There were no overt signs of panic as the six television networks unveiled their fall lineups for advertisers here last week.
Network presidents did not appear before their real public wearing sandwich boards saying, “Please sponsor us.” Dates with the hottest stars and starlets were not raffled off. Tony Danza did not get a new show, only a cameo as a cabbie in a comic video CBS prepared for its presentation.
But for all the usual bluster on display in the annual “upfronts” ritual that marks the end of one television season and the beginning of selling the next, there was much anxiety evident amid the full-length unveiling of the “Friends” spinoff “Joey,” CBS hiring The Who to play three songs at Carnegie Hall, and the rampant recombining of stars who failed to catch the public’s fancy last season (e.g. Rob Lowe and Joe Pantoliano in CBS’ new “Dr. Vegas”).
Hordes of advertising executives and a herd of reporters shuffled from one Manhattan hall to another to hear the six networks make elaborate promises about the future via extensive and often gluteus-numbing shows. For the business community, the presentations in such storied venues as Carnegie, Madison Square Garden (WB and UPN) and Radio City Music Hall (NBC) were about billions of dollars in ads being sold in advance, or “upfront.” For the viewing public, it was a preview of coming distractions.
Through the week, it was hard not to see network hands being wrung. Most everybody, in their elaborate, separate shows, emphasized not how great things are, but that the networks ended up not doing as badly versus cable as people feared at the beginning of the television season. When NBC said the total audience for the Big Four (ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC) was down 2 percent from the previous season, this was meant to be heard as triumph.
In contrast with the Up with People enthusiasm others tried to generate, the session for very troubled ABC was almost desultory. From a theater way too small to accommodate the interest (hundreds had to watch in simulcast), network sales chief Mike Shaw kicked things off by telling people that it was smart to buy ads on network TV, but he never took on the more difficult but seemingly more relevant challenge of making a specific case for ABC.
Then, introducing the network’s lineup, new chief programmer Stephen McPherson emphasized that he was just “29 days” into the job. Translation: These shows, including irredeemably broad-looking family comedies from Mel Gibson (“Savages”) and a comic named Rodney Carrington (“Rodney”), aren’t mine, and I won’t be held responsible.
Perhaps the biggest sign of desperation came, surprisingly, from NBC. Despite needing to add just five new series, the network went ahead and ordered an animated comedy imagining the pampered lives of the felines who work for Siegfried & Roy. That they brought on heavily edited video of a heavily scarred Roy to endorse “Father of the Pride” did nothing to temper the cringing in the audience.
Imagining NBC’s thinking, late-night host Conan O’Brien, in a scorched-earth monologue on the Radio City stage so biting toward his network and bosses that it felt like a resignation letter, said, “`He’s been terribly mauled. We’ll make a show about it!'”
His network’s new slogan, O’Brien said? “NBC. At least we’re not ABC.”
But NBC and ABC were hardly alone in being a touch discombobulated. All of the networks played at least lip service to the idea that theirs is now a 52-week business, but they all had different ideas of what that meant. Most dramatically, two of the Big Four networks decided to shrug off the traditional fall season, the very reason for the existence of the upfronts.
NBC, keeping an earlier promise, said it will start most of its new shows and new seasons of returning shows right after its Olympics broadcasts end, in late August, weeks ahead of the official season start.
Fox announced a three-tiered schedule that debuts some shows in summer, some in November and some in January; if you had at hand a sundial, a tidal chart and the ghost of Fred Silverman, you could figure it out. Then again, why bother? Based on Fox’s recent upfront track record, a good number of the shows it announced won’t air as announced.
Reality still ascendant
Before last season, everybody seemed to agree there had been an overdose of “reality,” and no new unscripted fare would be part of the initial fall lineup. This year, only the two strongest networks, CBS and NBC, are shunning untested reality. The others rushed to catch some of the magic of Donald Trump, whose sudden stardom made him a central figure at the upfronts. NBC had The Donald appear on stage at Radio City, making still more extremely tired hair jokes and boasting, “I’m a total ratings machine and everyone knows it.” CBS, in its video, had Trump being run over by the Danza-driven cab, to much audience laughter.
