Other
Episodic Series
Squat!
by Bo Bennett, PhD · 220 pages
Logline
A desperate out-of-work marketing director takes a job at a dysfunctional Boston fitness center, navigating an absurd cast of trainers, a clueless owner, and growing feelings for his coworker while trying to save the gym.
Synopsis
With the help of a freakishly wise janitor, a newly-hired membership director struggles to keep a fitness center afloat while being given ridiculous tasks from an ethically-questionable owner.
Take an opinionated and all-around diverse group of fitness trainers, add a sketchy owner, a genius janitor, and throw in an endearing but largely incompetent general manager, and you have the perfect recipe for riotous, chaotic hilarity. You have Squat!
Set in a large fitness center in the Boston suburbs, the sitcom follows Scott Carter, a former big-shot marketing executive who takes a job at Squat Spot Fitness out of desperation. Carter quickly discovers that the place is run by an ethically-questionable owner willing to exploit staff and clients alike, and a general manager who’s in way over his head. With the help of a bright fitness director and a freakishly wise janitor, Carter manages to keep the gym open... for at least a bit longer.
Squat! features an interesting cast of characters who embody many of the social and political issues of the day. Rather than address these issues directly, they remain lightly veiled within seemingly petty arguments and conflicts. Each episode offers viewers the anticipation and fun of discovering the parallel “real world” political and social issues highlighted. Without taking sides, Squat! invites viewers to laugh at the absurdity of humanity while deepening understanding of those with differing beliefs.
The series presents an additional running theme of owner Jack Pemberton’s dubious assignment to Scott Carter. Carter struggles to satisfy his boss without compromising his values.
Squat! offers humor—of the smart, subtle, and laugh-out-loud varieties—along with lovable, fallible characters, and even an insight or two about creativity, understanding, and ethics.
The first season comprises ten fully-scripted episodes, rewritten as a comedic novel. Season One innocuously and hilariously provides a nod to such topics as COVID / mask-wearing, claims of election fraud, QAnon conspiracy theories, pronouns, “Karens,” defunding the police, multi-level marketing scams, cults, and even truth itself.
If Seinfeld had a threesome with Dodgeball and The Office, and miraculously conceived a lovechild, Squat! would be it.
AI Pitch Package
For producers, scouts & managers
Logline
When disgraced marketing exec Scott Carter takes a desperate job selling memberships at a failing Boston fitness center, he must satisfy an ethically bankrupt owner and rally a chaotic staff to save the gym without losing his own soul.
Short synopsis
Scott Carter, once a big-shot marketing director, hits rock bottom and lands a job as membership director at Squat Spot Fitness, a struggling Boston suburb gym run by the ethically dubious Jack Pemberton. Alongside an overwhelmed general manager, a sharp fitness director he's falling for, and a mysteriously wise janitor, Carter tries to keep the doors open while fielding Pemberton's increasingly shady demands. The gym's eccentric trainers and clients become a comic prism for the era's hot-button arguments — masks, cancel culture, MLM schemes, conspiracy theories — refracted into petty workplace squabbles. Season One is a workplace ensemble comedy about compromise, decency, and staying sane inside an absurd institution.
Extended synopsis
Scott Carter used to run marketing campaigns for real companies. Now, unemployed and running out of options, he takes a job nobody wants: membership director at Squat Spot Fitness, a mid-tier gym in the Boston suburbs held together by duct tape and denial. His new boss, owner Jack Pemberton, treats staff and clients as interchangeable revenue sources, and the general manager is a well-meaning disaster who is perpetually in over his head. Carter's only competent allies are the gym's sharp, no-nonsense fitness director — with whom he shares an obvious will-they-won't-they spark — and a soft-spoken janitor whose offhand wisdom keeps solving problems that management creates.
Each episode centers on a new indignity Pemberton foists on Carter — a shady promotion, a legally questionable liability waiver, a PR crisis of his own making — forcing Carter to choose between his paycheck and his principles. Around him, an ensemble of trainers with wildly different worldviews turn petty gym disputes (locker room etiquette, class scheduling, a stolen protein shaker) into stand-ins for the era's culture-war flashpoints: mask mandates, election conspiracy theories, pronoun debates, defunding campus security, and MLM recruitment pitches disguised as "wellness opportunities." The show never states its politics outright — it lets the audience recognize the real-world argument hiding inside the absurd workplace one.
The throughline is Carter's slow realization that keeping Squat Spot alive might require becoming a little bit like Pemberton — and his growing determination not to. His relationship with the fitness director develops in the margins of the chaos, giving the season a warm emotional spine underneath the satire. By season's end, the gym survives, barely, but the real victory is Carter holding onto who he is.
