It was time to take “Friends” to the next level and give it the even stronger hammock of the slot between our two biggest shows, “Seinfeld” and “ER.” We decided to make the move later in the new year. We cut the order short for “Madman of the People,” the Seinfeld lead-out, and in March 1995 moved “Friends” behind “Seinfeld.” To no one’s surprise, we improved the time period performance and at 8:30, inserted what would be the first in a long line of mediocre comedies in the 8:30 and 9:30 slots on our Must-See TV nights. “Hope and Gloria,” welcome to the party.
The full Must-See TV strategy was in place was we entered the 1995-96 season. The house was built, and now all we need to do was rearrange the furniture. The driver of the strategy was comedies. We started the prior season with 12 comedies on the schedule and increased that to 16 in the fall of ’95.
Twenty years ago, scheduling still mattered a lot, so the game was to pair up a new comedy with something established. Six new comedies (seven if you count “Hope and Gloria,” which premiered in March 1995) were in the 8:30 or 9:30 satellite slots, paired up with established successes. We had comedies on five of the seven nights, and three nights — Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday — had a four-comedy block.
Comedies were sales-friendly and repeatable, and given the half-hour format, we were able to launch more potentially successful comedies in the adjacent half-hour. Sold as the Must-See TV brand, the whole was greater than the sum of its parts.
This was especially true of our Thursday comedy block and “ER” at 10 p.m. Thursday night was the most attractive to advertisers, especially automakers and movies, and the CPMs we charged on the night were the highest in the business. Thursday night was also the first night of the crucial (back then) sweeps periods (November, February and May), and we dubbed our Thursday schedule the “greasy pole.” We would start the sweep with a dominant lead, and the other networks would then try to catch up — only to be faced with another Thursday night ratings onslaught.
We moved “Friends” to 8 p.m. on Thursday, and given that it was only in its second season, the license fee (NBC did not own it, Warner Bros. did) was reasonable. We put two new comedies in the satellite slots — “The Single Guy” and “Caroline in the City” — and with “Seinfeld” as the tentpole, it was the most profitable night on television.
We parlayed the enormous young adult appeal of Thursday night into creating the most profitable night in NBC’s history up to that point. In January 1995 ABC had the Super Bowl and attempted to launch a new drama after the post-game. “Extreme,” some sort of rescue show, premiered after the game and lasted two months of Thursday night. The morning after the game, at our daily 2:30 meeting, I went into one of my rants about how putting something new after the Super Bowl just showed more people that it sucked quicker than premiering it on its regular night. Very few series premiered and succeeded after the game, and if they did, it was as much that they were put in a solid time period (a la “The Wonder Years”) and would have succeeded regardless.
As an alternative to premiering a new series, I suggested that we go to the “Seinfeld” gang and offer them the post-Super Bowl slot for the 1996 game on NBC — and that we announce it in the upfront and make a killing. We would ask them to do a one-hour episode. Everyone thought it was a good idea. Warren Littlefield went to see Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David, who immediately shot down it down.
Honestly, we were not surprised. That same season we came up with a theme for Thursday night “Blackout Thursday.” All the Thursday comedies were in New York City, and we pitched a night where a city power failure was factored into the stories of all the shows. The other three comedies bought in, but “Seinfeld” passed. We still marketed the night that way, but Jerry and Larry just did their thing.
After being shot down by “Seinfeld,” we went to “Friends,” who embraced the idea. I think they were thrilled that we had so much faith in a freshman comedy to offer them the slot, and they delivered with an All-Star hour. “The One After the Super Bowl” featured Julia Roberts, Brooke Shields, Jean-Claude Van Damme and Marcel the monkey, and the rating and the money we generated for the game, the postgame (which held on to all the 18-49s waiting for “Friends”) and the episode made it the most profitable night in NBC’s history.
The strategy of protecting new comedies by putting them behind established shows resulted in five freshmen shows returning for another season. In addition to “The Single Guy” and “Caroline in the City,” “NewsRadio” (hammocked between “Wings” and “Frasier” on Tuesdays) returned for the 1996-97 season. Two midseason shows, “Boston Common” and “3rd Rock from the Sun” were also renewed.
We also had some family comedies on Sunday night from 7-8 p.m., and “Brother Love” featuring the Lawrence brothers (remember them?) also got a second season pickup.
More about those shows … after the break.
The 1995-96 primetime season was when those of us at the Peacock network were starting to have some fun. As the scheduler, I felt I had built as close as I could come to my vision of a dream schedule. My mantra in programming was “Reduce the cost of failure and invest in success,” and I believed our schedule accomplished that.
