It seems that the ladies of Wisteria Lane won't be running out of hysteria anytime soon.  TV Guide has learned that Desperate Housewives series creator Marc Cherry hopes to extend the ABC dramedy for a total of nine seasons instead of his previously envisioned seven.  The announcement came during a Wednesday cake-cutting ceremony marking 100 episodes of Desperate Housewives.

This raises the question of whether ABC will make Cherry's dream a reality.  A source told TV Guide that “while the idea of unspooling even more saucy stories for the resurgent Housewives seems a natural, much paperwork — including a formal pick-up from ABC — needs to be in hand first.”

Last February, Variety Magazine revealed that Marc Cherry and the ABC Studios had signed “an eight-figure overall pact”, ensuring Cherry's commitment to the show until May 2011, the end of the series' projected seventh season.  In line with this, the studio has negotiated deals with “all key members of the cast” to stay on the show until then.  At the time, he revealed his plan to wrap up the story of the housewives saying, "At the end of my deal, and after seven seasons, it will be a good time to call it quits. I don't want anyone else to run the show, and I don't want us to fade away."

In keeping with that sentiment, insiders suspect that Cherry is open to extending his own pact to 2013, so that he can remain at the helm for the extra seasons.  And while Cherry said that he would like the show to come to an end at that point, ABC Studio's Mark Pedowitz stated that “We'll cross that bridge when we come to it”.

Meanwhile, fans can catch Desperate Housewives when it returns with new episodes on Sunday, January 4 on ABC.


-Kris De Leon, BuddyTV Staff Columnist
Source: TV Guide
(Image courtesy of ABC)