TVSquad

As I said in my post about the 90210 panel, CW entertainment president Dawn Ostroff doesn't like to give us definitive answers. For some reason, she doesn't feel she has to. Problem is, that doesn't make the critics very happy. We don't like it when someone isn't being forthright with us, and we can sense it.

In her executive session, Ostroff avoided saying anything definitive on two major topics: the lack of "urban" shows on the schedule and the mechanics of the network's deal with Media Rights Capital to produce the network's entire Sunday block of shows.

Ostroff talked a lot about "flow." She knows that her network's target demo is women 18-34, and she wants her network to have a more cohesive identity. That's one of the reasons why the network jettisoned the WWE in favor of this block produced by MRC. "It was all men and there was no duplication," she said. "They didn't watch any other CW shows and vice versa," meaning that the rest of CW's audience didn't watch the WWE.

But she refused to go over what the deal with MRC entailed. The shows, In Harm's Way, Surviving Suburbia, Valentine and Easy Money, will be promoted seamlessly during other nights, and the Sunday shows will have promos for other CW shows. "It'll be more seamless than the WWE was for the network," she said. They'll have input into creative decisions and will consult with MRC as to whether to pick up or cancel individual shows. But as far as financials go, Ostroff just insisted on saying it was a "complicated" deal, likening it to when a major studio fills out their release slate with films from independent studios. What annoyed us was that she kept saying it was "complicated," implying that the seasoned journalists in the room were either not interested or not smart enough to want to hear the details of the deal. I wonder if she should have chosen another word there.

The subject of the disappearance of "urban" shows was brought up, paired with the move of Everybody Hates Chris and The Game to the "death slot" on Fridays. "We buy programming and develop shows based on the merit of show," she tap-danced. "If we think there's a great pitch out there for a show," they'll buy it. She thought Chris fit well on Fridays because families like to watch TV on Friday nights. Of course, there was a follow-up, asking if the network has moved in another direction. "I don't know if it's about moving on in another direction. If it was, the (two shows) wouldn't be in the schedule," she said. Gossip Girl and One Tree Hill gained traction for them on Mondays during the strike, she said, and they wanted to keep the momentum going. It all goes towards that "flow" she mentioned. I was starting to hear that word so much I wanted to retire to the men's room.

Speaking of Gossip Girl, Ostroff was especially estatic about tht show, noting that, despite the fact that Nielsen has the show very low on its ratings list, she cited a study by Optimedia, a company that measures show popularity across all media, including downloads, moblie devices, DVRs and online viewing, that shows GG as the fifteenth most popular show in the country. And she sees the show's influence in areas like the fashion industry, which would belie the low Neilsen ratings. The discrepancy "is one of the big mysteries of the TV universe," she says.

Ostroff also showed a clip of a Sam Raimi-produced reality show called 13: Fear is Real, which puts a group of contestants in the woods of the Louisiana bayou and plays on their darkest fears. One contestant will be "killed" each week (he or she disappears without explanation and doesn't come back) and the last one standing wins the sum of $66,666. Funny, but it seems like a paltry amount to win after being scared to death for days on end.

Finally, the CW is starting their season on September 1, three weeks earlier than most networks (Reaper will bow at midseason; no premiere date for that has been set yet). They're doing it to be "outside the clutter" of late-September fall intros. In fact, they're looking into starting the 2009-10 season in July or August, just to give their shows a bigger head start.

The two other panels were for Privileged, a drama starring Joanna Garcia as a Harvard grad who makes her way in the world of Palm Beach privilege by agreeing to tutor two bratty billionaire teenage girls, and Stylista, a competition to get a job at Elle magazine by going though humiliating tasks that even Anna Wintour would find cringeworthy. The only thing I remember about each is that Privileged kept getting compared to Gilmore Girls and that someone accused the Stylista producers -- a combined team from America's Next Top Model and Project Runway -- of taking glee in being mean to the contestants. I really didn't catch much else in that second panel, because I was too busy weeping for society after seeing the clip.