TV SERIES/FILM PITCH
A group of dads meet through their kids’ preschool and bond over a shared love of music. Their attempt to form a rock band is an epic failure, but they discover their popularity with the preschooler audience, and rocket to fame and infamy as “Daddy Rock”, the world’s number one band of all time (for children).
THE STORY
Pete is taking time away from his career to be a stay at home Dad.
With his daughter entering preschool, he finds himself volunteering and spending more time around the school. While hanging out at the schoolyard watching their kids play, chit chat amongst some of the Dads reveals that they all love music, and have instruments and play occasionally, but always alone.
“Hey, we should get together and jam sometime!” someone suggests.
“That’s an awesome idea!” they all exclaim.
The dads encounter a mixed range of enthusiasm from their spouses. Their children are super supportive, except for the teenaged kids of band members (who are mortified and live in constant fear of inevitable universe exploding embarrassment from their dorky dads).
The dads gather in Pete’s garage, with drums, amps and guitars.
With a booming drum beat, bass rocking rhythm, wailing guitar feedback and screech of vocals, they rock out. Hard.
“Holy shit!” they realize, “We’re fucking awesome!”
They are not awesome. They totally, totally suck.
But the dads have a blast, and believe whole heartedly in themselves, and the music. They play on.
The dads encounter ridicule at every step, as they come up with a name and logo, search for a gig, play their first concert, and release a self produced album and single.
Their spouses have had enough and think they’re crazy. The young kids think they’re pretty good. But when the dads start goofing off and acting silly on stage one day. . . the kids?
The kids go fucking nuts.
The band is pressured by their kids to play a concert for the entire preschool class. The fledgling dad band get a phenomenal response.
The other parents take notice of how captivated their kids are with the band and are keen to know where they can buy the band’s album, and how to book the band to play at birthday parties.
The band plays more and more gigs. They compliment their act with silly costumes, props and sets. The kids eat that shit up.
The band makes a video that quickly goes viral.
Their popularity explodes and they now have a massive fanbase.
The band develops merch to sell to fans. Their “Daddy Rock” band brand is born.
The band struggles to write more songs for their album. They take their favourite rock songs as inspiration, making up silly bits and lyrical nonsense. Everything they do is hilarious and the kids are in hysterics.
The band goes on their first national tour and are confronted with rival bands in the children’s entertainment market.
The band has another huge hit, this one inspired by death metal, as they discover that kids really dig the Cookie Monster style vocals.
The band gets a TV show.
The band goes on a global tour. They worry about selling out. A band member quits. Band infighting comes to a head. A new member joins the band, but is ill-suited for the role. The band stars in a movie. The band gets into a sex, drugs and rock’n roll of scandal. The band breaks up. Where would you like this story to go? Lots of options here.
THE CHARACTERS
The lead singer and rhythm guitarist of Daddy Rock is imagined here as someone like comedian Pete Holmes or Rory Scovel.
All the kids at the preschool love this fun Dad! He is known by everyone as the funniest and silliest of all of the daddies.
Other Daddy Rock band members are setup to be comedic roles and are presented here as only general characterizations. Each band member characters can be adapted to suit the comic personas of a diverse cast of comedian/actors.
The lead guitarist can be an older dad in his fifties.
Maybe the bass player is a single younger dad.
The keyboard player can have at least six kids.
A band member could have an ambiguous gender identification, yet clearly identify themselves as a daddy in the parenting partnership.
Perhaps the drummer is a surly recruit, who not only doesn’t have kids and adamantly has declared will never have kids, can’t stand kids, and has to be cautioned about his tendency to say very inappropriate things in front of children.
Other characters can include the spouses and children of band members, the preschool teacher and other parents, and various music industry people that the band meets as they fail as a shitty cover band and then rocket to success as a famous children’s act.
PRODUCTION NOTES
Daddy Rock is setup to work either as a feature length film or as an ongoing TV series.
Daddy Rock is targeted to an intergenerational audience, drawing inspiration from the the brilliant John Mulaney’s Sack Bunch Kids, and Jack Black kicking it in School of Rock. Silly fun! But also supported by some mature free thinking wit. Kids might not get all of the jokes, but there will be nothing that will scar them forever. Alternative comedy family fun here.
Daddy’s Rock music is inspired by a fusion of multiple popular music styles, although the band tends to lean heavy on the classic rock, new wave and early nineties alternative sound. Their music explores their inner children, and their inner children were deeply influenced by the Muppets. Daddy Rock has fun mocking some of the mass market craziness of acts like The Wiggles.
Daddy Rock soundtrack album? Why not.