Posts with tag ratings
Posted Aug 26th 2008 10:22AM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Pickups and Renewals, Reality-Free
All right, let me say this up front and without equivocation: if CBS picks up
Flashpoint and cancels
Swingtown, I'm going to be ticked off. I'm not down on
Flashpoint.
As Jane wrote, Flashpoint is a good show. No
24, but solid procedural entertainment. However, when I read that
Canada's CTV has renewed up north and sources say that CBS is close to doing the same, I immediately got my back up.
Why should
Flashpoint get a break while an interesting, quirky and outside-the-box drama like
Swingtown may not? It's disheartening to me that
CBS is searching for a cable network to take Swingtown, while a "safe" crime show like
Flashpoint doesn't have that concern.
Continue reading The chances for a Flashpoint pickup are good
Posted Aug 19th 2008 2:43PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: OpEd, Casting, Reality-Free
When
All My Children snared veteran head writer Chuck Pratt Jr. to take the reins and "write" the S.S. Pine Valley, the scribe promised swift action. With a look toward kicking up the soap's ratings more than a notch or two. Pratt, whose credits include
Desperate Housewives, Ugly Betty, Melrose Place, Life Goes On and
Santa Barbara, among others is certainly capable.
I liked ABC drafting Chuck for
All My Children, but I'm thinking that the announcement yesterday,
an open casting call for an Iraq war veteran to play an Iraq war veteran, is a publicity stunt. The executive producer, Julie Hanan Carruthers, said in a press release that casting a real life soldier will heighten the experience for viewers. Excuse me, but I think that's utter hogwash. All My Children doesn't need an actual veteran of the war in Iraq to create a great soap opera storyline. That's why they brought in Chuck Pratt, Jr.
Continue reading TV Squad Soap Report: All My Children's looking for a real Iraq vet
Posted Aug 18th 2008 2:29PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: CSI, Casting, Reality-Free
As
Jane wrote a couple of weeks ago, CBS was hot on the heels of landing a big name star to fill the void when William Petersen leaves
CSI later this year. The names bandied about included Kurt Russell and John Malkovich, and one other major motion picture star, Laurence Fishburne. Today, the network announced
Laurence Fishburne will indeed be the new addition to CSI. His character is a forensic scientist, like Grissom, but don't expect him to have Gil's fascination with insects. No, Fishburne's man has other bugs: he's a former pathologist and college lecturer who's focused on why people commit acts of violence. It should be interesting to see how his preoccupation with the why integrates with the other CSI gang who are all Grissom-trained and generally obsessed with how a crime is done and who done it.
Fishburne will be introduced in the ninth episode when his character meets members of the CSI team during a murder investigation and ends up joining them.
Continue reading CSI lands Laurence Fishburne
Posted Aug 10th 2008 2:01PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Programming, Ratings, Reality-Free
The Nielsen ratings for last Friday night showed that
NBC did really well with the Olympic opening ceremonies. Good for NBC, bad for fans of CBS's
Swingtown. It didn't take a psychic to predict that all that NBC Universal hype would draw those who love pomp and spectacle. It also didn't take a seer to see that CBS wasn't giving
Swingtown a fair shot by asking it to go up against the Olympics.
Still, in CBS's defense,
Swingtown just hasn't grabbed the kind of ratings all summer long -- mostly on Thursday nights -- to warrant the network believing that it has a potential hit on its hand.
The New York Times pondered Swingtown's fate, too.
I think it does, but only if CBS gives
Swingtown some time. I'm not alone in thinking this either.
Josef Adalian agrees, as do and many TV Squad readers have expressed their passion for this show. Will CBS hear them as they chant, "All we are saying, is give
Swingtown a chance."
Continue reading What will CBS do with Swingtown?
Posted Aug 4th 2008 3:23PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Celebrities, Reality-Free
I can't believe it's gone. I've been watching for weeks now and the damn thing has grown on me, not to mention the polyester pants and paisley shirts. Are you lost? I'm talking about
Swingtown. There are but two episodes left of the series and unless there's a dramatic spurt in the ratings, I don't think CBS is going to re-up the show. Add to that the fact that Grant Show has shaved his moustache. That could be a signal that
Swingtown is not coming back.
