Internal shake ups at HBO haven’t hurt Game of Thrones yet, but this one is slightly closer than usual. Deadline reported yesterday that Michael Ellenberg, the man who has been overseeing HBO’s drama department since 2011, and therefore Game of Thrones‘ entire run on the network, is heading out for other pastures. What makes this interesting to us is that instead of replacing him, either by an internal hire or an outside candidate, HBO is not filing the position. Instead, Casey Bloys, who oversees their comedy division, will take over the drama one as well.
We’ve known for a while that Game of Thrones, which is the network’s biggest show by orders of magnitude, is also one of a very few true dramas still on the network that is garnering critical acclaim. As deadline notes, the “drama portfolio” has shrunk dramatically in the last five years, as other shows like True Blood, Boardwalk Empire and The Newsroom end their runs. Other dramas, like True Detective, have not fared so well either, and may not survive this changing of the guard. Even “comedy” shows with dramatic elements like Girls have declared clear end dates.
Game of Thrones isn’t going anywhere as of yet. In fact, Season 7, which Benioff and Weiss insisted for quite some time was their end goal, though not officially confirmed, has been all but confirmed as not being the final season, since HBO execs have been talking about working out deals for Season 8. The extra year gives the network a bit more breathing room to develop replacements for when it does. This year they’re introducing a new period drama Vinyl, which they even allowed to push Game of Thrones back in the schedule by a couple of weeks. There has also been rumors circling about the network working with Margaret Atwood to develop her MaddAddam trilogy, as well as with Martin himself on a different non-Westeros based show. No word if those will be effected by this change either.
Via http://winteriscoming.net/2016/02/03/hbos-vice-president-of-drama-development-michael-ellenberg-leaving-network/
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