ABC’s recent shows have been about showing the diverse parts of America’s culture from African American households to those living with a disability. The network’s successes in spotlighting what society looks like today have paved the way for a new emerging demographic…Single Parents. (in 2017 there were 16 million single parents with single fathers making up 16% of that number.)
KIMRIE LEWIS, JAKE CHOI, BRAD GARRETT
Single Parents on ABC follows a group of single parents as they lean on each other to help raise their 7-year-old kids and maintain some kind of personal lives outside of parenthood. The series begins when the group meets Will, a 30-something guy who’s been so focused on raising his daughter that he’s lost sight of who he is as a man. When the other single parents see just how far down the rabbit hole of PTA, parenting and princesses Will has gone, they reluctantly band together to save their own routine while latently getting Will back into the swing of the normal adult world. It’s a show about reclaiming identity in a time of adult life that calls for constant sacrifice.
On the TCA panel: Katherine Pope (Exec Prod), JJ Philbin (Co-Creator), Elizabeth Meriwether (Co-creator), Jason Winer (Exec Prod), stars Kimrie Lewis (Poppy), Brad Garrett (Doug), Taran Killam (Will), Leighton Meester (Angie), and Jake Choi (Miggy)
The panel talked about “room parents” in classrooms, Philbin’s inspiration for the show is her own fear of becoming a room parent.
Meriwether was asked about the transition from FOX to ABC’s workspace. Some of her idea for this show came from writing characters on New Girl who were going to be parents and during her own pregnancy.
Garrett’s character has bits of Roy Martin according to the actor. In the show, his wife was an exotic dancer. When asked how she passed, his ironic response “On the pole”. In his real life he told a bit of his own experiences including joking about how his marriage “Cut into his wife’s dating.”
The TCA panel revealed the group had only just gone through its first series table read. Meaning producers weren’t ready to reveal specific upcoming stories but did reveal a lot of them would revolve around finding love and these friends leaning on one another.
