Netflix’s current comedy slate looks nothing like the sitcom programming that broadcast TV delivered in the 1970s and 1980s, a time when shows like Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and Master of None simply couldn’t exist. But the streaming service’s newest project is a callback to that time, as they’ve given a straight-to-series order for a reboot of the classic Norman Lear-produced sitcom One Day at a Time. What’s more, EGOT winner Rita Moreno has already been signed on as a co-star.
This new version of One Day at a Time, which is being produced through Sony Pictures TV, is a reboot from the bloodline up. It will be a multi-camera comedy, the first for Netflix, that centers on a Cuban-American family headed by the newly-separated military mother of an anti-conformist teenage daughter and an introverted tween son. Moreno will play the Cuban-born grandmother who assists her daughter on a day-to-day basis, according to Deadline. As in the original, this version will also feature a building manager named Schneider. (R.I.P. Pat Harrington, Jr.)
The creative team behind this reboot will be How I Met Your Mother writer/producer Gloria Calderon Kellett and Everybody Loves Raymond writer/producer Mike Royce. The duo definitely knows a little something about hit sitcoms, although that doesn’t necessarily mean that those shows’ popularity will carry on to this reimagining.
Development on a new One Day at a Time was announced some months back, with the goal of making the family a different culture already in place. Netflix, which just branched out into around 130 new countries across the world, has made good on their goals of bringing more diverse programming to audiences. Internationally popular shows like Narcos and Club de Cuervos prove that people are more than ready to watch shows about nationalities rarely seen on American TV.
As well, Netflix is also perfectly happy with bringing in projects that already have fanbases built into them. For instance, we got our first look at the continuation spinoff Fuller House recently, and heard news of what we can expect from Season 5 of Arrested Development. On the drama side, Netflix also gave new life to network-canceled shows like Longmire and The Killing. Of course, One Day at a Time will technically be the streaming giant’s first live-action remake, and it’s for a decades-old comedy that doesn’t come up often when “most cherished sitcoms” are talked about. So it’s hard to tell how much of its audience will be the same this time around.
Bringing in the always fabulous Rita Moreno, whose last notable small screen gig was TV Land’s Happily Divorced a few years ago, was a great idea. But the rest of the cast needs to be equally talented and noteworthy to attract and keep a new generation.
It’s not clear when One Day at a Time will hit Netflix, although it likely won’t happen until late in 2016 or early 2017. Thankfully, there are a ton of other new and returning shows that will begin streaming before that.
