Category Archives: Favorites

TV’s 10 Worst Time Slots: Can Any Show Survive?

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gracepoint-hed-01-2014_0

I’m very excited to begin contributing to Adweek, as they look to expand their TV coverage online. My first story for them is something that I’ve wanted to write for more than a year: a look at the worst TV time slots on television, the ones that have been radioactive for years on end, and manage to bring about the end of almost every show that is aired there.

I looked back at several years of TV schedule grids, and pulled together this collection of TV’s equivalent of death row.

Abandon hope, all ye who are scheduled here:

TV’s 10 Worst Time Slots: Can Any Show Survive?

‘NCIS’s’ Mark Harmon is the World’s Biggest TV Star

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mark harmon

Sometimes, the best stories fall into your lap when you least expect them. At TCA summer tour, I was attending the CBS/Showtime/CW party when I unexpectedly was given face time with Mark Harmon, who very rarely grants interviews (I fact I know firsthand, after spending years unsuccessfully trying to land an interview with him while I was at People). The result is this somewhat unconventional Daily Beast profile of Harmon, who is the world’s biggest star, but also one of its most humble. As I wrote,

Harmon is an anomaly in today’s overshare-first-ask-questions-later pop culture: an anti-celeb. There’s no gushing about the secrets of his 27-year marriage to Mork & Mindy star Pam Dawber (which is more like 270 in Hollywood years), no off-the-cuff speeches about politics or anything else controversial; no statements, in fact, that aren’t in some way related to his show. And his actions speak just as softly as his words: When you search “Mark Harmon” on TMZ, not a single story comes up, which doesn’t even seem possible. He’s perhaps the only person in Hollywood who says he wants his work to speak for itself, and actually means it.

Harmon talks about his quiet approach to stardom, whether he feels pressure as the man at the center of a billion-dollar franchise, how he came to executive produce NCIS: New Orleans and how much longer he’ll stick around on NCIS, which is enterting its 12th season.

NCIS’s Mark Harmon is the World’s Biggest TV Star

‘Schoolhouse Rock': A Trojan Horse of Knowledge and Power

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Schoolhouse Rock

This is the favorite thing I’ve written in quite a long while. To celebrate ABC’s upcoming Schoolhouse Rock special, I reflected on the show’s lasting legacy — it was an essential part of my Saturday mornings as a kid — for The Daily Beast:

Each song was a perfectly constructed Trojan horse: it was entertaining and infectious, while clandestinely packing an astonishing amount of information about lessons about word usage (“Verb: That’s What’s Happenin’”), America’s expansion (“Elbow Room”), women’s rights (“Sufferin Till Sufferage”), health (“The Body Machine”), the solar system (“Interplanet Janet”) and much, much more.

Like nothing before it, Schoolhouse Rock made learning fun and effortless. Multiplication tables were suddenly a breeze thanks to songs like “Lucky Seven Sampson,” while “The Preamble” was essential for anyone who had to memorize the Preamble to the Constitution in school. “I’m Just a Bill” is so concise and catchy that my high school U.S. History teacher played it in class to explain exactly how a bill becomes a law.

Not only did I get the chance to listen to watch all these segments again, but I also managed to get my two kids hooked on the show as well.

And that continues to be the brilliance of Schoolhouse Rock; it’s completely irresistible, and endlessly rewarding, whether you’re watching it for the first or the hundredth time.

Even after all these years, knowledge is still power!

Schoolhouse Rock: A Trojan Horse of Knowledge and Power 

Joan Rivers Pulled Off Hollywood’s Greatest Comeback

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joan-rivers

As Hollywood mourned the death of Joan Rivers, who passed away yesterday at 81, I appreciated the opportunity to recount how she pulled off Hollywood’s greatest comeback, by clawing her way back into the spotlight after Johnny Carson had turned his back on her. As I wrote at Quartz,

Rivers also discovered that once you’ve survived Carson’s wrath, you can survive anything Hollywood can dish out. Who cared if Sharon Stone or Kristen Stewart got offended by her red carpet quips? So what if people thought she had too much plastic surgery? There was nothing anyone could say about Rivers that the comedian couldn’t say herself — and much, much funnier.

While Rivers is rightfully being lauded for her work as a trailblazer for female comics, her journey after being blackballed by Carson was equally spectacular. Farewell, Joan.

