Fake Doctors, Real Friends Podcast: 10 Things We Learned From Bill Lawrence In Episode Three
8. ABC Passed On The Show
When Scrubs was still in the development phase, it was wholly owned by ABC Studios, which meant that the ABC network had first pass at buying the pitch. However, when Bill Lawrence was selling the idea to the people who made that decision, one of them genuinely fell asleep.
Needless to say, the network didn't buy the pitch, so Lawrence asked for permission to sell it elsewhere. Since ABC hated the idea that much, they let Bill go to NBC, never once thinking that it would be picked up, but of course it was.
This made Scrubs one of the only shows of the time owned and produced by ABC, but aired on NBC. It was a weird and bizarre business arrangement that was really quite risky for Scrubs, as its time slot was never protected, and NBC was likely to look at Bill Lawrence first if anything had to be let go, since Scrubs was owned and operated by their competitor.