The CW had a come-to-Jesus moment with The Chosen, but what does that mean for future faith-based TV on the broadcast network?
Things Have Changed at The CW
After experimenting with a Christmas special from The Chosen in December 2022, The CW began airing the first three seasons of the hit Gospels-based series, on Sunday nights, from July to Christmas, 2023.
Picking up the Christmas episode came early in the tenure of The CW’s entertainment chief Brad Schwartz, who joined the network in Nov. 2022. His new gig came on the heels of station-groups owner Nexstar taking over the network, originally conceived as a partnership between CBS/Paramount and Warner Bros. TV.
Schwartz brought two decades of media-leadership experience, including overseeing the transformation of TV Guide Network into Pop TV (and acquiring the Emmy-winning comedy Schitt’s Creek for the network).
Hearing From Brad Schwartz, The CW Network’s President of Entertainment
In February, The CW closed out the biannual TV Critics Association Press Tour in Pasadena, California. I attended its press conferences and later sat down for a one-on-one interview with Schwartz.
At the executive press session, Schwartz outlined his ambition for the network, which used to be home to a plethora of youth-skewing superhero and vampire shows, saying:
In the past you knew what The CW was, it was this young adult, and that’s what differentiated it. But what is NBC’s brand? What is CBS’ brand? What is ABC’s brand? What is Fox’s brand? Right?
If you’re in the broadcast business, you’re going after the widest audience possible. And so we’ve talked a lot about that, and it’s almost, internally it’s weird for me to not be able to say we are going after women, 25-54, and we’re doing it in an affluent way, because in broadcast, it’s just not big enough.
We have to be bigger, and so we have to do a lot of different things. So yes, we’re doing some young adult content. We’re doing game shows. We’re doing scripted procedurals. We’re doing sports on the weekend. We’re really trying, we’re a big tent brand.
Are Christians Allowed in The CW’s Big Tent?
The faith-based audience appears to be welcome in The CW’s tent. But don’t think that The CW is going to suddenly become the EWTN of the commercial airwaves.
As I quoted him in a story on The Chosen last August, Schwartz said to The Hollywood Reporter:
I think faith and family is an interesting opportunity that you don’t see across broadcast television. …
I see an opportunity in faith and family. The Chosen is a wonderful example of it working. So why wouldn’t we try to find a couple of more things? But that that feels like a Sunday night strategy, not an overall company strategy.
Sitting Down With Brad Schwartz
When we sit down later to chat, I want to know how The Chosen wound up on The CW in the first place. As Schwartz tells it, he was brought on to consult early on in the development of The WONDER Project.
The new independent studio produces for the faith-and-values audience. It was founded late last year by filmmaker Jon Erwin, one half of Christian filmmaking duo the Erwin Brothers, of Kingdom Story Company at Lionsgate (Ordinary Angels, American Underdog, I Still Believe, Jesus Revolution).
The Dallas Jenkins Connection
One of the major shareholders in The WONDER Project is The Chosen creator Dallas Jenkins, who’s been working on his first project with it, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. He and Schwartz became friends.
But in Hollywood, many business deals come out of friendships.
Says Schwartz:
I was very aware of The Chosen. I had done a year’s worth of research on this company and how we were going to build it. When I got to The CW, I’m like, “The biggest hit show in this country that nobody knows about is that one.”
I knew how successful it was. I was very close with Dallas. I felt like that show could be brought to a more wide stream, a more wide audience. We did, and it worked.
Although Schwartz isn’t Christian, he knew an opportunity when he saw it.
I spent a year doing research on what now is The WONDER Project. There’s a massive audience out there, if you talk to them in this respectful and empathy way.
Dallas’s The Chosen isn’t unlike The Crown. It is done with impeccable storytelling, wonderful writing, wonderful acting, wonderful directing, and it’s done at a scale that tells the story.
What Lies Beyond The Chosen for The CW?
So, if The Chosen represents a possible Sunday-night strategy for The CW, what would its companion show or shows be?
Schwartz says:
It’s more Touched by an Angel, 7th Heaven. I think it’s something in that world. …
There is room for family-friendly. There’s an audience out there, specifically between the coasts, that is thirsty for family-friendly stories told with empathy and scale. Those work on broadcast TV.
Schwartz says they’re looking at budgets in the range of ad-supported cable networks, not extravaganzas on the level of Amazon or Netflix.
As evidenced by the independently produced The Chosen, Schwartz is open to pitches from outside the major studios. But they have to be through established representation, because:
One, yes, we’re open to not the majors, because working with the majors is difficult, because we’re operating at a budget level that some of them can’t figure out. But the other side of that is … that is we’re a very small team. A very good team, but a very small team.
If every independent person in the world was pitching us stuff, [it would be] just be too much incoming. We can’t. I think there has to be a certain amount of filtering before the team will take something that we think can be produced seriously.
Why Should Faith-Based Producers Trust The CW?
Many folks looking to do faith-and-values content are very leery of working with mainstream networks (and not without good reason). So, I ask Schwartz what his pitch would be to get them to give The CW a try.
He says:
It’s working with people that have a track record in that space. Jon Erwin has a ton of respect and track record in that space, Dallas Jenkins has a ton of track record in that space, and the Robertson family.
There’s a lot of people out there that certainly mean something. They know that, when those stories get told, they’re told understanding the audience, they’re told with the right empathy for the audience, and they’re done with certain budgets to be able to do them well.
If you work with those people … I think if Dallas were to do a project on The CW, you would trust it. If Jon Erwin were to do a project for The CW, you would trust it.
It’s working with people that have a certain stature already, because we’re not going to get that on day one.
As I said, The CW is not giving its whole schedule to faith-and-family-friendly programming. It’s a mix, very much in line with other ad-supported channels. But, Sunday is a start.
Image: The CW’s new logo, with a scene from The Chosen, and a Brad Schwartz headshot. PHOTO: The CW (logo and Schwartz); (L-R) Jonathan Roumie as Jesus — Photo: The Chosen — © 2023 The Chosen. All Rights Reserved.
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