iCarly successfully webcasted its way through fives season from 2007-2012 as audiences enjoyed the lives of Carly Shea (Miranda Cosgrove), her brother Spencer (Jerry Trainor), and his bestie Freddy Benson (Nathan Kress). Now that the cast has grown up and so has the show, as showrunner Ali Schouten (Young & Hungry, Champions) explains. She got her big break as a producer on a show called All Night for Nickelodeon.
“iCarly is a really meaningful show and it means a lot of things to a lot of people,” Schouten began. The discussions for the reboot began during the start of the beginning of the pandemic when human interactions were restricted to online platforms. This posed particular problems for creatives who had their writers’ rooms, open mics and workshops shifted from in-person to online. Far from hamstringing her creative process, Ali thrived so much that Nickelodeon approached her to do “an adult version of iCarly.”
The original iCarly clocked 95 episodes – a testament to all the hard work put in by creator Dan Schneider and his writing team.
The reboot of iCarly couldn’t simply pick up where the old series signed off a decade prior. Carly and her crew did a lot of maturing and growing up during that time. “The reboot is different tonally. We’re dealing with more adult topics so it’s not going to be a rehash even if you bring back old character,” continued Schouten.
The world of iCarly has also evolved. “She was the one of the original online influencers and content creators. Carly has spawned a generation of content creators. Now her hobby is a job for her and she works with global brands.” She’s grown up from her humble roots of giving a voice to kids to becoming a global force.
Ali Schouten. Photo by Nyki Bell
There will always be a tug of war between audiences who expect iCarly the reboot to be an extension of the original and those who see it as a spinoff series. “There were so many touch points and original characters we could access, but ultimately, we chose the path most meaningful and truthful to us.” Schouten deliberately didn’t create a template of the original series in order to mimic the remake.
iCarly Grows Up
Ali Schouten had fertile story soil to grow her TV show. “For starters, we took a very different approach to dating in the remake. We also wanted to look at work in a very different way.” Carly generates her income by promoting brands, Freddy joined the tech world, and Spencer became an artist. Everyone is pursuing their passion rather than clocking into a nine to five office job.
iCarly has already been greenlit for a second season where Schouten will explore “what it means to be a female influencer.”
Carly’s friends and family have all grown up together enabling the show to tell stories of their relationships, getting married or divorced, and starting a family or a business. “There’s a really rich history between the characters we could draw from and discuss in an adult way.” The show referenced Freddy’s failed startup and Carly not returning to iCarly.
Despite their entering adulthood, the cast of iCarly retained elements of their youth. “The sense of fun that Carly has will always be part of her.” The show balanced Carly maturing on paper with a mortgage and being an influencer with her playfulness.
Prior to entering the TV writers’ room, Schouten had preliminary discussions with Miranda, Jerry and Nathan about where there characters would organically go. They discussed whether Carly was going to be raising a child or Jerry was going to always remain a bachelor. “They wanted to stay true to their characters and not stray too far from them.” They all pursued their own creative paths to live a full and satisfying life. Good advice for everyone!
iCarly is a highly-nuanced TV show so it’s understandable that nailing the tone was a big challenge in the writing. Paramount+ kept an eye on balancing the kids’ aspects with the adult ones. According to Schouten, the over-riding tone was “grounded but weird.”
On the set of iCarly. Photo by Lisa Rose/Paramount+
The TV writers’ room was highly collaborative process regardless of the title each writer had. Creating an entire season was a combination of being intimately familiar with the characters and deciding on interesting places for them to go. Miranda, Jerry, and Nathan referred to themselves as “I” rather than their characters’ names in the writers’ room. “In Carly’s case, it was a matter of going out on her own without Sam (Jenette McCurdy) or a boyfriend and doing her own thing.”
The pandemic meant that they had a small writers’ room with shorter turnaround times. Shooting started while they were still writing later episodes. It was important to Schouten that everybody’s voice and point of view was considered in the room to make the show the best it could be.
A small writers’ room didn’t translate into a small writing staff. iCarly had around fifteen writers. Selecting writers for these assignments was no easy task. “I read over four hundred sample scripts,” claimed the showrunner. Then she narrowed down the potential writers based on diverse writing voices and personality. She wasn’t interested in writers looking for a gig. “I wanted writers excited to work on this show. They also needed to relate the show.” Every potential writers had access to iCarly scripts so it was a level playing field.
iCarly also hired writers with a more traditional TV background and “writers familiar with the fanzine, millennial lifestyle and language that relates to the show.” Ultimately, Schouten hired writers who’d take the show to the next level.
Hiring Writers
As Schouten interviewed prospective writers they were asked to pitch ideas and personal stories from their lives. A personal connection could be as vague on enjoying TikTok to being an online brand influencer. “One of our writers has a background in influencing online politics.”
Once she hired her writing team, everyone broke stories in the writers’ room either together or in smaller groups. Then they went off to write their individual episodes. “They’d do a one-pager, outline, a writer’s draft and the whole room would reconvene to rewrite it. It’s all hands on deck. Every writer in the room has at least one joke in each episode.”
After this finessing, they would receive notes from the studio followed by a table read. Notes and new draft would follow each step before final approval to the shooting draft. “Sometimes there were more drafts in between.”
A successful TV writers’ room depends on “how the writers gel together.” The showrunner believes that the most important factor is kindness. “There’s a ton of funny and talented people out there, but some of them don’t respect other people or they don’t want to grow.”
Ali Schouten loves being a comedy writer. “We can make any idea work. We can make it funny.” Being funny is highly contentious especially when there are so many voices in the room. “When there are so many different viewpoints, sometimes you have to make an intuitive decision and trust your writers will make it work.” The writers will sometimes find a different version of the story to make it funnier based on the components they’re given.
In conclusion, Schouten believes that the most important element of successful comedy is empathy and an understanding of who people are. “The writers treat people like people. There’s truth, forgiveness, and vulnerability. It doesn’t need to come across as snappy. It needs to come across as real.” The jokes come later.
