Anger Management was given 10 episodes by FX and if it hits a certain ratings number, they’ll get 90 more that will be shot within the next two years. Two years! Just as a comparison, their FX cousin It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia has only shot 84 episodes total and that show debuted in 2005. And all signs are pointing to this threshold being met. The show is tracking very well and is picking up sponsors left and right. And how does Carlos “Charlie Sheen†Estevez feel about all of this? As he told the New York Times, he has workmanlike happiness:
I’ll be happy doing it. I was so miserable on Two and a Half, it was just, like, anything to keep my mind away from what this thing had become and what the people had become. Or who they revealed themselves to be in this process. If I’m happy, I don’t want to blow [things] up. And I’ve given everybody my word here, that you make a commitment, that you’re going to take a leap of faith here and let’s do something that’s never been done before.
Does not blowing things up mean not doing drugs?
What, drug test? Nah. I told them to go [away] with that one. It’s an invasion of privacy, man. Total invasion of privacy… They knew what they were getting. And they know it’s not always going to be smooth sailing.
I like the strategy of taking this ticking time bomb of a human and putting him under as much stress as possible with an insane shooting schedule. It’s like if you tried to deactivate an actual ticking time bomb by shaking it onscreen for 100 episodes over two years.