Everything old is new again — especially at NBC.
The network that revels in rebooting old shows will go back to the retread well — again — with “Remington Steele,” the 1980s dramedy that launched the career of future “James Bond” star Pierce Brosnan.
The new version in development would recast the series as a half-hour comedy, with the daughter of Steele and Olivia Holt (played by Stephanie Zimbalist in the original) reopening the once-famous detective agency— only to fall into the same romantic entanglements as her parents.
While TV reboots are found across the dial — CBS’ “Hawaii Five-0,” TNT’s “Dallas’ and ABC’s failed “Charlie’s Angels,” to name a few — NBC has shown a particular reliance on the format in recent years as it seeks to rebuild its primetime schedule from the fallow post-“Must-See TV” years.
“I have no idea why they keep closing the drawer on their hand,” says one industry insider. “I have to believe some piece of talent — writer, director — comes in and wows them with their ‘re-imagining’ of a TV classic and they have shortterm memory.”
Back in 2008, NBC remade the ’80s series “Knight Rider,” which ran for one season. The year before, it aired eight episodes of an updated version of “The Bionic Woman” — while, in 2010, James Garner’s ’70s drama “The Rockford Files” got a new pilot from “House” creator David Shore that never saw the light of day.
NBC subsequently produced a US version of the British police drama “Prime Suspect” starring Maria Bello — canceled after 13 episodes in 2011 — and last year’s re-imagining of “The Munsters” as a one-hour drama, “Mockingbird Lane” (NBC aired its scrapped pilot as a Halloween special).
Last week saw the premiere of an update version of “Ironside,” the old Raymond Burr cop show, this time starring Blair Underwood. It premiered to mediocre reviews and low ratings (its latest episode drew only 5.2 million viewers Wednesday night).
NBC also has deals for mini-series based on ABC’s 1993 miniseries “The Tommyknockers” and the 1968 film “Rosemary’s Baby.”
“It’s branding or creating some sort of identity without having to worry too much about explaining the show,” says Brad Adgate, senior VP of research at Horizon Media.
But while an ’80s reboot like “Remington Steele” may provoke nostalgia in viewers of a certain age, it’s unlikely to mean much to the majority of those in the “younger” demographic (18-49-year-olds) targeted by advertisers.
And whether or not “Remington Steele” ever makes it to the airwaves, it did get people talking — half the battle in TV land. “It got attention,” Adgate says. “Maybe that was their intent after all.”