Starz's Shining Vale opens with a pre-title card that cocreator–executive producer Jeff Astrof claims is based in fact: women are more than twice as likely as men to be depressed — or possessed — and the symptoms are the same.
In the dark comedy, debuting March 6, Courteney Cox stars as Pat, a writer in crisis who moves with her family to an old country house that might be haunted. She becomes concerned that her personal demons are manifesting in the form of the mysterious Rosemary (Mira Sorvino), who appears only to Cox. Greg Kinnear costars as Pat's supportive husband.
Citing his attraction to the material, Astrof dryly notes, "I'm proud to come from a long line of mental illness in my family."
After twenty-six years as a sitcom writer (Friends, The New Adventures of Old Christine), he was looking for something different. Producer Aaron Kaplan had an idea about "how he thought he'd grown up in a haunted house," Astrof relates, and had pitched the idea to Catastrophe cocreator Sharon Horgan. Astrof and Horgan teamed to develop the show. "Sharon wanted to do The Shining as a comedy, and I was all in," he says.
Comparing horror to comedy, Astrof says, "They're part of the same continuum — either you shock by punchline or by scaring people."
Soon after Starz ordered the pilot, he got a call from Cox, with whom he'd worked on Friends. "She said, 'I have to do this. You wrote this for me.'" Not only did Cox agree to star, she's producing as well.
Astrof began his career on Wall Street, but soon discovered it wasn't for him. He and his then–writing partner (Mike Sikowitz) moved to L.A. and got into the Warner Bros. Television Writers' Workshop. In 1994, they landed on the staff of a promising new sitcom, Friends.
They stayed for two seasons, until Jeffrey Katzenberg lured them to DreamWorks, a decision Astrof wryly estimates "cost me about $18 million." On the plus side, at DreamWorks he met his future wife, picture editor Shawni Modrell.
Since then, he's racked up credits on the likes of NBC's Trial & Error and TBS's Ground Floor. Looking ahead, he promises more comedy and chills for Shining Vale. "Creatively," he says, "I love that I don't have to just surprise people with a joke."
This article originally appeared in emmy magazine issue #1, 2022, under the title, "The Spirit Is Willing."
