Back in the spring, I interviewed “Cougar Town” co-creator Bill Lawrence about the creative turnaround that show made over the course of the season. In that interview, Bill said that they had done research showing that the title was a severe turn-off – that some viewers (mostly women) had no interest in watching anything called “Cougar Town,” even though the show had long since stopped being about Courteney Cox trolling for young men. He said he hoped to petition the studio and ABC into agreeing to a title change before season two.

Last Friday, though, Lawrence told Michael Ausiello that the name change wasn’t happening, so when I saw Bill at ABC’s party last night, I had to get him to elaborate on the subject…

So what’s this I hear about you keeping the terrible title of your show?

Oh, dude. The only title I could think of that was any better was “Stay tuned for more ‘Modern Family,'” which would’ve crushed. “After this commercial break. We would’ve had to nail it to change it. And we didn’t come up with anything. We couldn’t use anything with the word “friends,” because it would seem like we were pandering. They made some good points, which is that branding of a show matters. Eventually you can overcome a shitty title. It may be the worst-titled show of all time, but it’s a fun burden to overcome. DVRs, you’d have to reprogram with a new title. That’s like 30, 40 people we’d lose right there with their season passes. I’d have to call them all personally.

The truth is, we never nailed anything we really dug that would make that wholesale change worthwhile. So now we’re wearing it like a badge of courage.

You couldn’t have even just gone with “The Courteney Cox Show”? It’s more than that now, but it wouldn’t be a turn-off.

It’s not good enough. It would have had to blow those guys away – because they researched all our suggestions – to make it worth changing. Here’s the double-edged sword, which I find interesting. Classic network television story, when they wanted to put a laugh track on “M*A*S*H.” Larry Gelbart did a test where he tested it with laughs and he tested it without, and he went to those guys and said, “Look, people responded the same way whether there were fake laughs in it or not.” And the network said, “Well, great. Then we’ll keep the laughs.”

In the same vein, the network and studio are actively considering it. The story is out there that I fucked up the title, and we were actively searching for a change. I just care if it remains exclusionary. Who gives a shit? We’ll call it “C-Town,” but that actually sounds worse.

Yeah, that’s almost dirtier.

Someone was suggesting “The Family Jules,” and I’m like, “Why not just call the show ‘Balls’? ‘Nutsack’? There’s no win.” But if I could go back in time, it would be “The Courteney Cox Show.”

Bill Lawrence isn’t saying a Jennifer Aniston guest spot on “Cougar Town” won’t happen, but it hasn’t been locked down quite yet.

“Dude, you’ve seen me do this a thousand times. I generally just say people are going to guest-star on the show and hope it happens,” Lawrence, who co-created and executive produces the ABC comedy, tells Zap2it. “I announced last year that Jennifer was going to be on the show, but I hadn’t really talked to her people, or to her. Apparently she’s got an active movie career.”

Lawrence does say, however, that he’s “doing everything I can to make that happen.”

“Jennifer and Courteney [Cox, ‘Cougar Town’s’ star] are actually friends in real life, and they have this great chemistry,” Lawrence says. “I’d kill to see them do comedy again.”

Lawrence was his usual expansive self in talking with us, and he shared a few more thoughts on the show, its much-discussed but unchanged title and what Season 2 will bring. Some highlights:

Still “Cougar Town”: Lawrence says discussions about changing the show’s name — “there’s too much evidence that it’s an exclusionary title” — but no one came up with anything good enough. “I liked the name ‘Sunshine State,’ but then ‘Mr. Sunshine'”  — starring Cox’s former “Friends” husband, Matthew Perry — “got picked up,” he notes. “We couldn’t really put anything with ‘Friends’ in it, because to me it seemed too much like cheating. ‘Family Jules’ was out there, but I’m like, why not just call the show ‘Balls’? [laughs] … I think it would have been a bigger fight if we had cracked it, but we never did.”

Men vs. women: The “Cougar Town” writers room is pretty evenly divided between men and women, which is something of a rarity in TV comedy. “It’s gotten us a lot of the comedy on the show. … TV writing is a sexist business, and every other show I’ve been on has been eight guys and three girls or nine guys and two girls. When you have it [even], it’s fantastic comedy that goes right into our show. … It’s not a bunch of guys steamrolling two other voices — it’s a back-and-forth. It’s been a cool experience.”

Opening up: Lawrence says the show hasn’t booked any guest stars for the new season, but he hopes to open up the show’s world — and diversify the cast —  with some more secondary characters. “Ian Gomez is Latino, but my other shows, the workplace comedies, have been more of a melting pot. So we’re going to try to mix that up some this year. … We’ll use things like Travis [Dan Byrd] going to college and the world expanding a little bit [to inject some diversity]. … I really like the show, but that’s one of the things that still bugs me.”

“Cougar Town” begins its second season on ABC on Sept. 22.

Source: Zap2It

It’s a Monica and Rachel reunion. Whoo!

With all the Friends TV news this week (here and here), you fans were just a wee bit excited to read the report that Jennifer Aniston is nearing a deal to join Courteney Cox on Cougar Town early in the coming season.

So is it true? We just talked to Cougar executive producer Bill Lawrence and he says:

“Nothing’s happened yet,” Bill says. “I’d kill to get Jennifer on the show, and if I had any inclination it was happening, I would be telling everybody ’cause I don’t really give a sh-t. I would love it to happen and the second it did I would tell everybody in the world, but nothing’s happened.”

“By the nature of Jennifer and Courteney’s friendship,” Lawrence continues, “they’re gonna have to answer questions about that forever and ever…But the reality is Jennifer Aniston I think does anywhere from 70 to 80 movies a year. She works a lot, so it’s tough to make that stuff work. But I’d love it to happen.”

Been in “Friends” withdrawal? “Cougar Town” is here to help.

EW is reporting that Jennifer Aniston is nearing a deal to reunite with “Friends” co-star Courteney Cox on an early season episode of “Cougar Town,” which would mark the second “Friends” reunion on the show, as Lisa Kudrow appeared in Season 1 as Cox’s gynecologist.

It wouldn’t be a huge surprise to see Aniston strutting her stuff around Gulf Haven come fall, as Aniston and Cox are well-known good friends in real life. There is no word yet on what type of character she’ll be playing on the show.

This isn’t the first post-“Friends” Aniston-Cox reunion. Aniston dropped by Cox’s brief FX show “Dirt,” where the two shared an on-screen kiss and made the dreams of million of men come true. There were also rumors this summer of Aniston’s involvement in the Cox horror reboot “Scream 4,” but Zap2it’s source says that pairing is “highly unlikely.” We’re still crossing our fingers. She was great in “Leprechaun.”

“Cougar Town” airs Wednesday nights at 9:30 p.m. ET on ABC.

Source: Zap2It