Piloting Chicago TV Comedy

By Rob Christopher in Arts & Entertainment on Nov 27, 2006 5:10PM

If you're a writer, Thanksgiving weekend is always rife with material. In addition to amateur night at the bars on T-Day Eve (if you were brave enough to venture out), there are the usual family shenanigans on the day of, and a juicy Black Friday anecdote or two. What's more, the office Christmas party is approaching. If you're feeling starved for material around this time of the year, then you obviously aren't paying attention.

Instead of letting it all slip through your fingers, why not mine some of that gold and create a pilot episode for a sitcom? The Chicago Film Office in association with the Chicago Short Comedy Film & Video Festival has announced the Chicago Comedy TV Pilot Competition. The best 20-30 minute pilot episode wins a $5,000 cash prize and will also get the attention of some top TV execs.

You've heard us whine again and again about how crappy most TV comedy is nowadays, and about how sad it is that there isn't much in the way of comedy television coming out of Chicago. Well here's your chance to shut us up. And maybe at the same time you can beat NBC and Second City to the punch. The deadline is March 27th, so get cracking.