NBC renews ‘Chuck’ and orders four more new series for the next TV season

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‘Chuck’ fans, you’re in business, and this time Subway had nothing to do with it.

NBC has renewed ‘Chuck’ for another season. Creator Josh Schwartz took to Twitter the second he heard the good news: ‘Thank you Chuck fans for getting us a 4th season! Thrilled to keep working with amazing cast & crew.’
The network also ordered four more new shows:

‘The Cape’ is a one-hour drama series starring David Lyons (‘ER’) as Vince Faraday, an honest cop on a corrupt police force, who finds himself framed for a series of murders and presumed dead. The rest of the cast includes: Jennifer Ferrin (‘Life on Mars’), Ryan Wynott (‘Flash Forward’), James Frain (‘The Tudors’), Keith David (‘Death at a Funeral’), Summer Glaur (‘Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles’), and Dorian Missick (‘Six Degrees of Separation’). Created by Thomas Wheeler (‘Empire’), executive produced by Gail Berman and Lloyd Braun.

‘Friends With Benefits” is a comedy revolving around a group of 20-something singles as they navigate the confusing world of dating. Ben Weymouth (Ryan Hansen of “Party Down”) is on the hunt for the perfect woman who meets his unique set of standards, while his best friend, Sara Maxwell (Danneel Harris of “One Tree Hill”), is just looking for a man to settle down with and raise a family. Ben and Sara have fallen into the habit of turning to each other for moral and physical support as they wait for Mr. and Ms. Right to arrive. Their friend Aaron (Fran Kranz of “Dollhouse”), a romantic at heart, doesn’t approve of Ben and Sara’s complicated friendship, but he, along with womanizer Hoon (Ian Reed Kesler) and straight shooter Riley (Jessica Lucas of ‘Melrose Place”), are all distracted with their own dating trials and tribulations. Created by Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber (“(500) Days of Summer”), it is executive produced by Brian Grazer and Imagine Television.

‘Harry’s Law,’ formerly known as ‘Kindreds,’ is a dramatic series that follows a curmudgeonly ex-patent lawyer and his group of misfit associates -- high school biology teacher, a fashion-conscious assistant, and a recovering drug addict -- as their lives come together to form an unconventional kind of law practice. You can pretty much guess who created this one: David E. Kelley (‘Boston Legal’ and ‘The Practice.’).The cast includes Aml Ameen (‘Kidulthood’), Kathy Bates, Ben Chaplin (‘Me and Orson Welles’) and Brittany Snow (‘American Dreams’).
And in a most interesting move, NBC is back in business with Conan O’Brien. His production company’s drama, ‘Outlaw,’ starring Jimmy Smits, has been ordered. Formerly known as ‘Garza,’ the legal drama (another one!) centers around a conservative justice of the Supreme Court who, after his liberal activist attorney father dies suddenly, steps down to start a private law firm to challenge the system. But, by becoming a maverick and loose cannon, he may have made some dangerous enemies in very high places who are working toward his undoing. The rest of the cast includes Jesse Bradford, Carly Pope, David Ramsey, and Ellen Woglom.

Earlier today, NBC renewed ‘Law & Order: SVU’ and ordered a new spin-off, ‘Law & Order: Los Angeles’ but canceled the mothership: ‘Law & Order.’ The pilot for ‘Law & Order: Los Angeles’ has not been shot, and no one has been cast.

-- Maria Elena Fernandez
twitter.com/writerchicaTop photo: Jimmy Smits in ‘Outlaw.’ Credit: NBC

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