‘American Gladiators’ Reboot On The Way, Executive Produced By Seth Rogen & Evan Goldberg
Longtime collaboratorsSeth Rogen & Evan Goldberghave worn a lot of hats over the years. They’ve worked together as co-writers and co-produers on projects likeSuperbad, Pineapple Express, andSausage Party, and they both wrote, produced and directed the stellar apocalyptic comedyThis Is The End. Lately, the two have been dabbling on television with adaptations ofPreacherandThe Boys, but now they’re doing something much different on the small screen.
MGM is shopping around a reboot of the physical competition seriesAmerican Gladiators, and Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg are said to be on board as executive producers.
The original run ofAmerican Gladiatorsran from 1989 to 1996, staying popular in syndication with retro episodes airing on Spike TV in the early 2000s. The series followed athletic individuals forced to square off with even more muscular and intimidating men and women in a series of physical competitions and obstacle courses. Here’s a taste of one of the matches from the show:
The show was popular enough to get its own video game on several game systems.
NBC previously brought backAmerican Gladiatorsin 2008 with a new line-up of competitions and gladiators, including Hulk Hogan and Laila Ali as the show’s hosts. In case you didn’t watch the reboot, you might have missedHaywirestar Gina Carano as the gladiator known as Crush:
NowDeadlinehas word on theAmerican Gladiatorsreboot, and one can assume it will offer a new spin on the familiar formula of the original show. But with Rogen and Goldberg involved, maybe there will be a different kind of twist on the series to add some laughs to the proceedings besides the gladiators being a group of cheesy muscleheads. It would be interesting if they try to style the series like the original version, with vintage games and wardrobe.
The question is whether there’s an audience interested in a show likeAmerican Gladiators. In recent years, shows likeAmerican Ninja Warriorhave gained popularity, so it would stand to reason that there’s no better time for a series likeAmerican Gladiators, but the market might not have room for another athletic competition show like that.
Then again, maybe audiences can’t get enough of toned up ladies and gentlemen showing off how much more in shape they are than we are. After all, Kevin Hart is hosting a new physical challengegame show on CBS calledTotal Knock Out, so maybe there’s a market for comedians to host reality competition shows like this now.
