Showtime has greenlit nine episodes of The Real L Word: Los Angeles, which is both an awful title and way too reminiscent of The Real Housewives of [Some City]. Oh, but it’s not a coincidence! Showtime thinks the series could have franchise potential à la Housewives! According to Autostraddle.com, production company Magical Elves (Top Chef) was actually in talks with Bravo until Ilene Chaiken brought the project over to Showtime. Variety says the project is “dependent on casting” and that “if all goes as planned, The Real L Word would debut sometime next year.” Chaiken told the press, “Even though we concluded our sixth season of The L Word on Showtime this past March, I believe we are not nearly finished telling our L Word stories.”
I believe “our” may have been the wrong word choice there. Sounds to me like the plan is to go around to different cities picking the prettiest lesbians, styling them according to designer sponsorship (in the true spirit of the original Word), and letting the real people’s lesbianny drama play out so that Ilene Chaiken doesn’t have to write anything else original about lesbians. And if it sucks, they can just blame the lesbians. And then, to soften the blow, Jane the Producer from PopWatch’s favorite canceled show ever, The Comeback, can pop up and say “I just think your ‘reality’ could be more interesting.” As magical as the Elves have proven themselves to be, this proposal just sounds bad to me.
What do you think — could a reality show reflect “the way that [lesbians] liiiiiiiiiive…and loooooooove” better than a scripted series, or is this idea as awful as the entire Max storyline?
Photo Credit: Showtime
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Ilene Chaiken is a hack. The L word was a garbage night time soap and I was more than happy to let it die.
Stupid. Cancel this before stupid Chaiken can earn money off of it. She doesn’t deserve it. Can’t even believe that they’re putting this trash on Showtime. … not still bitter at all about the ending of the L Word. Can you tell?
Awful idea. Ilene seems determined to wring every last cent and all the soul out of the L Word. She should just man up and admit she blew it by killing off the L Word early, counting on The Farm being picked up. That awful joke of a 6th season smacked of someone who had already moved on. Now we’re seeing Chaiken’s desperate attempt to keep the cash cow alive.
Has she run out of money already? JESUS!!!! Nothing know to women kind could be as bad as any of The L Word story lines. Ilene Chaiken is a fakess and a fraud and should just fade away quietly.
she basically screwed up any chance for a proper Alice spinoff by having such a dumb non-ending waste of a season (a little bitter)…the catwalk through the parking lot broke my heart. I dedicated so much time to the L Word and got nothing in the end but anger and resentment. I do not want more reality…I want a finale I can be happy with and Alice to have a spin-off with little dashes of the other ladies every once and a while…thank god that “Shane” is going to be on CBS this fall…
I don’t really watch those Housewives shows, but come on, isn’t it time for a little equality? Can’t lesbians create their own terrible reality programs, just like everyone else? It’s the 21st century for crying out loud.
Chaiken? No way will I watch it if she’s involved.
To be honest, I thought ‘The Real L Word’ title sounded reminiscent of ‘The Real World’. I mean, just pick the ‘L’ away from ‘world’, move it around, and…well, you get the point.
Even though I haven’t watched an episode of this show, I get the feeling it’s going to devolve into lesbian porn. If that’s the case, what’s the point of it existing?
Ilene Chaiken is not a writer, she is a copy catter that steals ideas and makes them hers. PATHETIC!! Please stop that woman before he makes every lesbian out there look like an idiot!
Name the show anything you want, I’m tired of being jerked around by Hollywood execs. All I want is an ‘L Word’ series about Beautiful Lesbians and their drama. On again off again no more lesbian and gay series? Every other life style has their shows, what about us? After L Word ended, I felt very sad and cancelled cable TV.
As long as I’m in the Minneapolis cast, I’m all for it.
l word was a good show that have a poor ending i think all the fans of the show deserve a really good finale. The real l word sounds like a bad copy of the l word. Ilene sell her soul for MONEY!!!!!!
As long as there is someone on the show who looks even slightly like Katherine Moennig I will gladly tune in.