NBC’s on-the-bubble Good Girls resumed Season 4 on Thursday night with 1.6 million total viewers and a 0.3 demo rating, followed by a second episode’s 1.34M/0.3 — all told, pretty much on par with this season’s Sunday averages (1.5M/0.3). CBS’s United States of Al‘s Season 1 finale (3.7M/0.4) drew Thursday’s largest audience, while steady in the demo. ABC’s steady Holey Moley (2.6M/0.5) took the nightly demo win.
Sinclair’s Streaming RSNs And Warner’s CNN Plus May Be Pay TV’s Biggest Disruptors
Analyst Alan Wolk: While the entertainment offerings on streaming today easily surpass the offerings on cable in terms of both quality and quantity, the same cannot be said for news and sports.
The CW CEO Mark Pedowitz will be the first to tell you that Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki were the secret to the success of former network juggernaut Supernatural. Now, he’s hoping that one of them — Ackles — will help reinvigorate the recently concluded franchise with The Winchesters, a prequel series as The CW makes its third attempt to launch an offshoot from the 15-season hit.
“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 media giant received more than $10 million in state and local economic development funds as incentives for locating the production facility in Albuquerque. Above, New Mexico Gov. Michell Lujan Grisham, left, speaks as New Mexico Economic Development Cabinet Security Alicia J. Keyes listens, during the official opening of the NBCUniversal’s New Mexico Production Studio, Thursday, June, 24.
Exclusives
Her promotion follows that of Jordan Helman, who was the head of drama before being named head of all scripted content. That was after Beatrice Springborn moved over to run NBCUnviersal’s UCP.
The 30 winners of the 81st annual Peabody Awards were named this week during a multi-day virtual celebration.
NBC’s The Blacklist ended Season 8 (as well Megan Boone’s run as a series regular) with 2.15 million total viewers and a 0.2 demo rating, dipping to series lows on both counts. Fox’s MasterChef (2.6M/0.5) dipped but still led Wednesday in the demo; while ABC’s $100,000 Pyramid (3.4M/0.4) was steady and drew the night’s biggest audience.
QVC, HSN, Demand Africa and Quincy Jones’ Qwest TV bring more content to Allen Media’s free streaming platform.
Peacock will launch a Tokyo Olympics destination on July 15 featuring live coverage of some the games’ biggest events, including gymnastics, track and field and the U.S. men’s basketball team’s pursuit of their fourth straight gold. The NBCUniversal streamer said Wednesday that Peacock will feature new daily live shows, original programming, dedicated Olympics channels, full event replays and curated highlights. All of Peacock’s Tokyo Olympics programming will be available to stream for free with exception of USA Men’s Basketball live coverage that will be available to Peacock Premium subscribers.
The National Football League is exploring options for its media properties including selling stakes to strategic partners, a move aimed at expanding the reach of its television networks and digital services, the league told team owners in a letter Wednesday. The league said it has hired Goldman Sachs Group Inc. to explore potential partnerships for the properties, which include the NFL Network and RedZone pay TV channels as well as NFL.com.
NBCUniversal and Amazon just announced that Peacock will launch on Amazon Fire TV and Fire tablets in the U.S. starting on Thursday. The Peacock app will bring thousands of hours of on-demand movies and shows, as well as live news and sports programming, to Fire TV and Fire tablet customers nationwide. The announcement is part of a larger partnership between Amazon and NBCU, with more announcements coming soon.
The TV Hit Isn’t Just Dying — It May Already Be Dead
The television hit — the most abiding of entertainment traditions — appears to be dying. That isn’t to say shows don’t have fans; they do, and some of them are more passionate than ever. But according to its long-standing definition — a universally recognized show that gathers a large, verifiable audience and becomes unavoidable in all the places people talk about television and endures well beyond its run — the TV hit is vanishing.
The 48th annual Daytime Emmy Awards will include tributes to TV icons Regis Philbin, Alex Trebek and Larry King, with Kathy Lee Gifford, Ken Jeong, Martha Stewart and Robin Roberts making special appearances to honor their late colleagues. Presenters for this year’s awards — hosted by The Talk’s Sheryl Underwood and set to air Friday, June 25, on CBS — were announced today, along with the special tribute appearances.
NBCUniversal gave its strongest indication yet that it would move forward with plans to broadcast 7,000 hours of Tokyo Olympics events even as worries continue over the potential health of attendees and athletes as Japan continues to grapple with the effects of the coronavirus pandemic.
NBC’s America’s Got Talent this week drew 6.6 million total viewers and a 0.8 demo rating, down a tick from its last regularly scheduled episode but still dominating Tuesday in both measures. Leading out of that, NBC’s College Bowl revival debuted to 2.8M and a 0.5, tying for second in the demo for the night.
The return of the classic game show hosted by Jay Leno has been sold in 190 U.S. markets to station groups including Sinclair, Nexstar, Scripps, Tegna, Meredith, Gray, Hearst, McKinnon, Standard Media, Block, Lockwood, Mission and Sun Broadcasting. It launches on Sept. 13.
Fuse Media yesterday kicked off the beta launch of Fuse Plus, a new streaming service that will roll out widely later this year. It’ll be available on Apple TV and Amazon Fire TV devices to start.
Richter, who has worked alongside Conan O’Brien on his three shows, reflects on at his career as latenight’s No. 1 second banana.
In a virtual presentation today during the Cannes Lions brand confab, Nielsen shed a bit more light on streaming from its growing body of research on the U.S. market. Following up on its announcement last week of a new measurement tool called The Gauge, SVP of Product Strategy Brian Fuhrer explored the May viewing numbers during a 20-minute talk. Subscription video on demand services remain the dominant form of streaming, he said, with 52% of total streams. Ad-supported video on demand followed with 27% and MVPDs and virtual MVPDs (e.g., YouTube TV) account for 10% of all streaming.
Measurement Woes Persist As Stations, Nielsen At Critical Juncture
Since the pandemic, many TV stations are facing measurement and under-delivery issues that they fear will only be compounded by Nielsen’s inclusion of BBO homes in October. While Nielsen is working to improve the sample, the uncertainty has some broadcasters turning to less Nielsen-reliant alternatives. Note: This story is available to TVNewsCheck Premium members only. If you would like to upgrade your free TVNewsCheck membership to Premium now, you can visit your Member Home Page, available when you log in at the very top right corner of the site or in the Stay Connected Box that appears in the right column of virtually every page on the site. If you don’t see Member Home, you will need to click Log In or Subscribe.
Byron Allen’s Entertainment Studios has ordered We the People With Judge Lauren Lake, a daily/strip one-hour syndicated court series that will be available to broadcast TV and global cable, network and digital platforms in fall 2022. The series will be produced and distributed by Allen Media Group/Entertainment Studios.
