‘Love Me’ Drama Based On Swedish Format From ‘Life Sentence’ Creators & Elizabeth Banks Set At ABC As Put Pilot

Nellie Andreeva

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EXCLUSIVE: In a competitive situation, ABC has landed Love Me, a one-hour drama based on a Swedish format, with a put pilot commitment. The project, one of the first significant pitch sales this broadcast development cycle, hails from Life Sentence creators Erin Cardillo and Richard Keith; Elizabeth Banks and Max Handelman’s Brownstone Productions; Welcome to Sweden co-creator/star Josephine Bornebusch; and Warner Bros. TV, where Brownstone and Cardillo and Keith’s In Good Company are based.

Written by Cardillo and Keith, Love Me follows the stories of a multi-generational family in Chicago as they search for love in our increasingly detached digital world and explores how their unconditional love for one another helps them navigate the highs and lows of it all.

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Cardillo and Keith executive produce for In Good Company, with Brownstone’s Banks and Handelman. Bornebusch, who stars in, writes and directs the Swedish series, also executive produces. Brownstone’s Dannah Shinder is co-executive producer.

The Swedish series — original title Älska Mig — starring Bornebusch and Sverrir Gudnason, examines how friendship, grief and romance intersect with love in the lives of three generations of people living in the Swedish capital Stockholm. The six-part comedy-drama series, from Nordic Entertainment Group, is set to air this fall across the Nordic region on NENT Group’s streaming service Viaplay. You can watch a teaser with no English subtitles below.

Finding a big family soap is among the ABC’s targets this development season.

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Love Me is Cardillo and Keith’s first sale under a multi-year overall deal they have at WBTV. The duo have sold four other broadcast projects with the studio over the past five years, two of which went to series, Significant Mother (2015) and Life Sentence (2018), both on The CW. Cardillo and Keith also worked together as co-eps on the second season of Netflix/WBTV’s Fuller House.

Cardillo and Keith have been collaborating since the mid-2000s when they met in acting class at Warner Loughlin Studios. They won the New York Television Festival in 2013 with spec script We’re Not Your Parents. Cardillo is repped by Velocity Entertainment Partners and Bloom Hergott. Keith is repped by Lichter Grossman.

Brownstone also is producing the Hulu comedy series Shrill as well as an adult animated series reboot of The Flintstones in the works at Warner Bros. Animation. Banks currently is directing, producing, co-writing and starring as Bosley in her continuation of Charlie’s Angels (November 15) for Sony Pictures. Banks and Handelman are repped by UTA, Untitled, Ziffren Brittenham.

Swedish actress-writer Bornebusch is repped by Paradigm and Agentfirman Planthaber/Kilden/Mandic.

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