The annals of American networks are littered with failed attempts to remake British comedy series. For every Office, there is a Spaced or a Coupling. US channel NBC has already tried to craft a take on Graham Linehan’s ace sitcom The IT Crowd and failed. The company is trying again, making a deal with Scrubs producer Bill Lawrence.
This is a tough one to figure out. One the one hand, we’re really not sure that anyone needs to make another IT Crowd: it was a perfect sealed bubble of a show that helped boost the careers of stars Chris O’Dowd, Richard Ayoade and Katherine Parkinson. But then you have Lawrence, the man behind Spin City, Scrubs and more recently, Cougar Town and Ground Floor, who will be working with Neil Goldman and Garrett Donovan, two former Scrubs writer/producers who went on to help Dan Harmon make Community.
So there are certainly some clever, demonstrably funny people on board for this one. And in a weird coincidence, the star of the ill-fated 2006 take on the show (which also imported Ayoade) was one Joel McHale, who ended up on Community. You can watch a little of the pilot, which ended up scrapped by a regime change at the channel, here{
In further encouraging news, Linehan himself is involved, as he confirmed via Twitter.
Yep. I'm closely involved and we're going to get it right this time RT [@PaulFORegan](https://twitter.com/PaulFORegan): Any thoughts on NBC trying an IT Crowd remake again? > > — Graham Linehan (@Glinner) [October 16, 2014](https://twitter.com/Glinner/status/522878661083791360)
However it shakes out, the new show will take on the basic concept: two nerdy IT guys slaving away in the basement of a massive corporation are confronted with working for a new female manager who knows nothing about technology. It has what they call in the trade a “put-pilot commitment”, meaning that at least one episode will be produced to see if the channel picks it up.