Structurally, this is a classic ensemble workplace comedy in the vein of a bottled, contained setting — one location, a rotating carousel of gym-goers, and a house style built on escalating absurdity followed by a grounded, human beat. It's built for episodic returns: new members, new schemes, new Pemberton demands, same found-family core.
Why it adapts
Squat! is built around the single most reliable comedy engine in TV: a contained, visually rich location (a gym, complete with equipment, classes, locker rooms, and a front desk) populated by a strong ensemble with built-in conflict generators — an unethical owner, an incompetent GM, a wise janitor, and a bench of ideologically mismatched trainers. That setting alone offers producers a poster-ready cast photo and a location that's cheap to build and endlessly reusable for physical comedy setpieces (botched fitness classes, promotional stunts gone wrong, ridiculous corporate mandates played out in gym-floor chaos).
The show's real hook for a buyer is its stealth-topical format: each episode's petty office squabble doubles as commentary on a real cultural flashpoint (masks, conspiracy theories, pronouns, MLM culture) without ever naming it directly, which is a marketable, discussion-generating gimmick — audiences will want to guess "what is this episode really about?" and share theories online, the same engagement loop that drove conversation around shows like Superstore and American Auto.
Carter's arc — a disgraced white-collar professional forced to hold his ethics together while under pressure from a shady boss — gives the series a relatable, sympathetic spine and a natural season-over-season engine (new Pemberton schemes, an evolving romance, an ongoing battle to keep the gym solvent). It's inexpensive to produce, has obvious returning-character appeal for a multi-season order, and slots cleanly into any network or streamer's half-hour comedy slate.
Format recommendation
Episodic Series
This is a classic contained-workplace ensemble comedy with an episodic A-plot/B-plot structure, recurring characters, and a serialized will-they-won't-they undercurrent — built for a multi-season order, not a two-hour feature. The single-location gym setting and cold-open/topical-issue-of-the-week format mirror successful half-hour ensemble comedies designed to run 8-13 episodes per season.
Comp titles
Superstore
Same DNA: a big-box workplace ensemble mining a clueless-to-shady management structure and a diverse staff for satire, with a slow-burn workplace romance at its center.
American Auto
Recent NBC ensemble comedy about an out-of-touch corporate leadership team fumbling institutional dysfunction — matches Squat!'s owner-vs-staff structure and topical satire.
Physical
Shares the fitness-world setting and uses the gym as a pressure cooker for exposing personal and cultural hypocrisies, though Squat! plays broader and more overtly comedic.
Ted Lasso
Proof that a fitness/sports-adjacent workplace with a found-family ensemble and a big-hearted outsider protagonist can be a mainstream, awards-friendly hit.
The Office (US)
The template for lightly-veiled social commentary emerging from petty workplace conflict, filtered through a lovable-but-flawed ensemble and an incompetent-but-sympathetic authority figure.
Audience
Adults 25-54 who watch ensemble workplace comedies on broadcast and streaming — Superstore, The Office, American Auto, Ted Lasso, Abbott Elementary fans. Broad-appeal, watercooler-friendly comedy that skews slightly left-of-center in sensibility but is built to avoid alienating either side of the audience, making it attractive to advertiser-friendly broadcast or a streamer looking for a comfort-watch ensemble comedy.
Tone
satirical
ensemble-driven
absurdist
topical
warm-hearted
workplace comedy
Adaptation Readiness Score
76 / 100
Visual storytelling
71
Dialogue strength
76
Character distinctiveness
79
Hook strength
80
Format fit
89
Market timing
66
Strengths
- Originated as ten fully-scripted episodes, so the bones of a shootable pilot and season arc already exist — minimal structural translation needed
- Strong, castable ensemble archetypes (sketchy owner, in-over-his-head GM, wise janitor, sharp fitness director) that give actors clear comedic lanes
- Confident, poster-ready high-concept pitch ('Seinfeld/Dodgeball/Office lovechild') and a workplace setting with built-in physical comedy potential
Adaptation friction
- Hot-button topical satire (COVID, election fraud, QAnon, defunding police) risks feeling dated or tonally polarizing by the time it reaches screen, and buyers may be wary of perceived political risk regardless of even-handed intent
- Workplace ensemble comedy is a crowded lane (Superstore, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, The Office) — needs a sharper visual or tonal signature beyond premise to stand out in pitch meetings
- Without manuscript excerpts showing actual jokes/dialogue rhythm, it's hard to confirm the 'laugh-out-loud' claim holds scene-to-scene versus reading well in summary
Listed on 2026-04-29
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