The discussion took place at The New Yorker Festival, and based off Huwitz's comments on stage, the official New Yorker Twitter feed, wrote, "Arrested Development coming back for one more TV season before movie." New York Times reporter Dave Itzkoff was also in attendance at the Q&A and tweeted, "Mitch Hurwitz says he plans limited Arrested Development series (9-10 eps, 1 character per ep) that would lead into movie."
Itzkoff's elaboration answers the question of how they would deal with the limited availability of certain cast members – Will Arnett, for instance, is starring in the new NBC sitcom Up All Night and wouldn't have the time to do a full season of Arrested Development. But he probably could take the time to star in a single episode catching up with Gob Bluth.
All of this is enough to get any AD fan salivating of course, but it's hard not to be wary… We've heard about the movie for years without it ever happening, and the fact is, Arrested Development, beloved though it may be, was not a hit TV show. So it remains to be seen if Hurwitz could get the backing to get a TV miniseries made, on top of a film we still hope truly comes to be.
But we have to keep hope alive… and not forget there's always money in the banana stand.
Update: TMI or not, Will Arnett has also now tweeted, "I'm peeing with @batemanjason at the moment..and we can confirm that we are going to make new AD eps and a movie."
Jason Bateman tweeted, "It's true. We will do 10 episodes and the movie. Probably shoot them all together next summer for a release in early '13. VERY excited!"
Update 2: Deadline now has some potential answers to where this "I can't believe we're actually talking about this" Season 4 of Arrested Development could air. It seems 20th Century Fox TV, who co-produced the series with Imagine, have been in talks with both Netflix (who have been moving into original programming) and Showtime, as possible homes for the 9-10 episode run. Again, I remain cautious until we hear a deal is signed and sealed, as we've been down this road many times with just the movie... But right now, it's hard not to get at least a little optimistic about the situation!
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