‘Penn & Teller: Fool Us’ Among Many Unscripted Decisions To Be Made At The CW As Network Looks To Swipe Left On ‘FBoy Island’

Peter White
·2 min read
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The CW’s fall schedule includes a number of new unscripted series such as a game show night on Mondays with Trivial Pursuit and Scrabble as well as the return of Whose Line Is It Anyway?

But there was no room for one of the network’s longest-running hits, Penn & Teller: Fool Us.

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Much like in scripted, The CW has a number of decisions to make and the return of the magic competition series is one of them.

The show has run for ten seasons and more than 150 episodes since launching 2011. Its tenth season premiered in October and recently wrapped a 20-episode order.

The CW President of Entertainment Brad Schwartz told Deadline that it has the fourth quarter “locked”. “If there is a new season of Penn & Teller, that’ll be top of 2025,” he said.

“Penn & Teller has obviously been just a crazy consistent performer and we did 20 new episodes of that last year,” he said. “One of our priorities is trying to find something behind it, something to pair with that.”

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FBoy Island was one of The CW’s biggest bets in unscripted. The network launched the third season of the show, which originated on HBO Max, last fall and it is currently airing a female-skewing spinoff, Lovers and Liars.

But given the cost of that show – even if it became cheaper by moving production to Malibu rather than the Cayman Islands – it is unlikely to return.

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“FBoy Island was something that didn’t work and kind of pointed to maybe being too young for broadcast,” he said.

It’s clear that some of the unscripted shows that do work for The CW are slightly older skewing.

Schwartz said that its recent launch of 24/7 Police, which launched recently and comes from Jersey Shore producer SallyAnn Salsano, was its biggest unscripted premiere in three years. “We have a decision to make on that,” he added.

“Crime Nation did great and our affiliates loved that, it was a great lead in to the local news. It’s kind of our Dateline or 48 Hours,” he added.

Elsewhere, it has The Big Bakeover from Velvet Hammer Media, that launches in June that Schwartz said was a particular favorite of unscripted boss Heather Olander. “There’s a lot of unscripted shows still to premiere,” Schwartz added.

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