AHC - Popular American TV lawyer show w/no criminal or family law

Your challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to create a TV show centered aroundt he practice of lw a la Perry Mason, Matlock, etc., running at least 4 years (not sure if 3 or 5 is best guide so I split the difference), which is in the top 10 at least 2 years. (As an alternative, it can fail to be top 10 in the Nielsens but simply crack the top 25 if it's on for at least 8 years.)

The catch: There must be no Criminal Law or Family Law practiced by the attorney in question. He/she can do wills/estate planning/probate, contracts, whatever, but must choose never to handle Criminal law or Family Law cases, but refer them to others who handle such cases off screen.(This to get around those who would argue that Perry Mason never seemed to get as far as the trial itself anyway.)

Now, you can have a Sweeps Month special where a will contest includes a murder, for instance, but you must have the main character only dealing with the any courtroom drama in the prescribed areas. Criminal activity like moving property markers around and having to figure out who did it can also happen. My main interest is in seeing if someone can cleverly develop a show based on areas that in general involve a lot less conflict and witha lot less riding ont he outcomes than in the tradition shows.
 
Simple: Entertainment Law. HBO, flush with the success of Entourage (or one of HBO's competitors, probably someone like Showtime), decides to dive deeper into the glitzy underbelly of Hollywood. The show follows a high priced entertainment contract lawyer, who bounced from the boardroom to the barroom, with plenty of sex, drugs, and booze to keep the moral guardians hearts fluttering and the 18-35 demo tuning in.
 

Vahktang

Donor
100 episodes is the magic number. At that point you can strip it and syndicate it, showing it 5 days a week. This can take 4 seasons now a days.
From the early 90's, a half hour comedy:
The Reprobates, a family of lawyers, their wives, husbands and staff, who deal in real estate, probate and wills, in a county where the big river can change property lines every spring.
Each week would include a thinly disguised fictional tv family as the B story: the Flintstones, the Munsters, the Huxtables, often with the original actor reprising their role.
Starring: Ed O'Neal as the Patriarch, a wise old hand trying to stay in business and out of jail.
Michael J. Fox as his son, thinking himself too good for this practice and blaming his lack of success on that he never got to go to an Ivy League school. Anyone who does show up with that degree gets fawned over or dispised.He is married.
Jenny McCarthy as O'Neal's daughter, also a real estaye agent, trying not to cross the ethical line, witb a heavy dating life geared towards contacts.
Add in staff, associates, other relatives a.d guest stars from other lawyer shows and it should do well
On NBC, thursdays at 9, or ABC produced by Susan Harris.
 
100 episodes is the magic number. At that point you can strip it and syndicate it, showing it 5 days a week. This can take 4 seasons now a days.
From the early 90's, a half hour comedy:
The Reprobates, a family of lawyers, their wives, husbands and staff, who deal in real estate, probate and wills, in a county where the big river can change property lines every spring.
Each week would include a thinly disguised fictional tv family as the B story: the Flintstones, the Munsters, the Huxtables, often with the original actor reprising their role.
Starring: Ed O'Neal as the Patriarch, a wise old hand trying to stay in business and out of jail.
Michael J. Fox as his son, thinking himself too good for this practice and blaming his lack of success on that he never got to go to an Ivy League school. Anyone who does show up with that degree gets fawned over or dispised.He is married.
Jenny McCarthy as O'Neal's daughter, also a real estaye agent, trying not to cross the ethical line, witb a heavy dating life geared towards contacts.
Add in staff, associates, other relatives a.d guest stars from other lawyer shows and it should do well
On NBC, thursdays at 9, or ABC produced by Susan Harris.

lol, this is brilliant.

Considering that this challenge was borne out of my learning that in rural kentucky boundary lines really are drawn up like that (the one in question included a white oak "at the edge of the woods" and a stone in someone's line (who died decades ago)) the river changing boundaries is perfect.:)
 
Contract Law can be exciting, you can have villians trying to cheat people out of their rightful obligations, corrupt back stabbers out for themselves and raise the stakes.

You can have millions of dollars on the table, or have some ones lively hood on the floor. This stuff matters and does effect people.

If you want a bigbang theory esqu show have it be about patent and copy right law. The lawyers are all geeks trying to save their pet francess's. A good show might be about them all fighting to work on the star wars case.
 
Due Diligence -- a financial thriller

While this does stray into crime / terror areas, the idea is that the focus of the show involves putting together clues in the nexus of finance, campaign financing and corporate "shell" restructures.


Due Diligence

Ruth Sanderson – southern woman from humble origins who won full scholarships to Harvard (B.A. – Finance) and Yale Law School (J.D.). Post-graduation, she clerked for an elderly patrician Supreme Court Justice who maintains an avuncular watch over his former clerks. She’s hired by a Boston Brahmin, 200 year old firm that handles the legal work of a massively powerful investment bank (based on Goldman, Sachs). She is uncomfortable there but needs all the money she can get to take care of her parents. Her father has lung disease from working in a factory that burned OSHA signs for extra fuel; her mother has Alzheimer’s. She has an older brother who is an Army Ranger.

Robert Winston III – Boston born and bred, wealthy and politically powerful family background, former Yale Law student with Ruth. They were involved briefly but she broke it off when his family obviously disapproved of her. He has followed the standard course laid out for members of his family who become lawyers and is working as an Assistant U.S. Attorney to build credentials for a future political run.

Steven Carpenter IV – Boston Brahmin, managing partner of the firm in which Ruth Sanderson works. Ostensibly eager to fast track her into partner status as the firm’s male / female ratio is about as balanced as an NFL football lineup, he nonetheless is the keeper of secrets – which means her biggest supporter may actually be her worst enemy.

Individual episodes show her coping in various ways with being in a male upper class bubble that considers her a “hick” female.

The overall story arc involves her doing the “due diligence” grunge work on a series of inter-related money transfers, corporate mergers and reorganizations, and K Street lobbying in DC. She quickly realizes something doesn’t add up and pursues it despite Carpenter’s irritation.

She winds up looking at major money laundering, chasing the money trails to soft money organizations and bundlers that favor various congressmen and other politicians,. Late in the overall arc, she realizes there are pocket accounts made off of overnight currency exchange swings, and traces them back to possible terrorist organizations that may be gaming the system to arrange for a devastating WMD attack on the U.S. Even late in the overall arc, it’s not clear who knows that’s what is happening and who is just being played as fools. One of Robert Winston’s uncles, running for Governor in his adopted state of New York (and eyeing the White House beyond that) is one of the biggest beneficiaries of the scheme.

Winston trips over some of the same evidence while investigating a series of insider trading schemes. He also sees that Ruth is handling most of the grunt level paperwork. He and Ruth circle each other warily, not sure who to trust, and also ride a wave of sexual tension between them.
 

Vahktang

Donor
Wills/estates can be very intriguing/resource consuming also.
Dickens had a famous case, Jarndyce v. Jarndyce concerning a large inheritance. It went on for generations and by the time the case was settled lawyers' fees had devoured the entire estate.
Based on real cases.
The case in the series could be like the Anselmo case in the series Moonlighting.
 
Contract Law can be exciting, you can have villians trying to cheat people out of their rightful obligations, corrupt back stabbers out for themselves and raise the stakes.

You can have millions of dollars on the table, or have some ones lively hood on the floor. This stuff matters and does effect people.

If you want a bigbang theory esqu show have it be about patent and copy right law. The lawyers are all geeks trying to save their pet francess's. A good show might be about them all fighting to work on the star wars case.

The Paper Chase was made into a TV show for a while in the 70s/80s. That dealt with contract-law in university, though not in an actual law firm.
 
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