To celebrate the life of Matthew Perry, who died on Saturday at the age of 54, TBS will host a weeklong Friends marathon dedicated to Perry’s beloved Chandler Bing, beginning Nov. 1. The marathon will include special tributes showcasing what Perry and Chandler — who was ranked as the best Friends character and second funniest character of all time — meant to the show’s fans.
Starting Sept. 25, the Emmy-winning family comedy will air weekdays from 12:30-3:30 PM. (Additionally, off-network juggernaut Big Bang, which rules TBS’ primetime, is getting its daytime marathons extended.) After a decade of exclusivity on NBCUniversal, the company will now share Modern Family with TBS after series’ producer/distributor 20th Television/Disney sold it to the Warner Bros. Discovery cable network in a shared syndication window.
Exclusives
Cautious Ad Spenders Open Their Wallets For March Madness
March Madness is expected to rake in more than $1 billion for TV partners CBS and Warner Bros. Discovery as it plays out from March 14 until the winning team is crowned on April 3. “March Madness gives advertisers audience levels they cannot find anywhere else,” says one buyer.
Full Frontal with Samantha Bee is over at TBS. The cable network has canceled the weekly late-night series after seven seasons. It is the latest major cancelation at the Warner Bros. Discovery network following the merger. Other shows canceled on the network include the second season of Chad and reality series The Big D, which was axed ahead of its premiere.
The scuttling of the completed season is the latest divestment from scripted programming on Warner Bros. Discovery’s cable channels.
Adrienne O’Riain is leaving the Turner networks after 11 years, most recently as SVP, original programming for TNT, TBS and truTV, serving as co-head of scripted development for the TNets. O’Riain is the latest senior programming executive to leave the TNets following the Discovery-WarnerMedia merger as WarnerMedia’s ad-supported entertainment linear networks became one of the first cost-saving targets for the new regime.
Warner Bros. Discovery’s U.S. Networks Group will be reorganized under Kathleen Finch, chairman and chief content officer, with long-time Discovery executive Nancy Daniels adding responsibility for TBS, TNT and truTV. Those former Turner networks had been overseen by Brett Weitz, who is leaving WBD, the company confirmed.
The exec had been with the so-called “TNets” for 14 years, with the linear networks now under the oversight of Discovery’s Kathleen Finch.
After 25 years, the TNets are consciously uncoupling from the Screen Actors Guild. TNT and TBS will no longer air the SAG Awards. (The kudoscast had aired on TNT since 1998, while sister network TBS began simulcasting the event in 2007.)
TNT and TBS are moving out of the scripted game under new parent company Warner Bros. Discovery, which CEO David Zaslav has promised will find $3 billion in cost savings across the new company in the post-merger era. The WarnerMedia-run cable channels will no longer develop new scripted content, three sources close to the matter tell Variety. It is unclear what will happen to TBS and TNT’s current slate of scripted programming.
HBO Max, TNT and TBS will air U.S. Women’s and Men’s National Team matches beginning in 2023 in an eight-year deal. About half of the matches will stream on HBO Max and air on TV, with the rest exclusive to the streaming platform.
Turner Sports is embracing the multicast for its coverage of the NBA All-Star Game. Sunday’s game will feature two separate feeds — the traditional telecast on TNT, and an alternate one on TBS that Turner is calling Inside the All-Star Game, anchored by its Inside the NBA crew of Ernie Johnson, Kenny Smith, Charles Barkley and Shaquille O’Neal. Golden State Warriors forward Draymond Green, who signed a unique deal with Turner Sports in January, will also contribute to the TBS telecast.
After much speculation Monday in which a number of early January awards events such as AFI, Palm Springs, the BAFTA tea and more have either postponed or canceled plans to hold their events due to COVID complications, the Critics Choice Awards on Jan. 9 (televised on The CW and TBS) plans to go ahead with its show at the Fairmont Century Plaza in Los Angeles as originally planned.
Ahead of American Dad!’s Season 17 premiere, TBS has renewed the hit animated comedy series for two more seasons, 18 and 19. Series co-creator/executive producer Matt Weitzman and executive producer Brian Boyle have signed new deals to continue as showrunners.
Dame Helen, as the Oscar, Emmy and Tony-winning actor is properly addressed, makes her debut as a quiz host with Harry Potter: Hogwarts Tournament of Houses. The weekly, four-part series begins 8 p.m. ET Sunday on TBS and Cartoon Network.
TBS is looking to turn to a Hall of Fame broadcasting pinch-hitter to host the National League Championship Series between Oct. 15 and 24. Bob Costas and TBS are working toward an agreement that would see him host the network’s marquee MLB event. TBS wanted to alleviate the pressure on TBS’s regular host, Ernie Johnson, as his duties on Inside the NBA begin in mid-October. Johnson is expected to host the opening rounds of the TBS playoff coverage.
TBS said Tuesday that it has completed a deal with WarnerMedia sibling Warner Bros Domestic Television Distribution to acquire off-network rights to the CBS/Warner Bros Television comedy Young Sheldon, and will now premiere in syndication on the cable network beginning Sept. 27. It joins the lineup at TBS that already includes fellow WBTV-produced shows The Big Bang Theory and Friends.
Ex-Fox News Host Ed Henry filed two more defamation lawsuits Thursday in U.S. District Court in New York, naming NPR’s David Folkenflik and CNN’s Alysin Camerota and Brian Stelter (as well as their CNN parent, TBS) for their allegedly defamatory commentary and reporting on his firing by Fox News. The filings follow a similar lawsuit filed Wednesday in New York against Fox News and the channel’s CEO Suzanne Scott. That lawsuit also alleged defamation.
“Try to do what you love with people you love, and if you can manage that, it’s the definition of heaven on Earth,” he said, marking the end of his third latenight show over 28 years. It’s a tenure second only to Johnny Carson’s 30 years on Tonight. O’Brien’s next venture is a weekly variety series for HBO Max, set to arrive in 2022 with an as-yet unannounced format.
The crew, a mix of ITV America staff and folk from the Warner-owned studio complex, said producers have been “unresponsive” for requests for recognition. Around 10% of staff are striking but production is continuing.
The host will bring his nightly show to a close in late June but will continue his relationship with WarnerMedia via a weekly HBO Max series.
Sunday’s Screen Actors Guild Awards ceremony airing at 9 p.m. ET on TNT and TBS will be taped, bowing to the pandemic that has upended the entertainment industry’s awards season. For the SAG honors, the challenge became how to evoke the tradition of ceremonies past.
The CW and its ad-supported cable sibling on the WarnerMedia side, TBS and TNT, have teamed up to give two tentpole new series an extra promotional boost with a one-episode cross-network rebroadcasts.
Samantha Bee will have another year to vent to her heart’s delight on her TBS program, Full Frontal. The WarnerMedia-backed network will renew Bee’s satire-and-talk show for a sixth season, which will debut on Wednesday, Jan. 13 at 10:30 p.m. ET.
The man in his 30s was declared dead at a hospital shortly before 7 p.m. Wednesday, Los Angeles County coroner’s spokeswoman Sarah Ardalani said. The cause of death has not been released, and the man’s name was being withheld until relatives could be notified. The reality competition show ran on ABC from 2008 until 2014 and is being rebooted by TBS and production company Endemol Shine North America.
Conan O’Brien will end his late-night series Conan on TBS next year, but he’s not leaving the WarnerMedia family. He will then launch a new weekly variety series on HBO Max. Conan will end in June of 2021.
