The Hollywood Reporter says that Roseanne wanted the same $2 million licensing fee she now gets for her series, which dies in May after nine seasons. That was apparently too rich for ABC, even though Roseanne was one of the network's few prime-time shows capable of winning its time slot. Still, the ratings for the series are way off from its heyday in the early '90s when it was TV's most-watched.
ABC had first dibs on any Roseanne spinoff. The New York Times quotes one insider as saying that Carsey-Warner Productions, the show producer, will now shop the new show to other networks and expects a deal "within a matter of days." They'll certainly run it by CBS, which has a strategy of hiring proven commodities: the network lured Bill Cosby back to series TV and snatched Family Matters from ABC's schedule.
Roseanne's film career pretty much peaked on her first outing in 1989, with Meryl Streep in She Devil. She was last seen in Blue in the Face in 1995, an ensemble film by Wayne Wang. She's due on the New York stage for a brief run as the Wicked Witch in The Wizard of Oz in May.