'Desperate Housewives' creator: ABC wouldn't allow abortion storyline

BEVERLY HILLS – "Desperate Housewives" creator Marc Cherry sees one big advantage in having his new series, "Why Women Kill," on CBS All Access instead of on a traditional broadcast network.

"I’ve been having so much fun using (profanity)," the writer/producer told reporters at the Television Critics Association press tour Thursday. "This is my first streaming show, and to get the freedom of more time, more money, less episodes, it leads to a different kind of storytelling ... and there’s such provocative material."

Cherry is no stranger to provocative material, getting as much murder, infidelity and general salaciousness into "Housewives" as he possibly could during its hit 2004-2012 run on ABC, but there was one thing he says he was absolutely forbidden from including.

"I was not allowed to do an abortion storyline," he says. "And I’ve seen many people do it (since), and on ABC, interestingly enough. But at the time ABC would not let me do any of that."

None of the members of the original cast, which included Teri Hatcher, Marcia Cross, Eva Longoria, Nicollette Sheridan and Felicity Huffman, were meant to have the abortion narrative, Cherry says.

"It was going to be a new character, and we had a whole (plan)," he says. But, "I brought it up and, boy, that was swatted away so quickly I was like, ‘Oh, OK.’"

Would Cherry want to return to Wisteria Lane in a less restrictive time, even if not all of the original cast could return? (Huffman is awash in legal troubles in the ongoing college admissions scandal, and recently pleaded guilty to charges.)

But Cherry is done with that particular portion of his career.

"I did 180 episodes of ‘Desperate Housewives,’" he says. "Unlike, say, a ‘Sex and the City’ or something that was on cable and didn’t do as many, I feel like I’ve done that."

The writer also sees "Women," which stars Lucy Liu, Ginnifer Goodwin and Kirby Howell-Baptiste as three women dealing with infidelity in different decades, as a spiritual successor to "Housewives."

"In a weird way, I found a new way to do ("Housewives")," he says, "because so many of the themes I dealt with are on (‘Women’)."

"I feel I’ve done my masters program (with ‘Housewives’), this is my doctoral thesis right here."

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Desperate Housewives' creator: ABC wouldn't allow abortion storyline