Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Creating ‘Three Rivers’, Part One

Rob Owen (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette) has just published part one of an interview that he had with Three Rivers writer-executive producer Carol Barbee. The topic is how Three Rivers came into being and why Pittsburgh was selected as locale.

As with many things in life, a series of factors that some would call coincidences led to the making of Alex O’Loughlin’s new television series.

Carol Barbee was already developing a medical show for CBS, one of executive producer’s Curtis Hanson’s film company execs was giving a seminar at the University of Southern California and former University of Chicago Medical Center transplant coordinator, Steve Boman, sold the concept for a show about the competitive organ transplantation business to CBS. One thing led to another and culminated in the new series.

Especially the transplant aspect appealed to Barbee. “I said I’d do it from three points of view: Donor, recipient, doctor. Each one was so compelling.”

The choice for Pittsburgh as setting for the medical drama was sealed when the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center came up as # 1 on the list of top transplant cities in the world. That three rivers converge in the city fits in perfectly with the stories being told from three different perspectives.

Read the full article:

*** “Creating ‘Three Rivers’” ***

[tags]alex o’loughlin, alex o’lachlan, cbs, three rivers, carol barbee, andy yablonski[/tags]