How about a REAL reality TV show? No more staging, scripting and editing. Look how popular real time/real life COPS videos are. Sure, they edit out the real violence and profanity (FCC rules), but imagine the popularity of a show that DIDN'T do that! Show the REAL violence, profanity, nudity and, yes, death. Stop sugar-coating "reality" and (as we used to say decades ago) let it all hang out. #abc
Why does everyone forget that this isn't entirely unprecedented? After Jack Paar left the Tonight Show, NBC gave him an hour talk show in prime time. Not every weeknight, but still, it's a precedent, and it lasted a couple of years. (By the way, Paar is a conversational gem--a snarkmeister of the Mad Men era. Check out the DVD collection of his best work.)
NBC has Leno, Conan, Fallon, Carson Daly. CBS has Letterman and Craig Ferguson. ABC has Kimmel. Spike Fereston is on some other network. This is eight celebrity chat shows. The supply of celebrities will be used up by the end of the month, then what? Even with eight chat shows on the major networks, Charlie Rose somehow manages to get the best guests.
@uncle_wiggly: And Charlie Rose manages to waste those best guests because the point of any Rose interview is the long-winded "brilliance" of Rose's questions, which always contain both the question and the answer. A far better interviewer is Dick Cavett, who was witty, concise, conversational, informative, and just deferential enough to let his guests talk and shine.
And if Leno had aired at 10pm instead of 1135 15 years ago, we never would have gotten some of the best television that has ever been shown.
Here are some of "those" shows we probably never would have seen...
-Law and Order (the Original)
-LA Law
-Hill Street Blues
-ER (The first 10 seasons)
-The West Wing (aired at 9pm but was a hugely expensive drama - something the Leno move is a rebuke to)
-Homicide: Life on the Streets
-Kings (which I loved, which was originally supposed to air at 10pm...)
Can you think of what TV today would be like without the influence of Law and Order or Homicide or ER or LA Law? I can't.
@ndhapple: You are correct, ma'am/sir--my apologies. For some reason I thought Kings was on CBS. Editing my comment now. But I still disagree with the premise of your comment--there's no way the airing of Leno would've prevented these shows from airing. Also, I don't see how West Wing is proving your point if it aired at 9.
@DahlELama: Because Leno stands for the new NBC mantra of "managing for margins." The days of the $4 million per episode ensemble drama are over if Leno works. Nothing personifies that style of program quite like the West Wing did.
It just saddens me to know that such a show probably wouldn't get the green light at this day and time.
@SpicyTamale is a GA peach: OMG, Life was cancelled because nobody was watching it. Jay didn't kill it. Law and Order is still on the air and that was in the 10:00 time slot.
@dinalohan: On this one. Hell, during the last season of "Friends", at least one or two of the cast members were making a million bucks an episode. And that was just a sitcom (albeit an extraordinarily popular one).
"TV producers, writers, actors, grips, agents - everyone who takes a piece of the bloated production budgets a primetime drama throws off."
Explain this statement please. From where I sit, these people are an important part of the media economy, in other words, your readers. Why the snotty, ungrateful attitude?
@lionel-mandrake: Right! And grips just get a 3% raise every year, it's not like they're the reason budgets are "bloated" (which they decidedly are NOT)
Next to the limp, sweaty, homophobic desperation of America's Favorite Unfunny Comedian, the endless CSI variations that CBS will be running at 10:00pm are looking really good.
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Yeah, let's build a stadium and fill it with Lions and Tigers and Bears, OH MY! #abc
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I honestly don't know how I will ever stop laughing derisively at this statement.
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Here are some of "those" shows we probably never would have seen...
-Law and Order (the Original)
-LA Law
-Hill Street Blues
-ER (The first 10 seasons)
-The West Wing (aired at 9pm but was a hugely expensive drama - something the Leno move is a rebuke to)
-Homicide: Life on the Streets
-Kings (which I loved, which was originally supposed to air at 10pm...)
Can you think of what TV today would be like without the influence of Law and Order or Homicide or ER or LA Law? I can't.
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09/14/09
It just saddens me to know that such a show probably wouldn't get the green light at this day and time.
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Oh, I'm sorry, did you want it to be a good show?
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Explain this statement please. From where I sit, these people are an important part of the media economy, in other words, your readers. Why the snotty, ungrateful attitude?
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