Chuck Lorre Lands Comedy on Netflix

Netflix has ordered the comedy Disjointed from Chuck Lorre, comic mastermind behind The Big Bang Theory, Two and a Half Men and other hit sitcoms. Warner Bros. Television is producing the half hour, multi-camera comedy. Kathy Bates stars.

Netflix has committed to an initial order of 20 episodes for the workplace comedy, where Bates plays the owner of a Los Angeles cannabis dispensary.

Lorre and David Javerbaum, formerly of The Daily Show and the Onion satire newspaper, are executive producers.

It’s a significant move to the SVOD world for Lorre, whose shows are a staple on broadcast TV. Netflix describes the cast as including three “budtenders”, Bates’ character’s twenty-something son and a deeply troubled security guard—“all of them are more or less constantly high.” Such loglines would not likely fly on broadcast.

Chuck Lorre Productions shares producing duties with Warner Bros. Television.

Michael Malone is content director at B+C and Multichannel News. He joined B+C in 2005 and has covered network programming, including entertainment, news and sports on broadcast, cable and streaming; and local broadcast television, including writing the "Local News Close-Up" market profiles. He also hosted the podcasts "Busted Pilot" and "Series Business." His journalism has also appeared in The New York Times, The L.A. Times, The Boston Globe and New York magazine.