First, and most importantly, it was sales-friendly with 16 comedies and several quality dramas. Virtually every comedy at 8:30 or 9:30 led out of an established comedy. Lead-ins still mattered back then, so the probability of any of these satellite shows tanking was pretty slim.
Second, there were an additional seven hours of the schedule that were pretty much failure-proof. We had two movie nights that were a combination of made-for-TV movies, theatricals (which I would purchase along with our head of business affairs, John Agoglia) and event miniseries from our movie and miniseries empress, Lindy DeKoven. In addition to the movie nights we had three hours of “Dateline” on the schedule (Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday).
We had established programming at 10 p.m. across the schedule, so our affiliated stations had strong ratings leading into their local news.
The sales-friendly nature of the schedule meant I had the support of our sales department in keeping it going and making the moves that would make NBC quite profitable through the rest of the ’90s.
We had a vision for our comedies — young adult singles living in New York — and that seemed to be resonating with the audience. We were delivering a young (18-49), urban, upscale, college-educated audience, and the biggest shows were on the night most valued by advertisers — Thursday.
I thought a lot about why “Friends” resonated the way it did. Of course, a big part of the show’s success was the casting and the writing, but there are a lot of shows that hit those two targets and don’t break out. “Friends” found the secret sauce. For me, why “Friends” exploded was this (please don’t share, thanx): You either wanted to become them, were them, or remembered being them. In my opinion, “Friends” hit every demo target. I think that’s what to this day, young people keep discovering the show.
Our goal was to replicate that formula, especially on Thursday night, and that’s why “The Single Guy” and “Caroline in the City” were given the primo satellite slots. For whatever reason, I can’t remember, Warren Littlefield and I decided that we did not want to know the testing data when we were in pilot season in May 1995. We violated our own policy when it came to “Caroline in the City.” We were convinced that this was going to be our highest-testing pilot, and the Saturday before scheduling meetings, we begged Eric Cardinal, our head of research, to share the results. We were relieved to discover that we were right.
Over on Tuesday we went 50/50. “The Pursuit of Happiness,” which initially aired at 9:30 after “Frasier,” didn’t cut it. I think it was too serious and too adult for the comedies that our audience was looking for. On the other hand, “NewsRadio” hit that absurdist sweet spot and would become an important player for us. I remember going to the table read for the pilot. It was pretty funny, but there was a feeling that we could punch up the comedy if we replaced the handyman at the radio station with someone funnier. So, Joe Rogan replaced a guy named Ray Romano, and the rest is history. The butterfly effect in action.
I the spring of 1996 we added two comedies to the schedule for a tryout. “Boston Common” replaced “The Single Guy” for a short run and was renewed for the 1996-97 season. On Tuesday, we added “3rd Rock from the Sun” to Tuesday at 8:30. We “stole” “3rd Rock” from ABC after they passed on it. To be honest I was not a fan, but the Masked Daughter loved it when I brought it home for the family to screen.
It opened to some lofty ratings, and my 10-year-old would taunt me about how she knew more about hits than I did. We flipped “3rd Rock” into the leadoff spot on Tuesday to test its strength as a lead-in show. It did not disappoint. This enabled us to once again move “Wings” as we were about to expand our comedy presence for the ’96-’97 season.
We were having fun and ended the 1995-96 season as the No. 1 network in adults 18-49. We were commitment-free and had built a strong framework for success. Next time I’ll talk a bit more about movies and “Dateline” — and how I received a Jeer from TV Guide.
I want to take a little break from the building of the Must-See TV schedule to talk a bit about the two formats that helped us fill out 22 hours — newsmagazines and movies.
As successful as NBC was in the mid-’90s, it was impossible for anyone to schedule 22 hours of successful original scripted series. You had to rely on other formats to fill out parts of your schedule. Over the course of my scheduling career, there were three types of shows that played the role of giving your scripted series relief. I saw it evolve from movies to newsmagazines to reality shows (especially reality competitions). In the 1995-96 season, our first No. 1 finish of the Must-See TV era, I had two nights of movies (Sunday and Monday) and three hours of “Dateline” (Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday), which covered seven of the 22 hours.
The scheduler is generally the point person between the news division and the entertainment group. Early in my tenure as head of scheduling, I became the unofficial program exec on “I-Witness Video,” which was an early shock video hour produced by our news division. I continued to play that role as we developed the “Dateline” brand. After the executive producer of “Dateline” was fired for blowing up a GM truck, he was replaced by Neal Shapiro, who is currently CEO and president of public television station WNET in New York City. Andy Lack was president of NBC News, and Neal and Andy were important allies over the MSTV era.
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