Life’s Work is a memoir by famed TV producer David Milch, who counts NYPD Blue and Deadwood among his credits. Milch’s story also touches on his considerable vices, including substance abuse and gambling. It’s a quick read, at 276 pages, and much of the book plays as though Milch is sitting next to you on a park bench, sharing his life story. 

Milch grew up in Buffalo. His father was a surgeon who dabbled in organized crime, at times operating on wounded mobsters. He was also an abusive alcoholic, and his son turned to alcohol early in life.  

Milch’s best friend growing up was a kid named Judgy, and his father was an abusive alcoholic too. Judgy didn’t live long, dying in a drunk-driving accident in college. But he popped up in Milch’s work at various times in his writing career. 

That career began as a novelist. Milch studied at Yale, where his professors included Robert Penn Warren, and his classmates were President George W. Bush and John Kerry, Bush a fraternity brother. Drugs and alcohol were eagerly consumed by Milch. 

Milch then went to grad school at the famed University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop, where his professors included Kurt Vonnegut. Heroin and alcohol dependency continued, and he drove his professors bonkers. While in Iowa, Milch was also involved in an illicit business involving the manufacturing of acid. 

Milch found himself in New Haven again at Yale Law School, but was drunk much of the time, and his heart was never in it. 

His debut novel found a publisher but did not sell much, and Milch tried writing for TV. He landed at Hill Street Blues in 1982, and learned the tricky craft from some masters. 

His spinoff Beverly Hills Buntz did not last long, but Milch and actor Dennis Franz moved on to NYPD Blue. On that project, Milch got very close to Bill Clark, a New York detective who consulted on show scripts and stuck close to Milch for much of his remaining life. 

NYPD Blue gets a good chunk of the book, and Milch shares that Franz’s Detective Cipowiz was based in part on his father. 

Milch spent more and more time, and money, at the horse track, and said he bet a million dollars in one day–more than once. 

He holds down a series of big jobs in television despite his dependency on drugs and alcohol, and trips to the racetrack that involve frightfully large bets. He shares about his work after NYPD Blue, including Brooklyn South, and shows that did not catch on, including Big Apple and something called John From Elsewhere and His Friend Tex. He also shares about the friends (Henry Winkler, Ed O’Neill) and enemies (Leslie Moonves) he makes in Hollywood. 

Milch later pitches HBO a series detailing Christianity in ancient Rome. It reminds HBO execs of another project in the works at the network, so Milch pivots, and comes up with a western set in the 1870s with a similar theme. Deadwood is born. 

He finds the project very satisfying, but is heartbroken when it is cancelled after three seasons. 

After that is oddball surfer drama John From Cincinnati. It launches on HBO out of the Sopranos series finale, but only lasts for ten episodes. 

Milch also talks about his doomed HBO series Luck, which aimed to make sense of the creator’s time spent at the racetrack. “The hope going into this work, not fully articulated but nevertheless moving in me, was that through the art, my experiences at the track would be transformed, would come to mean something new,” he writes. 

Luck had Dustin Hoffman and Nick Nolte in the cast, and Michael Mann in the exec producer crew, but three horses died during two seasons of production, and the project was scrapped. 

Around the same time, Milch and his wife got a call from their business managers that his gambling has put the family in a deep, deep hole. 

Needing to get back to work, he pitched HBO a series on a Murdoch-like family called The Money, which had Brendan Gleeson, Ray Liotta and Nathan Lane in the cast. It never saw the light of day, though Milch acknowledges that another series detailing a Murdoch-like family, Succession, saw great success years later. 

Amidst his family’s dire financial situation, Milch is put on a $40 a week allowance. He is later diagnosed with dementia, seriously limiting his ability to leave the house. 

Other projects, bearing the titles Big City and Shadow Country, don’t get past pilot either, but Milch was pleased to get back onto Deadwood for a finale movie, which premieres in 2019. 

He relocates to an assisted living facility that same year. “It’s awful being crippled like this,” he writes. “Hobbled. It’s a hobbling. It’s an accumulation of the ineffectual. I can’t remember what I meant to do.”

As the book concludes, Milch finds peace with what he’s contributed to popular culture, and with his growing family. He sums himself up in a sentence: “My deepest belief about myself is that, given half a chance, I’ll steal your dope and help you look for it.”

Milch is quick to point out both his faults and his attributes, including his generosity to staff writers, crew members, and those looking to get started in Hollywood. The book moves rapidly, only slowing down when Milch offers up complicated philosophical explanations for the genesis of his various shows.  

It is a testament to Milch’s talents that he rose so high in television, despite his addiction issues. One can’t help but wonder what he might’ve accomplished without those vices holding him back. ■

HBO has set the premiere date for its much anticipated Deadwood movie for May 31, the network said Thursday. 

Deadwood: The Movie will bring back stars of the drama series that ran on HBO from 2004-06, including Ian McShane, Timothy Olyphant, and Molly Parker, said the network. 

During its three-season, 36-episode run on HBO Deadwood series was nominated for 28 Primetime Emmy Awards and won eight.

Beverly Hills, Calif. — HBO programming president Casey Bloys was on the hot seat Wednesday at the network's TCA summer press tour session as TV critics peppered the executive with questions about the network’s controversial new series Confederate.

Complete coverage of the 2017 TCA Summer Press Tour.

The series, which will be produced by Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss and will depict what the nation would look like if the South had won the Civil War, drew initial backlash when ammounced, from critics concerned about how the issue of race, and slavery in particular, would be portrayed.

Related: HBO Greenlights ‘Confederate’ From ‘Game of Thrones’ Producers

Bloys said the network’s decision to announce the show via a press release without any context from the producers was “misguided” and should have been handled differently.

“If I had to do it over again I would have let the producers sit and talk about it,” Bloys said. “The key to all of this is the context and hearing from the creators. All we can do is ask people to judge the final product rather than what it could be or might be.”

MCN Flashback > TCA16: HBO's Casey Bloys Takes Heat During TCA Session

Bloys also said the long anticipated revival of Western-themed series Deadwood is coming closer to fruition, adding that he’s excited about the new script for the David Milch series, which ran on HBO from 2004-2008. “If we can do it for a budget that makes sense and we can get the cast together then we’re inclined to do it," Bloys said. 

He also said the network is close to greenlighting a third season of its anthology series True Detective, which will feature Moonlight actor Mahershala Ali. “I’m very impressed and excited about what I’ve read,” Bloys said of the script for True Detective.

Bloys also addressed the Game Of Thrones spinoffs, saying that none of the characters in the current Game Of Thrones series will appear in any of the series followups.   

CBS Studios International said it has reached a multi-territory licensing deal with online video giant Netflix for CBS and Showtime series like Ray Donovan and Dexter in six European markets and the Netherlands.

The agreement also gives Netflix exclusive first-window rights to the Showtime series Penny Dreadful in these markets.

In addition to Ray Donovan and Dexter, as part of the deal, CBS Studios International has also licensed to Netflix early seasons of current series Elementary, Under The Dome, Deadwood and Jericho.

“We're excited to have CBS’s world-class programming and Showtime’s acclaimed original series be part of Netflix’s launch in these territories," said CBS Global Distribution Group president and CEO Armando Nuñez in a statement.

In addition to the Netherlands, territories included in the agreement are for Netflix in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Belgium and Luxembourg.