Trophy Wife is a fun comedy, staring a slightly older man, Pete, who marries his third wife, Kate (Malin Akerman). Kate is a reformed party girl, who is also known as the trophy wife.
As part of our Disney press trip last week, we visited the ABC Studios to pre-screen two Trophy Wife episodes before visiting with the executive producers of Trophy Wife: Sarah Haskins, and Emily Halpern.
We watched parts 1 and 2 of the Wedding Episode. Part 1 aired last week and Part 2 airs tonight on ABC at 9:30/8:30c. Trust me when I say you don’t want to miss this one! Even The Muppets make an unexpected appearance!
The Wedding: Part One” Pete and Kate decide to renew their vows, but they get more than they bargained for when Kate is found to be living in the country illegally. Jackie and Dianne are in parallel as they struggle to let their relationships go “public”.
“The Wedding: Part Two” Pete agrees to let Kate plan a “do over” wedding when she has regrets about their elopement; Diane makes a decision about her relationship; Jackie struggles to tell Bert that she and Sad Steve are dating.
I visited with Malin Ackerman at our ABC Moms of TV cocktail party, and she was just as I’d imagined: super nice and beautiful! It was great to just hang out in a relaxed environment (on the patio terrace of ABC, of course!) and hear her thoughts on life, the series and a combination of the two.
When visiting with Creators and Executive Producers, we found out the show is loosely based on Sarah Haskins’ life. It interesting to know ideas for today’s tv shows come from life experiences – which make it great (and easy) for viewers to relate to!
How did you come up with the idea for Trophy Wife?
Sarah Haskins: We’re the creators, so we came up with the idea together. It’s very loosely based on my life. I married an older man who’d been married a few times before and has children from those different marriages. Kind of like Malin Akerman’s character, without rocking the short shorts.
It’s a situation that while unique and highly specific, is also very universal. People have dealt with divorce and co-parenting. It’s very common and we thought has a place on TV.
The characters have very good chemistry. How hard was it to get who you wanted?
Sarah Haskins: We filmed the pilot off cycle and we didn’t appreciate it at the time. That wound up being a huge advantage because we weren’t competing for all the exact same actors as all of the other pilots at the same time. And a lot of that had to do with Malin. She was really the first piece. ABC had actually passed on Trophy Wife the first year we developed it and ultimately it was given a second life when Malin read the script and ABC really wanted to work with her. And so did we.
Why do a wedding episode now?
Emily Halpern: We were kind of trying to think of a big episode idea. Honestly, we knew this was gonna air in March. It was a 2-parter. In a comedy, we can’t shoot the president [Laughs] so how big can we go? A wedding felt good to us.
Make sure you catch episode 2 tonight, on ABC at 9:30/8:30c.
You can also follow along on twitter: Trophy Wife (@TrophyWifeABC) #TrophyWife #ABCTVEvent