Grant actually named the Fu-Manchu moustache, Sebastian. "[It'd] gotten out of control. The moment they called wrap on the last episode,
I shaved it off," he told the New York Times. "I feel like myself again. People who didn't know me looked at me like, 'What the hell are you doing?' I was at a restaurant the other day, and a woman asked me if I was a porn star."
Continue reading Grant Show and the porno moustache
Posted Jul 12th 2008 12:06PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Pickups and Renewals, Reality-Free, Army Wives
The
success of Army Wives has been huge for Lifetime. Currently, the second season is doing gangbuster ratings so it's no surprise the CEO Andrea Wong announced yesterday that
Army Wives has been renewed for season number three.
Commencing in early 2009, there will be 18 new episodes of the military-oriented, drama set in Fort Marshall around the lives of the families of Army personnel. Currently, the tale of the "tribe" has been a grand slam, Sunday night success for the cable net, the number one cable show among women 25-54 and women 18-49, Lifetime's key demographics.
Continue reading Lifetime drafts Army Wives for a third tour of duty
Posted Jul 5th 2008 2:02PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Pickups and Renewals, Ratings, Reality-Free
How much of
Swingtown is real and how much is pure fiction? According to Mike Kelley,
Swingtown's creator,
there are elements in the show that come right from his childhood memories of growing up on the North Shore, a trendy suburb of Chicago. But the sex and the swinging? That's mostly creative license.
So were there really sex parties and swinging in the Kelley home? "You know, it comes from imagination, for the most part."
Inspired by 1976, the era of women's liberation, disco-dancing, the end of the Vietnam War, and sexual freedom thanks to the pill and no AIDS, Kelley balances the fantastic elements with nostalgia.
Continue reading What's really real in Swingtown?
Posted Jul 4th 2008 5:52PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Sports, Programming, Reality-Free
Amid controversy and the threat of certain world leaders boycotting the upcoming Beijing Olympics, the word came out yesterday that President George W. Bush would attend the opening ceremonies. According to the Hollywood Reporter, this is good news for NBC, and the c
ompanies that have bought advertising for the Games.
While I can see how a boycott based on human rights abuses in China and Tibet would be a serious problem for the network -- and it still may lose viewers who choose to individually tune out rather than give positive sanction to China's misdeeds by watching -- I don't see how NBC can think a Bush appearance will bolster ratings.
Continue reading Will Bush at the Olympics really help NBC?
Posted Jun 20th 2008 8:02AM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Interviews, Celebrities, Reality-Free, Burn Notice
On USA's spy-action-comedy series
Burn Notice, there are great actors all around. Recently, I had the chance to spend a day on the set of
Burn Notice (more on that next week!), and share in round-table interviews with the stars of the show.
Here's one of those wonderful actors, the irreverent and brilliant Bruce Campbell. As Sam, Jeffrey's old friend -- and sometime nemesis -- from the spy wars, Campbell is having a ball filming in South Florida and stealing scenes like nobody's business. Oh, and he smells good, just like
Old Spice.
Q: What is the character of Sam about?
Bruce Campbell: He's about 50. No, he's like the other characters in the show, damaged goods, which is why I like him.
Continue reading Bruce Campbell: The TV Squad Interview
Posted Jun 17th 2008 12:41PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Ugly Betty, Casting, Reality-Free
One sign of a show's success is the ability to attract stars in guesting roles.
Army Wives, which has been
setting new records in ratings for Lifetime, has been a blockbuster hit and now they're starting to book flashy guest stars.
Ana Ortiz, Hilda Suarez on ABC's Ugly Betty, is going to be turning up on Army Wives this summer prior to her return as Betty's big sister on
Betty in the fall. Ms. Ortiz will go to Charleston, where
AW is filmed, before clocking in to the
new New York studios for Ugly Betty.
Ana is going to be playing Sandi, a waitress who becomes involved with Roxy and Trevor in a legal way, something about a lawsuit. While it's hard to project, there are clues in that description that can start the wheels turning. First off, if she has a connection to Trevor and Roxy and we know Trevor is currently in Iraq, will Sandi's story take place after he's home? Or maybe Sandi is a girl from Trevor's past who turns up at Fort Marshall looking for him and finds that he's overseas but has left behind a wife -- Roxy -- and her boys, whom he adopted.
