– The Giants-Patriots tilt was seen by 97.5 million viewers, making it the highest-rated Super Bowl of all-time, and only second to the 1983 finale of M*A*S*H. The game was up 5 percent from last year’s Colts-Bears Super Bowl. – Super Bowl XLII earned a 43.2 household rating and 65 share, and averaged a 37.6 among adults 18-49. – Fox-owned […]
– Twentieth Television has renewed The Morning Show with Mike & Juliet for a second season the Fox O&O’s, including WFLD-TV in Chicago. The program has done on many stations, especially in southern markets such as Birmingham (WBRC) and Greensboro, N.C. (WGHP). Other pickups include San Francisco (KTVU), Seattle (KCPQ-TV), and Portland, Ore. (KPTV). – Mighty Oak’s Whacked Out Sports […]
News Corp. had made good on its promise to sell eight of its Fox TV stations, and it did to the newly-formed Local TV group headed by private equity firm Oak Hill Partners for $1.1 billion. The proceeds from the sale gives News Corp. the cash it needs to purchase the Wall Street Journal. In a separate development, Tribune and […]
Interesting tidbits from the world of broadcast TV: – New Jersey residents aren’t happy with New York area WWOR-TV and accuse the Fox-owned station of backpeddling on its commitment of public service and giving the residents of the state the short shrift. WWOR is the only commercial VHF station in New Jersey. The FCC will hold a hearing tonight in […]
Weigel Broadcasting’s Chicago independent WCIU-TV scored another urban sitcom coup by acquiring CBS Television Distribution’s Everybody Hates Chris. The program will air in off-network syndication as a strip beginning in the fall of 2009, assuming the CW renews the show for next season. WCIU is likely to pair Chris with Debmar’s Tyler Perry’s House of Payne, another urban sitcom that’s […]
This week’s issue of Crain’s Chicago Business details the continuing ratings struggle of CBS-owned WBBM-TV. Joe Ahern, who helped rocket competing WLS-TV into a ratings powerhouse in the ’80’s and ’90’s, is finding it a difficult task to repeat the same feat at WBBM. At issue is the station’s poorly-rated newscasts, which places behind not only ABC-owned WLS and NBC-owned […]
It looks like Family Guy has succeeded where The Simpsons succeeded. According to numbers supplied by Twentieth Television (from a banner ad that appeared on TV Week’s website), Family Guy’s airing at 10 p.m. on WGN-TV finished number one in the time period between Sept. 17 and Sept. 21 among men 18-34 (2.2) and women 18-34 (2.6). It beat not […]
In this corner, it’s Fox-owned WJBK-TV – in the other corner, it’s Post-Newsweek’s NBC affiliate WDIV – and they are boxing to see who will come out on top in the ultimate battle to become Detroit’s ultimate website champion… (don’t count out the spoiler, either – ABC affiliate WXYZ-TV.) Both stations are upping the ante, including streaming their newscasts (WDIV […]
Warner Bros. Domestic Television Distribution announced a deal with ten Fox-owned My Network TV affiliates, including WPWR-TV in Chicago, for their new 35-title movie package. It was also sold to 123 other markets, bringing the clearance rate to 90 percent of the U.S. Titles include Batman Begins, March of the Penguins, Million Dollar Baby, Ocean’s Twelve, and two Harry Potter […]
We’re gonna turn it on… we’re gonna turn on the power… at Fox-owned WPWR this fall. But the power’s been off for a few years now at the station. Like other big-market MNT affiliates (WWOR and KCOP in N.Y. and L.A., respectively), WPWR has performed poorly, often placing last in total-day ratings among Chicago’s English and Spanish commercial TV stations. […]
The syndication business hopes that three new shows can break the losing streak the platform has had for the last few years. The most controversial of the three is Warner’s TMZ, the anti-celebrity website that has grown in popularity in the last few months. The trash-celeb show, reminiscent of Hard Copy, premieres Sept. 10 locally on Fox-owned WPWR-TV and WFLD-TV. […]
Fox-owned WNYW in New York will run every Simpsons episode in chronological order from 1 to 400 beginning on September 10. (Are you listening, WFLD?) Here’s are the local fall lineup for WNYW, as well as two other New York stations, Tribune’s WPIX and WNYW’s sister, WWOR. Meanwhile, here’s more on the new WPCH – the former WTBS in Atlanta. […]
We have The Ten, they will have The Edge. WJBK-TV, the Fox-owned station in Detroit, is returning to the 11 p.m. newscast race effective on September 24 named The Edge. WJBK had news in the 11 p.m. slot when it was a CBS affiliate, but was moved to 10 p.m. when the station was switched to Fox by then-owner New […]
Aaron Barnhart of TV Barn takes a look at the new Warner Bros.- syndicated show spun off from the popular website premiering in the fall (It airs in Chicago on WPWR-TV at 6:30 weeknights and late nights on sister station WFLD-TV beginning in September.) And that website has scored another coup – it was the first to break news of […]
An article in Crain’s Chicago Business this week details the ongoing weather wars between Chicago’s television news operations. Competitors are taking aim at each other, particularly at Fox-owned WFLD-TV and new meteorologist Amy Freeze. The weathermen at other local stations are taking their shots at her and her station, with one weatherman saying that WFLD’s breaking into regular programming for […]
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