Matthew Aldrich Attended Showrunner Training Program
The Writers Guild of America, a labor union organization that represents TV and film writers in the U.S., hosts an annual Showrunner Training Program. According to the list of program alumni on the WGA’s website, Matthew Aldrich (“Creative Architect” for Netflix’s upcoming adaptation of The Chronicles of Narnia) is an alum of the program.
The WGA’s Showrunner Training Program is “designed to help senior-level writer-producers and recent creators hone the skills necessary to become successful showrunners in today’s television landscape.” Other well-known projects of SRT alumni include the upcoming television series House of the Dragon on HBO and Percy Jackson and the Olympians on Disney+.
The training program does not appear to be for those seeking new skills to enable a career change, but rather for high-level writers who are already hired to oversee a future or existing television series. In order to be eligible to attend the training program, applicants must be:
Current-active WGAW or WGAE members in good standing with “Supervising Producer” level credit or above on a current, dramatic (comedy or drama) television series and/or a pilot script, pilot or series currently set up at a network, cable channel or streaming service.
Internet archives indicate that Matthew Aldrich’s name was added to the alumni list at some point after July of 2020, suggesting that he is a recent attendee of the program.
Related:
- Who Is Matthew Aldrich? All About the Creative Architect for Netflix’s Narnia
- Coco Writer: Good or Bad Idea to Helm Netflix’s Narnia? | Talking Beasts
Does this mean that Netflix will kick off their adaptation of The Chronicles of Narnia with a television series? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
Well at least that partly explains what he’s been doing for the past 3 years! hahaha. Hopefully we might start to see some progress soon! 🙂
Hope his studies pay off!
That’s cool that they have this for established professionals, though I have to wonder why he’s completing this program only now when he was hired awhile ago.
As far as I can tell, you have to have a pilot script (or actual pilot) to participate if you’re not a showrunner for a show that’s already airing. Given that Matthew Aldrich was hired June 2019 and these training programs take place in January, it doesn’t shock me that they weren’t far along enough in development to attend the program in 2020.
I think it’s kind of exciting that he probably attended this program earlier this year! Means that things might actually be moving forward now, and suggests that Netflix has plans to begin with a series.
This might explain why there has been a wait. I’d rather there be a wait and have a great script. If the script is not good, then they are just wasting their money making a series. Well, maybe not entirely wasting it. Walden’s PC and VDT are still good movies even though the major changes from the books annoy me.
What I am hoping is that he and the rest of the production staff are taking the care with this program that they did with Coco. I really hope he has reached deep into Lewis’ notes and literary criticism of the works so that he places the right emphasis on things.