedding” in 2003.
Besides Hasselhoff, the show's cast over the years included Pamela Anderson, Yasmine Bleeth, Alexandra Paul, Erika Eleniak, Nicole Eggert, Parker Stevenson and many others. Hasselhoff also starred in a spinoff series, the private drama “Baywatch Nights,” which aired from 1995 to 1997. “Baywatch” was a syndication sensation, airing in more than 145 countries at one point, more than any other show of TV. The show's PR company even made up a statistic, calling it a “no.” 1 series in the world,” which was later reprinted as fact in publications.
The show was originally inspired by Bonann's time as a Los Angeles County lifeguard. Bonann later became an Olympic filmmaker and after years of hosting a show about lifeguards, he finally met Berk and Schwartz. They originally developed “Baywatch” for Grant Tinker's GTG shingle, who had a series commitment at CBS. When the Eye network moved on, the pilot “Baywatch: Panic at Malibu Pier” was sold to NBC, which aired it as a movie – and successfully picked up a 12-episode season.
“Baywatch” was a failure on NBC, and the producers managed to buy the rights to the series from GTG in order to produce new first-run episodes in syndication. The producers recruited various investors, including a small distributor, LBS, as well as an earlier version of Fremantle (which had distributed the series internationally and saw Hasselhoff's popularity in Germany), British media outlet ITV and the Chris-Craft TV channel. band. All-American TV, led by Scotti Bros. Records, agreed to invest as an underwriter of the show, then took over as distributor when LBS went bankrupt. Pearson TV later purchased All-American; Pearson eventually became part of FremantleMedia, which was created via a series of mergers by Germany's Bertelsmann in 2001. (FremantleMedia became Fremantle in 2018.)
And that's the long road that led to how “Baywatch” became a flagship title in Fremantle's library. A “Baywatch” reboot has been discussed in the past; most recently, a “Baywatch” film starring Dwayne Johnson and Zac Efron was released in 2017. This film grossed $178 million worldwide.
As for Olsen, she's very familiar with rebooting classic TV franchises, having worked on revivals of “90210” and “Beauty and the Beast,” both on the CW. His other credits include “Blood and Treasure,” “Reign,” “Life Unexpected,” and “Private Practice.” Olsen is repped by Independent Artist Group and attorney Melissa Rogal.