The creator of THE Real CSI: Miami revealed that he has big plans for the show if it is renewed for another season, but admits that the transition to the new format was not easy.
Anthony Zuiker, 55 — creator of the CSI franchise and its new unscripted series, The Real CSI: Miami — spoke exclusively to The US Sun about where he sees the latest heading after its June 26 premiere.
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During the sit-down, Anthony discussed the progression of the blockbuster franchise, including CSI: Miami, CSI: New York and CSI: Cyber, which he co-created with Carol Mendelsohn, and the recently canceled CSI: Vegas, developed by Jason Tracy.
He revealed that after more than two decades of investment in scripted crime dramas, starting with the original series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, which ran from 2000 to 2015, he decided to try a different format to keep up with the times.
The television writer explained that CBS approached him about doing an unscripted version of the franchise, fueling the massive popularity the true crime has gained in recent years.
With CSI: Miami in mind, Anthony began formatting episodes of the program, converting it into a documentary-type series.
That’s when The Real CSI: Miami was born – an unscripted series that details cases from the CSI spin-off and some Florida cases, including interviews with victims’ families, police, forensics, etc.
‘FIRST FIGHTS’
However, Anthony confessed that switching from scripted to unscripted with a show based on real events brings its own set of challenges.
“The challenge, don’t call it bad, but the challenge of this is when you take real factual cases that don’t have any wiggle room for creativity based on that, sometimes that factual format of real events doesn’t I don’t like being married to the exploratory narrative of CSI born from this”, exclaimed the book’s author.
“It’s not a cop show with a forensic show. So we need to make sure the way we distribute information is factual and linear,” Anthony continued.
“But at the same time, you have the magic of storytelling. What CSI is in terms of doing the whole crime series theme, and that was a little bit of initial struggles in the first three months and the last 12 months.
“We started on our way and the shows got better and better and better, but it was a learning curve,” he added.
The Real CSI: Miami premiered on CBS and Paramount+ last Wednesday, and a new episode will be released each week.
Since its launch, the program has received significant praise on social media.
“All my true crime fans check out the real CSI on CBS,” encouraged one fan on X, while another boasted, “They made a show called the real CSI Miami, loved it.
There have been five versions of the CSI franchise on CBS
But Anthony had already planned for positive feedback and had a vision of keeping the series new with spinoffs.
“I hope this particular formula has been deciphered skillfully by us. I don’t just hope the second season gets picked up for [The Real] CSI: Miami, but also the possibility of The Real CSI: Vegas, The Real CSI: New York, The Real CSI: Cyber,” the Illinois native revealed about formatting other CSI shows in the unscripted theme.
He also shared that he hopes to extend this idea to other cities beyond those covered by the franchise.
“We have no obligation to return to a scripted series because I’ve already done that. I worked long hours and 15 months to figure this out,” Anthony said before noting the reason for the change.
“If there is no budget for an expensively scripted premium show, I need to have the ability to continue to make more CSI at a price that would match the quality you saw. [in the latest episode of The Real CSI: Miami]. That’s my main focus now,” he concluded.
UNTIL TIME, SIN CITY
This will please fans who are devoted watchers of the franchise, especially since CSI: Vegas was released this spring.
In April, it was revealed that the show was in jeopardy, and weeks later it was pulled from the CBS schedule after three seasons.
CBS renewed 11 scripted shows for the 2024-2025 season, but the spinoff was not picked up despite acquiring 6.4 million viewers per episode, according to Nielsen’s seven-day linear ratings.
The network has had 12 of the top 15 scripted series on TV since mid-February.
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This story originally appeared on The-sun.com read the full story
