October 18-22, 2010

[marceline]

Unfortunately, those decisons don't seem to include changing management.

[Southofnowhere]

AMC is TOAST!

[JimTolkien]

ICAM. It is actually this simple...it's not that hard to see what CBS is trying to do. It's all about the bottom line and making investors happy by showing you can cut costs and turn a profit for a few years. Who knows if The Talk can do that,but if it can go against OLTL and not be that far off in term of ratings and viewership, then CBS will be pleased for that hour. I am looking forward to seeing how they will do now that they have gotten the 1st week jitters out of the way.

[DRW50]

Ultimately if it's just about profit and cheap price, then there won't be much of a reason for any new show to be put on the air in those timeslots. The show is safe for a few years no matter what because of Julie Chen, so they might test that out on LMAD first, who knows. If The Talk starts going down to 1.3 or 1.4 or whatever, with demos which aren't in the range CBS expected, then putting in repeats of procedurals, sitcoms, or even stuff like reruns of reality shows might make about the same profit as paying for a set, for guests, 6 salaries for the hosts, etc. I guess that's the idea which probably bothers me most, all of daytime eventually moving towards repeats, but I won't be surprised if it happens within a few years.

[marceline]

The next few weeks should be interesting. The Talk should find it's footing quickly enough but at the same time, we're now in sweeps so the stakes are high for OLTL but Ron's usually been able to pull together a decent sweeps so the next month will probably come down to promotion for both shows. If The Talk gets a few really amazing guests or generates a little controversy they could do some damage but I really think the numbers we're seeing now are going to be the norm.

[bellcurve]

In my market and many others in the central timezone, DAYS airs opposite AMC/B&B.

[Saving ATWT]

[Saving ATWT]

I don't think Sony owns B&B and that, aside from a partnership, the soap is all Bell with a Bell production company. They doesn't want to sell because of the international profit and B&B is the sort of show that could find a new network. The soap has a cheap production model, only tapes for about 7 months, and could end up on cable. As for Y&R, the Bells should sell their stake to CBS and take a one time payout. The family must realize that the days of soap are almost over and they are making the same mistake PGP made in 2001. CBS runs the drama network in the UK and would love to get more content. Then again, maybe the family can make more money over the next five years staying indie and holding on to the bitter end. I'd love to see the how much everyone makes off thee shows.

BTW, I don't think Brad Bell has the talent to make his own show. B&B was created by his parents and he has done poorly with that.

[jpoliver78]

Some surprising nuggets buried in those weekly numbers, among them...

OLTL was ABC's highest rated soap on two days - Tuesday and Friday. OLTL came in ahead of GH and AMC both days, and finished ahead of GH, but behind AMC on Monday.

Also, despite airing in its first week, the new CBS talker "The Talk" actually beat GH in viewers on Tuesday and AMC on Friday.

[Saving ATWT]

OLTL is in a great position to tie GH or even become ABC's top-rated soap. The 18-49 year olds don't seem all that interested in The Talk even though numbers might spike with a hot guest. Over the past three weeks, OLTL has been coming up close on GH in demos and I don't see any reason for this trend to end. OLTL seems to have found a niche and Fron's was smart to hold onto the show. AMC is in a fight for it's life. The soap was doing so much better under Pratt and a new writing regime is needed

[jpoliver78]

I know this is off topic, but CBS just reduced the episode order for "Medium" this season from the previously announced 22 down to just 13...which in all likelihood means that "Medium" will not be back next season and will be gone around January/February 2011.

I don't really see "The Talk" being sold the same way that "Medium" is. Who would want to watch an episode of "The Talk", or "The View", five years after the fact. Since both are either taped live or very near live and feature mostly current events, neither will be sold into (repeat) syndication.

As to the comments about running primetime reruns in daytime, that was actually a common practice until the 1980s/early 1990s. Whenever I would stay with my grandmother during the summers off from school, I remember watching reruns of "Golden Girls" and "Full House" during the early morning before the network game shows came on.

[EastMA2]

Wow! Didn't realize that. As I said yesterday, CBS is already a winner with The Talk financially.

[Bella20]

I'm sorry, but there is no top soap. In households Y&R is in first place, and then there is pretty much a five way tie for last. In the demo, Y&R might be first, but doesn't even have a million viewer lead over whatever soap winds up in last place, but while it is still bringing in a million pairs of eyes, I'll give it first place, and the rest are in a statistical tie for last. No soaps numbers are good, and nobody has anything to brag about.

You are right. Both The Talk ad The View are topical programs, so the only way that The Talk would be syndicated is if CBS cancels it, and it gets picked up by a production company that specializes in making syndicated programing like Regis and Kelly.

[marceline]

I think this is comparing apples and...anything other than apples.

Ignoring the fact that the audiences for daytime and primetime are considered to be wildly different (not by me, however.) Medium started on NBC before it came to CBS and they basically took the show as a replacement for Close to Home which was considered to be the weak link between Ghost Whisperer and Numb3rs.

[jpoliver78]

The issue with "Medium" goes back to an earlier comment..."Medium has weak prime time ratings but makes CBS loads of money through third party sales to Lifetime."

I pointed out that "Medium" has been, in effect, canceled by CBS this week, despite the "loads of money" that it is making CBS (who produces the series). So, even though CBS makes money off of each episode of "Medium" produced, the ratings this season apparently do not make it financially feasable to continue production.

Similarly, "The Talk" may not be getting the same viewership that ATWT got, but the fact that it is so much cheaper to produce, CBS is still making money despite fewer viewers tuning in. Also, since "The Talk" is produced in-house at CBS, the network also gets a larger percentage of the advertising revenue, which can only contribute to the money CBS is already making off the show.

I only mentioned the (likely) cancellation of "Medium" to note, that even with a network making money off a show, the network can still only tolerate certain ratings levels before that particular series is canceled.