TNT green-lit to series Truth in Advertising, the Shephard/Robin show it had been developing about two ad-agency creative executives.
Will & Grace’s Eric McCormack and Ed’s Tom Cavanagh will head up an ensemble cast with 13 episodes of the hour-long drama slated to premiere in 2009.
Truth focuses on challenges to the friends’ professional and personal relationships when one overtakes the other to become the chief creative executive at their big-time Chicago advertising firm. Greer Shephard and Michael Robin, the team behind TNT’s The Closer, will executive-produce with Closer writers Hunt Baldwin and John Covney.
The show’s pickup comes on the heels of TNT green-lighting Men of a Certain Age, the male buddy drama starring Ray Romano.
Both are part of an ambitious plan to comprise the network’s entire primetime schedule of originals, rather than acquired fare, by 2010.
“Truth in Advertising takes place in the high-pressure world of advertising, but it’s really a story of friendship and values and how those things are strained by the often-conflicting demands of work and family,” said Michael Wright, senior vice president in charge of the content-creation group for TNT, TBS and Turner Classic Movies.
