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With ER and Chicago Hope already on the table, would another doctor program be DOA? Hollywood hopes not. Come the new year, two new hospital shows will make their way to the little screen. The survival plan: counter the gritty realism of the existing shows with a lighter look at bedpan-and-gurney life.
Melrose Place exec producer Aaron Spelling takes his bed-hopping story lines to the world of medicine with University Hospital, a syndicated show that follows the sexploits of four young women at a nursing school. A draft of the script offers plenty of sizzle in the form of condoms, panties, and dropping towels. Also expect lots of outlandish, Melrose-style plot twists, including one nurse-in-training who escaped a bad relationship with a suitcase crammed with cash.
''Everybody's done doctors,'' says Spelling, explaining why he's doing nurses. ''Also, for syndication, we want to do shows that appeal to women. I think women are much more interested in the lives of nurses than they are in the lives of doctors.''
Hospital drama meets Northern Exposure on Fox's mid-season replacement, Medicine Ball. Look for off-kilter story lines, including a female clown whose epileptic fit leads her to undress at a kids' party and a 42-year-old who insists on a circumcision.
''You see some blood and gore, just so you know it's not a sitcom,'' says Robert Lieberman, who is executive producing Ball with his wife, chat-show host Marilu Henner. ''But we don't linger on it.''
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