CBS kills drama development slate

CBS has become the first major American TV network to make swingeing cuts in its scripted development slate, with the writers' strike now entering its twelfth week.

The network has cut 20 projects, most of them dramas, from its development slate, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Scripts from all of the major Hollywood studios, including CBS Paramount, are understood to have been affected and the Reporter named Brothers Grimm from Will & Grace alumnus Sean Hayes' Hazy Mills Productions as one of the terminated projects.

In a statement, CBS said: "Due to the ongoing writers' strike, our development needs for the upcoming pilot season have changed, and we have released some comedy and drama scripts. This year's pilot season, at best, will be played out in a very compressed time frame. In this landscape, we are better served creatively, financially and strategically by focusing our development on a more targeted number of projects."