One Direction Split H 2015
Yui Mok/PA Wire/APABC is getting back in the singing competition game.
The network has given a 10-episode series order to Boy Band, a reality competition where hopeful singers compete with one another to join a musical group, The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed.
In the show, viewers will have the control to vote for their favorite five band members live. No judges or host(s) are yet attached to the unscripted project, which is set to premiere this summer.
Matador Content (Lip Sync Battle) will produce the series, with Todd Lubin, Jay Peterson, Jane Munn and Joel Relampagos on board to exec produce.
The series order comes three years after ABC’s last attempt to launch a singing competition, Rising Star, which was canceled after one season. The Voice currently stands as the only such network music competition series in the U.S. American Idol left the airwaves in 2016; however, there already have been talks about reviving the franchise. (Like Boy Band, Idol was launched in the summer.)
Boy Band also shares some DNA with the 2000 ABC reality show Making the Band, which saw music producer Lou Pearlman — best known for assembling Backstreet Boys and NSYNC — put together a new boy band. The result was O-Town, which, while never reaching the same heights as its boy band predecessors, found success in the early 2000s. Seasons two and three of Making the Band subsequently followed O-Town’s early years before the show was revamped with new executive producer Sean “Puffy” Combs and moved to MTV.
One Direction, arguably the most successful boy band of the last decade, also was formed on a singing competition show, The X Factor in the U.K.
The series joins an already strong unscripted slate at ABC, which includes continued ratings performers The Bachelor and The Bachelorette (the latter of which will launch this summer with the first-ever African-American bachelorette), as well as game show revivals Celebrity Family Feud, Match Game, To Tell the Truth and $100,000 Pyramid. Next up is a revival of The Gong Show from Will Arnett.
ABC’s reality lineup also includes Shark Tank (and spinoff Beyond the Tank), The Great American Baking Show, a revival of BattleBots and America’s Funniest Home Videos. The network also recently launched season 24 of Dancing With the Stars, which has proven an impressive competitor against NBC’s The Voice on Mondays.
