When Kyra Sedgwick stepped into the lead role, ABC became even more excited about the drama they spoke of as "adult" and "riveting" and "different."
In all truth, it wasn't that "different."
It was pretty much your standard fare on basic cable.
Basic cable is where Kyra found her greatest success -- at TNT with THE CLOSER in a role that saw her honored with a People's Choice Award, a Satellite Award, a Golden Globe Award and, yes, an Emmy.
It was a strong performance.
And TEN DAYS IN THE VALLEY provided her a showcase for another strong performance: Jane Sandler.
Jane was a documentary film maker who crossed over into television and was the show runner of a cop drama. She was also divorced from Pete (Kick Gurry) and arguing over the raising of their daughter Lake.
Lake disappears while Jane is in the shed/office behind her home and Jane's convinced at first that Pete took her. Then it appears it might be the police -- or a section of the police -- who don't care for her TV show -- one that's using real life corruption as the inspiration for its plot line.
Drama and tensions flared.
Kick Gurry?
You could complain about him but he was supposed to be off-putting in the role of Jane's ex -- especially since we were supposed to assume he may have kidnapped their daughter.
Strong work was done -- especially by Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje (Detective Bird), Erika Christensen (Jane's sister Ali), Josh Randall (Ali's husband Tom) and Malcolm-Jamal Warner (as Jane's second in command Matt).
Josh Randall is one of TV's most underutilized actors and most underappreciated.
So when he was used for little more than bare chest scenes, who was surprised?
No one -- and no one complained either -- who would? Josh is also one of the hottest actors working in TV.
But turns out, the show cast Josh for something other than just his chest and face -- as it turned out, the child Jane and Pete were fighting over? Probably actually Jane and Josh's Tom.
The scene where Ali explodes in the waiting room of their fertility doctor and Tom tries to calm her down while also trying to keep the scene from intensifying should have won praise and awards for Erika Christensen and Josh.
And maybe it will.
Probably not though, not since ABC walked away from the series after the fourth episode.
That's when the show was pulled from the schedule and benched until last month when ABC began burning off the rest of the episodes on Saturday nights.
ABC replaced it with SHARK TANK. And, reality, the show didn't bring in a significantly larger audience than TEN DAYS IN THE VALLEY did.
What was the point?
It was a ten-episode limited series.
Just keep it where it was.
Better yet, use smart advertising to promote it.
But ABC wasn't thinking smart at all.
Take the title.
Why in the world would anyone call the show that?
Ten episodes?
Yeah, we get it.
That didn't make it a good title.
2 DAYS IN THE VALLEY.
Anyone remember that?
Charlize Theron, Teri Hatcher, Eric Stoltz and James Spader were among the actors in that film.
And ABC's own focus group testing informed the network that the title of the series was confusing some who thought the series was somehow related to the 1996 film.
So what was the point?
The network had decided -- before the first episode aired -- that they weren't going to do much of anything with the show.
If it hit on its own, great.
If not, it's ten episodes and they could burn it off on Saturday if they had to.
What an insult to everyone involved.
And does ABC grasp the message that they've sent to the creative community? It can be summed up as: "Warning, go to any other network because we're not going to support you or stand by you."
They've already lost Shonda Rhimes. The creator of GREY'S ANATOMY, SCANDAL and (the tremendously improved) HOW TO GET AWAY WITH MURDER has signed with NETFLIX and will be developing new shows for them, not ABC.
Their treatment of a quality show, which TEN DAYS IN THE VALLEY was, will make them the last choice for any show runner.
ABC looks like a loser and has the smell failure wafting off it.
The only real winner in all of this is Demi Moore who walked away from the show and instead elected to to do a guest role (Claudia) on EMPIRE -- a role that's going to be even more central to the plot when EMPIRE returns from its winter break with new episodes.