Desperate ABC moved a reality show called “Wife Swap,” about housewives temporarily trading families, from its summer schedule to fall, and it will cast Texas rich guy Mark Cuban in its Trump role. Similarly desperate Fox planned three new unscripted efforts, including Virgin empire builder Richard Branson as its Trump and another business competition show.
Even NBC, still popular this season but reeling after losing key shows “Friends” and “Frasier,” announced its midseason offerings would include new reality, “The Contender,” a Mark Burnett-Sylvester Stallone production about boxing hopefuls, not to be confused with Fox’s “The Next Great Champ,” about a different set of boxing hopefuls. Twelve of the 2003-04 season’s top 20 shows among 18-to-49-year-olds are reality series, NBC pointed out.
The most striking development in unscripted programming, though, came from WB entertainment chief Jordan Levin, who issued an abject apology for shunning the genre last year, despite evidence that it was the growing favorite among the young-adult-female demographic his network (partly owned by Tribune Co., owner of this newspaper) targets.
Then, he argued that reality was only a quick ratings fix, while scripted shows that could run years were the better basis for a business. Now, he said, “I was wrong,” a declaration refreshingly free of qualifications or even a hint of blame-shifting.
Spinoff safety
When they weren’t hoping to lasso more reality lightning, the networks were following the ostensibly safe strategy of spinoffs. NBC offered up the entire pilot of “Joey” (quickie judgment: a C-plus show, some laughs, but too crude and inconsistent in its view of the title character’s intelligence). CBS announced a third “CSI,” set in New York and airing Wednesdays, that will star Gary Sinise and Melina Kanakarades. NBC’s next “Law & Order” iteration will bow in midseason.
In the near-spinoff category, NBC’s modest success with the glitzy casino drama “Las Vegas” in the current season seems to have inspired several semi-imitators: CBS’ aforementioned “Dr. Vegas,” about a, no joke, casino doctor; Fox’s summertime “The Casino,” a Burnett-produced real-life look at Las Vegas’ Golden Nugget; and even NBC’s “Hawaii” and “LAX,” dramas that, like “Las Vegas,” seem inspired more by their locations than any compelling dramatic idea.
In another sign that the scales have tipped toward reality, Burnett had by far the most new shows of any executive producer. Yes, scripted auteur David E. Kelley will reimagine “The Practice” for ABC, as “The Practice: Fleet Street,” still starring James Spader. And Steven Bochco (“Hill Street Blues”) will bring on another cop drama (“Blind Justice,” about a, yes, unsighted detective) after his “NYPD Blue” ends its run in midseason.
But Burnett was virtually everywhere. Next season or this summer, he’ll have “Survivor” on CBS, “The Apprentice,” “The Contender” and perhaps “The Restaurant” again on NBC, “The Casino” on Fox and an undisclosed reality show on WB. Plus, he’ll executive produce two scripted shows on WB, “Global Frequency,” a drama about a covert intelligence group, and “Commando Nanny,” his own life story turned into a sitcom: Ex-British soldier takes job as L.A.-area nanny.
Still, there was not a complete abandonment of the idea of crafted solid scripted television, despite CBS brutally mocking NBC’s claim to the quality mantel with a mock-promotional video showing lowlights from “Fear Factor.” The two best comedies of recent vintage both got shots in the arm, NBC’s “Scrubs” earning a two-year renewal and Fox’s “Arrested Development” being brought back for next season against the ratings odds.
Fox is bringing on “The Jury,” a new summertime drama from Tom Fontana and Barry Levinson, who made the great “Homicide: Life on the Street.” And WB seemed as if it will try very hard to be good with “Jack & Bobby,” featuring the intriguing concept of two brothers groomed for the presidency, their story told in flashback after one of them has made it.
Amid all the hoopla of upfront week, you had to work to find such potential gems. But it was encouraging to note that there was more there than Mark Burnett and malicious felines made cuddly.
