What’s happening to the cherished genre these days isn’t funny as it could be reduced to nothing Seven weeks ago, CNN launched The History Of The Sitcom – an unnecessary eight-part documentary on a subject covered to death through books, PBS, and other media celebrating the form stretching from the days of I Love Lucy on your black-and-white mono […]
Career spanned ABC, CBS, NBC plus his own production company Media watchers are mourning the death of Fred Silverman, an executive who re-invented CBS and took ABC to the top, and later formed his own production company. Born in the Queens borough of New York, Silverman began his career right here in Chicago at WGN-TV in the early 1960s where […]
The long-running CBS sitcom to end in May after twelve seasons It won’t be remembered for its quality, but Sheldon and Co. have left their mark on pop culture, one “Bazinga” at a time. Chuck Lorre and CBS announced the conclusion of The Big Bang Theory last Wednesday after twelve seasons and ending its quest to becoming the longest-running live-action […]
They’re no fools, ABC retools; ten new shows highlight 2016-17 schedule As expected, ABC has overhauled its schedule for 2016-17, the first under new ABC Entertainment President Channing Dungey. Unlike NBC and Fox, who are introducing just three new shows onto their fall schedules and saving the rest for midseason, ABC is going full throttle, adding five new shows to their […]
Channing Dungey becomes ABC Entertainment president; First African-American woman to run a major network When it comes to CBS, you always hear the tagline “We’re America’s Most Watched Network”. When it comes to ABC, it’s always “We’re always in third or fourth place”. And it’s the sinking fortunes that led to ABC Entertainment President Paul Lee’s departure. The alphabet network and the phrase […]
Chicago’s last digital subchannel holdout is about to convert. WBBM-TV owner CBS – who operates Chicago’s only TV station not operating a digital subchannel – is entering a new venture with Weigel Broadcasting in launching Decades, a new digital subchannel network scheduled to launch in the second quarter of 2015 (in layman’s terms, next spring.) The channel has been cleared […]
HBO, CBS bypass middlemen to provide content to you, the customer If there was a turning point in the cord-cutting movement, remember this week. HBO announced it was launching a streaming service on Wednesday, attempting to attract those “cord-nevers”, the term thrown around for those who refuse or can’t afford to subscribe to cable or satellite. It was followed by […]
The world is reacting to the stunning news of actor and comedian Robin Williams’ death. The Chicago native was found dead at 12:02 p.m.. Pacific Time Monday, at his home near Tiburon, Ca. The Marin County Coroner’s office investigated, and Williams death was ruled a suicide. Williams had been suffering from severe depression, and recently entered a rehab facility to […]
After two decades in syndication, an off-network property is getting a facelift Cops, a longtime staple on both Fox and in off-network syndication, is being re-branded by Twentieth Television as Cops Reloaded in broadcast syndication and is being re-formatted an re-edited into different segments appering in the body of the show. For example, one segement could feature a car chase in […]
From last week, here is the cable portion of Television Critics Association press tour from Los Angeles – three days, and lots of cable networks… Wednesday/Thursday portion Starz Exec session: On Thursday, CEO Chris Albrecht spoke about the end of Spartacus, saying the series had run its course. Albrecht also gave updates on the series Starz had in production – […]
This past week, we saw the passing of two classic TV stars. Last Saturday, actress Barbara Billingsley passed away at the age of 94. Billingsley was best known for playing June Cleaver in Leave It To Beaver, which premiered on CBS on October 4, 1957 and moved to ABC in 1958, where it ran for five more seasons. Billingsley also […]
It’s no longer a rush to get into the 4:30 a.m. news business – it’s a stampede. Consider this – a recent search of TVNewsCheck of “4:30” turned up a whopping 115 items., with most of the stories featuring stations starting 4:30 a.m. newscasts in the past year, or so. This isn’t a rush – it’s a stampede. Get the […]
Mancow’s shtick is so laughable, it could pass itself off as a pathetic sitcom. Welcome to Everybody Loves Mancow, starring Mancow Mueller! In this show, Mancow thinks the whole world only evolves around him and only him – and everybody who works with him suffers for it. In this latest episode, Mueller talks about Tuesday’s Federal Court ruling on indecency […]
The new Family Guy spin-off got some good sampling last night. Fox’s premiere of The Cleveland Show, featuring the next-door neighbor of The Griffins who moved to Virginia to start a new life drew 9.4 million viewers and a 4.9 rating in adults 18-49, growing 17% from its Simpsons lead-in. The premiere of Cleveland coincided with the season premieres of […]
Stop me if you’ve heard this before… The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation is being criticized by governmental leaders and actor unions for airing too much American programming on the public network – a practice it has been doing for decades. The controversy comes as CBC dropped two Canadian-produced newsmagazine/lifestyle shows: Fashion File and Steven & Chris, due to low ratings and […]
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