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The Pilot Pirate: “Playboy” and “Pan Am”

Welcome back to the Pilot Pirate, where we preview the latest scripts looking for a home on the 2011-12 primetime TV schedule. Each week, we read and preview some of the projects interest to the AfterEllen community, breaking down scripts to help you, the optimistic TV fan anxiously awaiting the next Modern Family or Glee, keep up with the onslaught of pilots in contention.

A reminder: These are early stage scripts that are likely to be revised and, in some cases, drastically change before filming, and only some of which will make it to the airwaves.

This week: Playboy and Pan Am.

Pilot: Playboy (drama)

Writers: Chad Hodge (Tru Calling)

Network: NBC

Logline: Set in the 1960s, the drama takes a look at the lives of Playboy bunnies.

Cast: Amber Heard (Zombieland), Naturi Naughton (Fame), Laura Benanti (Broadway’s Gypsy), Leah Renee, Jenna Dewan-Tatum (Step Up)

Director: Alan Taylor (Mad Men pilot)

The characters:

Nick Dalton, the ultimate playboy

Brenda, 24, first African-American Bunny (Naughton)

Carol-Lynne, 30, the very first Bunny (Benanti)

Maureen, 20, the newest Playboy Club Bunny (Heard)

Alice, 27, awkward, married Bunny who takes care of everyone but herself

Billy Morton, the club’s general manager

Max, 27, the club’s sweet bartender

Janie, 23, the naughty Bunny who’s dating Max the bartender

Leo Bianchi, 34, dark, unpredictable young mobster

Gus Bianchi, 50, the top dog in the crime family

Benny Bianchi, the top dog in the crime family

Sean, 32, Alice’s husband

Joshua, 28, Sean’s boyfriend

Complete with the 1960s style of Mad Men, the mobster appeal of Boardwalk Empire and musical performances similar to the 2002-05 series American Dreams, Playboy has it all. And that’s just what happens inside the Playboy Club.

The story unfolds here when Maureen (Amber Heard), an orphan, comes to Chicago with the hopes of becoming the next Marilyn Monroe – whom she worships after reading the story about her in the very first issue of Playboy magazine. Maureen’s a dancer at heart and the Playboy Club’s newest cigarette Bunny but longs to perform, like the club’s very first Bunny, Carol-Lynne (Laura Benanti).

Each of the Bunnies has their own hopes and dreams – and secret to keep: Maureen knows the grisly details of the accidental death of a key member of the Bianchis, Chicago’s top crime family, a secret she shares with ultimate playboy Nick Dalton, who’s romantically involved with Carol-Lynne.

Brenda (Naturi Naughton), who is the club’s first black Bunny, longs to become the first African-American Playboy centerfold.

Alice is the only Bunny in the club who is married – but after a year, none of her co-workers have met her husband, Sean. And for good reason: late in the script it’s revealed that Sean has a boyfriend, Joshua, and that Alice has been living in the closet for years. The trio regularly attends Mattachine Society meetings, to which Alice generously donates a big portion of her tips and where she meets Sally, leaving the door open for more potential lesbian story lines.

While some of the characters are fairly common – Carol-Lynne’s old but wise Bunny becomes the Bunny Mother and mentors the young girls – the script is a page-turner that has everything: Bunnies in fishnets, the mobster appeal of “The Sopranos” and with parties at the dorm-like Playboy Mansion where Bunnies take champagne showers and skinny dip, the potential for a lot of sex, love and drama.

Part of what makes Playboy so appealing is the music: there’s a real opportunity for cover bands to come in and perform both at the club and the mansion – the pilot features Ike and Tina Turner. Covers of popular ’60s-era songs also will come up big for Benanti, a Tony winner for Broadway’s Gypsy. With the casting of Fame‘s Naughton, hopefully Benanti won’t be the only one taking the stage at the club. The performances, which include “Sh-Boom” and Frank Sinatra‘s “My Kind of Town,” complement the story well and are used sparingly and effectively.

One key role remains to be cast – the Jon Hamm of the show – Nick Dalton, the ultimate playboy, who has undeniable chemistry with Heard’s Maureen, yet is entangled with Carol-Lynne. Without giving too much away, his role in the crime boss’ death, with Maureen, is pivotal to the story and he’s connected to practically every aspect of the story. It’s not clear which Bunnies Leah Renee and Jenna Dewan-Tatum will play, but one has to be Alice.

Pilot Pirate outlook: How do I become a Keyholder?

Pilot: Pan Am (drama)

Writers: Jack Orman (ER)

Network: ABC

Logline: A sexy soap set against the jet age, focusing on the stewardesses and pilots and their glamorous world full of adventures.

Cast: Christina Ricci, Margot Robbie (Neighbours)

Director: Thomas Schlamme (Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, Parenthood, The West Wing)

The characters: Bridget, 27, selected to be the purser on the Clipper Majestic; also works with Richard Parks

Dean, mid-30s, pilot, dating Bridget

Paul Gibson, Pan Am executive

Laura, 23, a newbie stewardess who just left her fiancé at the altar

Colette, 23, French stewardess who was having an affair with a married man

Kate, early 20s, Laura’s younger sister with lofty goals

Maggie, 24, beatnik and stewardess (Ricci)

Richard Parks, works intelligence for the U.S. government

Just as Glee inspired a rebirth in the musical, the success of Mad Men has prompted the networks to further explore the 1960s, with not only Playboy but also Pan Am, which like NBC’s Bunny-filled club drama takes place in 1963, this time trading Chicago for New York.

The action here revolves around famed airline Pan Am and a group of pilots, airline officials and stewardesses – as they were known at the time – as well as the personal lives, political affiliations and romantic entangling that exists among them.

What makes Pan Am successful is the great potential to explore everything about the ’60s: local and international politics during the Cold War, fashion, travel, women’s liberation, as well as the evolving dynamics of the family. All the stewardesses are smart – they’re required to be college trained and can work until married or they age out at 32 – illustrating the airline’s shortsighted view of women as only out to land a husband.

While the character of Colette in the pilot is a clichĂ© – she had an affair with a married man and didn’t know – most of the other women in the script are extremely dynamic and each stewardess brings something to the table.

Mystery surrounds Bridget – initially named the purser of The Clipper Majestic – but she fails to make the flight, prompting concern from her love interest, Dean (the newly named pilot of the Majestic), who speculates that their rescue mission in Cuba might have gotten her grounded.

Kate is the most compelling of the group. She’s close with Bridget and newbie stewardess Laura’s younger sister who isn’t afraid to upset her family in favor of seeing the world and living her life on her terms. She’s also following in Bridget’s footsteps in working intelligence for the U.S. government.

Meanwhile, Ricci’s Maggie – the actress closed the deal earlier this week – is an activist navigating a double life: the beatnik world in which she lives and materialistic life that includes her career as a stewardess at Pan Am – a job she notes will allow her to see the world in order to change it.

While Pan Am may be described as a nighttime soap, its appeal is far more than the romance, which there’s little of in the pilot. The real draw here are certainly the politics and the way in which women of the era are portrayed. While the stewardesses all may have to go through inspection – the girdle jokes bound to stretch beyond those in the pilot – the characters are well drawn and have limitless potential.

Pilot Pirate outlook: ABC should immediately upgrade this pilot to series.

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