News > Hayek to dissect med-school drama
December 5, 2006
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"Ugly Betty" exec producer Salma Hayek is expanding further into television, setting up a medical-school drama at Fox.
"ER" scribe and co-exec producer Joe Sachs is aboard to write and exec produce the hour, which Hayek and partner Jose Tamez will exec produce via their Ventanarosa banner. Untitled project has been set up at 20th Century Fox Television.
Project will follow the personal and professional lives of students at an Ivy League med school. Drama will begin their first day on campus.
Fox has made a script commitment to the project.
Sachs has some personal knowledge of the subject: He attended Stanford Medical School.
Scribe has been a medical consultant on "ER" since the show's 1994 debut. He wrote his first episode in 1996 and joined the staff two years later.
Fox project would be Sachs' first series project outside of the "ER" universe.
"Ugly Betty," which repped Ventanarosa's first foray into series television for an English-language network, is one of the season's few legitimate hits. Skein has dramatically improved ABC's ratings in the 8 p.m. timeslot, particularly with younger females.
ABC has renewed "Betty" for a full season of 22 episodes. Ventanarosa produces the skein in association with Ben Silverman's Reveille and Touchstone Television.
In addition to exec producing "Betty," Hayek has a recurring role on the hourlong comedy, playing magazine editor Sofia Reyes.
On the feature side, Ventanarosa was a producer on "Frida," the 2002 Julie Taymor pic in which Hayek played artist Frida Kahlo.