Continue reading Ugly Betty's Ana Ortiz to guest on Army Wives
Posted May 11th 2008 1:02PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Industry, Programming, Ratings, Reality-Free
What do you do when you're losing a race, coming in last in a field of four, and have to justify your dismal performance? You change the scoring. What am I talking about? When asked about why his network is doing so poorly in the ratings, president and chief executive officer of NBC Universal,
Jeff Zucker told Television Week, "It's not just about the ratings anymore." What? (Imagine that as said by the Aflac duck). Do you think he really meant it, or is Jeff just hoping that the advertisers won't mind that his primetime lineup is getting its collective butt kicked by CBS, ABC and Fox most every night on the week?
Just to be fair, Zucker explains that the ratings don't matter because the network is fulfilling the expectations of the advertisers. "We're in an era where - we've made a commitment to our advertisers to a schedule. Advertisers have an expectation. It's not just about the ratings anymore. It's about our relationship with our advertisers and what their expectations are."
Continue reading NBC's Zucker says ratings don't matter anymore
Posted Apr 23rd 2008 8:01AM by Jen Creer
Filed under: Industry, American Idol, Watercooler Talk, Ratings, Predictions and Trends, News and Gossip
The
LA Times ran a piece yesterday stating that
American Idol's ratings are down for the first time in its seven-year run, with a 7% lag this season. Hmm, seven years and a 7% lag-- does that mean the show's viewers are showing signs of a seven-year itch?
The
Times story reported that shows typically show signs of a crack in the ratings veneer between seasons five and seven, which means that it is probably really smart for shows like
Lost and
Battlestar Galactica to determine their own ending dates, well before their ratings start to drop. Granted, a 7% decrease is not really anything to write home about. Simon, Paula, and Randy don't have to start paddling quite yet.
Continue reading Idol's ratings down; what does that mean for TV?
Posted Mar 20th 2008 10:23AM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Industry, Programming, Jericho, Pickups and Renewals
This is disheartening. ABC has been looking to Lifetime
as a new home for Men in Trees and October Road. Both dramatic series have not as yet been picked up for next year, and now this report makes it clear they are both skating on thin ice. The powers that be at Lifetime were given copies of both shows to review and chose not to pick up either of them. They basically threw the ball back to ABC, forcing the network to decide the fate of these two shows.
Continue reading Lifetime nixes ABC's October Road and Men in Trees
Posted Feb 25th 2008 8:42PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Daytime, Celebrities, Ratings, Awards, Emmys
Oscar turned 80 last night. For eight decades, Hollywood has been handing out gold statuettes for the best in motion picture arts and sciences. Sadly, last night's show will not have to worry about winning an Emmy. Not only was the show pedestrian, long and uninspired, it was also
a bomb in the Nielsen overnight ratings. In fact, it was historically disappointing: averaging just 32 million viewers to become the least watched Oscar telecast ever! EVER, people!
Of course, if you're worried that with ratings so bad, some day the Academy Awards won't be broadcast -- don't. The Oscars, like the Super Bowl, make a fortune for the network broadcasting it. ABC made an average of $1.8 million for each 30-second spot.
Continue reading Oscars a flop in Nielsens and that's not all
Posted Feb 15th 2008 3:59PM by Brad Linder
Filed under: PVR Wire
According to new research from Nielsen, people with personal video recorders watch more television. And while they PVR users generally like to plop down in front of the evening, they extend prime time a bit by sitting in front of the tube from 8 til midnight. That's because folks with a PVR can record one show at 8:00 while watching another, and then watch the first show at 11pm when their non-PVR owning friends are stuck watching Seinfeld reruns.
The rest of Nielsen's new data looks pretty much like all the reports we've been seeing over the last few years. A growing number of TV viewers have PVRs in their homes. People are most likely to watch sports, news and movies live, while they record scripted dramas, comedy, and other TV shows for watching later.
[via Advertising Age]
Next Page >
Hey, look! Labor Day weekend marathons!
Giveaway Tuesday: Signed True Blood promo poster
TV Squad is now iPhone-friendly