Joan Rivers pulled off Hollywood’s greatest comeback

‘You’re the Worst’: TV’s Best Couple is Awful and Perfect for Each Other

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youre the worst

Some shows are so terrific that I feel as if I have no choice but to sing their praises to as many people as possible. That’s the main reason that I pushed so hard to review You’re the Worst for The Daily Beast. It’s the best, and most surprising, new series of the summer. As I wrote,

Here’s the unexpected thing about You’re the Worst: While Jimmy (played by Chris Geere) and Gretchen (Aya Cash) are both, yes, the worst—I wouldn’t want to spend five minutes with either of them in real life—they also happen to be the most perfectly matched couple on television. There’s none of the usual forced chemistry, where a show pairs up its main characters regardless of whether it makes sense or not. These two click in every sense of the word—sexually, emotionally, comically—and it’s obvious that they need to be together, in part because no one else on the planet deserves to be subjected to either of them.

How great is this show? So great that it’s worthy of a second excerpt from my review:

We all know, and spend our lives trying to avoid, people like Jimmy and Gretchen. Thanks to You’re the Worst, now I can’t get enough of them. And while you might not have had time for the show earlier in the summer, there’s no excuse now as we limp toward September. Go to FX now and start catching up (the first five episodes are available there; the sixth airs on FX tonight). Because every once in a great while, two wrongs actually do make a right.

Start watching now — especially if you’re a Nielsen family!

‘You’re the Worst’: TV’s Best Couple is Awful and Perfect for Each Other

How Amazon Built a Studio That’s Finally Challenging Netflix

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transparent

As Amazon prepares to launch its third pilot season, I had a lengthy chat with Amazon Studios director Roy Price about his company’s strategy, measuring success, his terrific new series Transparent and competing with Netflix. He answered so many of my questions about Amazon, including what defines a successful series for them:

The main thing we’re focusing on is making Prime fantastic. And one of the things people really respond to is original new series, so we’re paying attention to, are people engaged with the show? Does it add value to the service as a whole? So it’s about views, and talking about the shows, and if you watch the whole season, how did you rate the show…Basically, do people really seem to value the show as part of the service?

Last year, we premiered Alpha House and Betas, and they premiered at, and hung around at, the number one and two series for awhile, so that’s very encouraging, because it shows that people are really getting into it and heavily sampling the shows. That’s the kind of thing we want to see, that it becomes a meaningful part of the value that the service provides. Ultimately, you’d like to see more people joining the service, and you’d like to see that people who watch the shows and enjoy the shows renew their subscription.

Price, who was a terrific interview, also talked about Amazon’s rationale for not disclosing ratings, how the public pilot process really works and whether Amazon considered picking up beloved-but-canceled shows like Community and Enlisted.

How Amazon built a studio that’s finally challenging Netflix

Charts: How We Watch TV on the Internet

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how we watch tv on the internet

TCA summer press tour ended more than a week ago, but there was still one story left for me to finish up (along with several others that I’ve banked for the fall): this companion piece to my earlier look at how we watch TV now. For this story, I delved into the ratings data from a separate press tour briefing given by Alan Wurtzel, NBC’s head of research and media development, about how audiences are using their smartphones, tablets and personal computers to watch and download TV content.

This isn’t just about “a bunch of 25-year-olds who wear black and live in Williamsburg. It affects everybody across the country,” said Wurtzel, who shared NBCUniversal’s data with Quartz. “One size no longer fits all.”

As with my previous data-heavy story, I urge you to read the whole thing; there’s just too much great info for me to attempt to summarize it here. But I’ll wrap up with another observation from Wurtzel.

And as viewers stream in greater numbers, especially on their mobile devices, these seismic shifts will only continue. “These changes are very real,” said Wurtzel. “They’re growing unbelievably fast, and they affect the core of our business.”

Charts: How we watch TV on the internet

Charts: How We Watch TV Now

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how we watch tv now

Hundreds of reporters have assembled at TCA summer press tour, but as far as I’m aware, I’m the only one who wrote a detailed story about the fascinating panel with CBS, FX, Fox and Showtime’s research gurus, who talked about how audiences actually watch TV now.

“We’re in a new era of television,” said David Poltrack, chief research officer for CBS, noting that weekly TV viewing has increased 2% over the last three years, from 35 hours and 36 minutes to 37 hours and 50 minutes. “This is a golden era of television content, and the public is embracing television and engaging with television in a way that they never did before, because it is so much good programming.”

While I usually try to summarize my stories a bit here, there’s so much terrific information throughout the piece about delayed viewing lifts and multi-platform audiences that I urge you to read the whole thing yourself.

Charts: How we watch TV now

Why So Many TV Shows Peak in Season 3

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tv shows peak season 3 atlantic

I had a feeling this story would have legs: The Atlantic has picked up my Quartz story on why so many TV shows peak by their third season. I really loved writing this piece and am so thrilled that it’s getting such a big response.

Why So Many TV Shows Peak in Season 3