Three stories in a row! The Atlantic picked up my recent Quartz story about why Hollywood can’t stop turning movies into TV shows.
TV Shows Based on Movies: Often Doomed
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Hollywood Won’t Stop Until it Turns Every Movie Into a TV Series
What’s the opposite of “great minds think alike”? In the past month, the broadcast networks have announced plans to turn 10(!) movies into potential series. As I wrote at Quartz,
Hollywood apparently won’t stop until it turns every movie into a series. It’s the strongest indication yet that there are no original ideas left among the broadcast networks, which already packed this fall’s television lineup with comic-book adaptations and spinoffs.
Hollywood won’t stop until it turns every movie into a TV series
Oscar host Neil Patrick Harris on His Best and Worst Emcee Moments
Today, Neil Patrick Harris was named to host pretty much the only awards show he has yet to emcee: the king of them all, the Oscars. In light of the news, I suggested that the Daily Beast dust off my interview with him from last year about his best and worst hosting moments, and that’s exactly what they did:
Cable Networks Will Save Themselves by Focusing on What They Do Best
Just nine months ago, USA President Chris McCumber was talking to me about his network’s push into comedy, and preaching patience. Looks like his patience has worn thin, because USA announced that it is retreating from comedy and refocusing on drama, while AMC has pulled the plug on almost its entire reality slate as it, too, opts to concentrate on what it does best. As I explained at Quartz,
Those surprising moves were in part explained by a Wall Street Journal report that the US top 40 most widely distributed cable channels in 2010—USA and AMC included—have lost an average of 3.2 million subscribers, or more than 3% of their distribution, during the last four years, as consumers have starting “shaving the cord” by opting for smaller, cheaper bundles of channels.
Intent on not being shaved out of existence, networks are refocusing on keeping their core audiences happy, rather than trying and attract new viewers. “In an environment of exploding content options for viewers,” AMC said in explaining its decision, “we have decided to make scripted programming our priority.”
Both networks damaged their core business by taking their eye off the ball, and their sudden retrenching should also be a red flag for E! and Bravo, which are both branching into scripted series for the first time.
Cable networks will save themselves by focusing on what they do best
Stop Hating on ‘Modern Family’ (But Also Stop Giving It Emmys)
Few people were more upset than I over Modern Family’s return to Emmy dominance back in August, when it once again won best comedy, beating Louie (!), Veep (!!) and Orange is the New Black (!!!). But at the same time, I felt like the backlash against the show — some people seemed to want it taken off the air immediately — seemed overblown. As someone who had watched all five seasons worth of episodes, I knew that Modern Family still had its moments. This fall seemed like a good time to revisit the show, so I did that today for The Daily Beast:
So, following Jay’s advice and putting all the hoopla aside, it’s time to examine how good—or bad—Modern Family really is at this point in its run. After watching Season 6’s first three solid episodes, it’s clear that Modern Family is much better than many of its haters remember. It’s still reliably and solidly funny, capable of several genuine laughs each week, which is more than most network comedies can say. But equally evident is the fact that the show, while still entertaining, stopped being groundbreaking long ago, and serves largely at this point as comedy comfort food.
This story also gave me an opportunity to talk about the most bitter, loveless couples on television: Mitch and Cam, who should really go their separate ways. But I still love Audrey Anderson-Emmons, who plays their daughter, Lily, my favorite character on the show. And I admire the show’s restraint in turning Modern Family into The Lily Show.
In its sixth season, Modern Family is still worthy of adoration from audiences — just not Emmy voters.
Stop Hating on ‘Modern Family’ (But Also Stop Giving It Emmys)
Why Sunday-Night Television is So Good
The Atlantic took notice of my Quartz piece on why all the best shows air on Sunday nights, and republished it. Two times in one week!
Five Reasons Why Sunday is TV’s Best Night
Homeland. The Good Wife. The Affair. The Walking Dead. Mad Men. Masters of Sex. Veep. Game of Thrones. When you think of the best (and most Emmy-nominated) shows on TV, almost all of them air on Sunday nights. As I wrote at Quartz,
It seems counterintuitive to pit all of TV’s best series against one another, as anyone who’s tried to program a DVR on Sundays can attest. But there is in fact a method to the networks’ madness, and five reasons why Sunday night’s quality TV overload exists—and won’t be going away anytime soon.
Through Nielsen numbers crunching (charts!), research and a great chat with Showtime Network President David Nevins, I came up with five very strong reasons — some of which surprised even me. Here’s one: airing on Sunday night is more important than being watched on Sunday night.
While many of the Sunday shows have drawn record audiences as mentioned above, it’s also true that premium cable networks like HBO and Showtime aren’t beholden to advertisers. So those executives don’t have the expectation or urgency that viewers need to tune in “live” during their shows’ initial Sunday night airing. “I always say, it doesn’t matter to me whether you watch it on Sunday; I’m fine if you want to want until Monday or Tuesday or Wednesday,” said Nevins. “You wait much past then, you’re going to miss the conversation.”
‘I’ll See You Again in 25 Years’: Why Showtime is Reviving ‘Twin Peaks’
It’s always good to see myself back on The Atlantic again. The site picked up my Quartz story on Twin Peaks.
‘I’ll See You Again in 25 Years’: Why Showtime is Reviving Twin Peaks
How, and Why, Showtime Resurrected ‘Twin Peaks’
It’s happening, again! Showtime announced it is reviving Twin Peaks as a nine-episode limited series, airing in 2016. While many people spoke with co-creator Mark Frost about how his and David Lynch’s decision to return to the show, I took a different approach, talking with Showtime execs for this Quartz story about why this made sense for the network.
“In some ways, Twin Peaks was the precursor to all of the high-quality, provocative serialized drama that we all do now,” Gary Levine, Showtime’s executive vice president of original programming, told Quartz. “So to go back to the OG of provocative, serialized drama seemed like a no-brainer. Twin Peaks always did and always will define cool, and that was just too tempting to turn away from.”
There’s lots more from Levine and Showtime Networks President David Nevins about how they’ll avoid the train wreck that was Season 2, how much they know about the new season and whether there could be more stories to tell beyond those nine episodes.
The TV Superhero Guru Behind ‘The Flash’
Greg Berlanti and I have been Twitter friends since back in 2012, when I fell for his USA summer miniseries Political Animals. But we’d never actually met until we sat down together at TCA summer tour to do this Daily Beast profile.
One of TV’s most prolific producers — he’s co-showrunner on Arrow and The Flash, a producer on The Mysteries of Laura, has three series (and counting) in development for next season, and is also producing the bigscreen Peter Pan reboot Pan — Berlanti talked about what’s in store for The Flash, his obsession with comics, how he’s succeeded with TV comic adaptations where Marvel has failed and the disadvantage to having so many projects on his plate:
The only slight disadvantage to doing more and more things is you really have to be where the problems are. So you don’t get to be as much where things are going well. And so, if there’s two things that I’m working on that are going well, I’m not in that story room or on that set. I’m wherever we’re having some challenges. Then, by the time we take care of those, I go back to the other ones. So the disadvantage of having multiple things is on a day where everything is going badly on all things. You want to shoot yourself! The advantage is that’s usually not the case. Usually one or two things are going all right, and it buoys your spirits a little bit.
His take on The Flash is broadcast’s best pilot this fall. While almost all new shows take much of the first season to find their way, Flash arrives impressively fully-formed and self-assured. And, oh yeah, it’s a helluva lot of fun.