Hot Off The Press: The Latest TV News and Information - Page 2645

Technology Notes
NBC Broadcasting head no fan of Dish's commercial-skipping device
By Joe Flint, Los Angeles Times' 'Company Town' Blog - May 13, 2012

NBC Broadcasting Chairman Ted Harbert is not a fan of satellite broadcaster Dish Network's new commercial-skipping device, the Auto Hop, which automatically deletes commercials from recorded prime-time programming from the four big broadcast networks.

"I think this is an attack on our eco-system," Harbert said on NBC's conference call announcing the network's 2012-13 prime-time schedule. "I'm not for it."

Harbert declined to comment on whether NBC or its parent Comcast Corp. was preparing any sort of legal response to Dish Network Corp.'s new technology. He did say he would have an elaborate message to advertisers and Dish on Monday at Radio City Music Hall when the network presents its fall schedule to advertisers.

Introduced last Thursday, Dish's Auto Hop is a component of Dish's PrimeTime Anytime feature on its digital video recorder service, which is called the Hopper. The Anytime feature automatically records the prime-time programming of CBS, NBC, ABC and Fox and stores the content on a rolling basis for eight days.

Viewers who use the PrimeTime feature can use the Auto Hop to literally black out commercials, provided the programs are watched the day after their original airing. The way it works is that the customer pushes a button and then when a commercial break appears, the screen goes black for a few seconds and then the program returns. The Auto Hop can't be used on live programming such as a sporting event that has been recorded.

Dish, which has more than 14 million subscribers, is already starting to heavily market the device, even tweeting about it.

The broadcast networks have so far stayed mum about the Auto Hop but in the past have expressed great concern about any device that allows consumers to bypass commercials. While digital video recorders allow a viewer to fast-forward through spots, the commercial images still play on the screen, albeit faster. The Auto Hop gets rid of the advertisements altogether.

The Auto Hop is being offered by Dish for use only on broadcast programming, not for shows on cable networks, even though that is technically possible. A Dish spokesman said the reason it is limited to broadcast shows is because those are the shows most frequently recorded by consumers. Whether that decision to offer the device only for a handful of channels provides fodder for a lawsuit will no doubt be revealed in the weeks ahead.

Several years ago, the networks sued over a similar device called Replay TV and won on copyright infringement grounds.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/ente...ng-device.html

Business Notes
Yahoo Announces CEO Scott Thompson Is Out, Settlement Reached With Daniel Loeb
By David Lieberman, Deadline.com - May 13, 2012

It's official: Thompson's four-month reign is over, following the disclosure that he misrepresented his bachelors' degree. He has left the Company, Yahoo says and the board has a deal with Third Point CEO Daniel Loeb, who has abandoned his proxy fight. Ross Levinsohn replaces Thompson as interim chief executive effective immediately.

Roy Bostock has stepped down as Non-Executive Chairman, replaced by Fred Amoroso. In addition, hedge fund manager Loeb and two allies media consultant Michael Wolf and restructuring expert Harry Wilson will join the board on Wednesday. Former NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Zucker won't be with them. With only three board seats going to Loeb's group, Zucker says he agreed to step aside to quickly facilitate a settlement.

Here's the announcement:

SUNNYVALE, Calif., May 13, 2012 Yahoo! Inc. YHOO -1.62% today announced that the Board of Directors has named Fred Amoroso as Chairman of the Board of Directors and Ross Levinsohn as interim Chief Executive Officer, effective immediately. The Company also announced that its Board has reached an agreement with Third Point LLC (Third Point) to settle its pending proxy contest related to the Company's 2012 annual meeting of shareholders.

Mr. Amoroso replaces Roy Bostock, who has stepped down from his role as Non-Executive Chairman in order to accelerate the leadership transition for the new Board. Mr. Levinsohn replaces Scott Thompson, former Chief Executive Officer, who has left the Company.

Under the Board's settlement agreement with Third Point, three Third Point nominees Daniel S. Loeb, Harry J. Wilson, and Michael J. Wolf will join the Yahoo! Board, effective May 16, 2012. Mr. Bostock, along with Patti Hart, VJ Joshi, Arthur Kern and Gary Wilson, all of whom previously disclosed their intentions not to stand for re-election, as well as Mr. Thompson, have decided to step down from the Board immediately.

As a part of the settlement agreement, Third Point, which owns an aggregate of 70,545,400 shares, or 5.8% of Yahoo! common stock, has agreed to withdraw its previous Board nominations for consideration at the annual meeting and vote its shares in support of Yahoo!'s nominees. Yahoo!'s slate of director nominees for election or re-election at the 2012 annual meeting of stockholders will now include Fred Amoroso, John Hayes, Peter Liguori, Thomas McInerney, Maynard Webb, Sue James, David Kenny, Brad Smith, Daniel S. Loeb, Harry J. Wilson and Michael J. Wolf.

As interim CEO, Mr. Levinsohn will manage the Company's day-to-day operations with assistance from Yahoo!'s existing senior leadership team.

The Board is pleased to announce these changes and the settlement with Third Point, and is confident that they will serve the best interests of our shareholders and further accelerate the substantial advances the Company has made operationally and organizationally since last August. The Board believes in the strength of the Company's business and assets, and in the opportunities before us, and I am honored to work closely with my fellow directors and Ross to continue to drive Yahoo! forward, said Fred Amoroso, Chairman of the Yahoo! Board of Directors.

Mr. Amoroso continued, On behalf of the entire Board, I would also like to thank Patti, VJ, Arthur, Gary and, in particular, Roy, for their dedicated long-term service and contributions to the Board and Yahoo!.

Third Point Chief Executive Officer Daniel S. Loeb stated: Harry, Michael and I are delighted to join the Yahoo! Board and work collaboratively with our fellow directors to foster a culture of leadership dedicated to innovation, excellence in corporate governance, and responsiveness to users, advertisers and partners. We are confident this Board will benefit from shareholder representation, and we are committed to working with new leadership to unlock Yahoo!'s significant potential and value.

Third Point Director Nominee Jeff Zucker stated: I have been supportive of Third Point's efforts since Daniel asked me to join the slate. When I became aware of Yahoo!'s offer of three board seats to Third Point, I approached Daniel and let him know that I would be happy to step aside to quickly facilitate a settlement. I believe that it is in Yahoo!'s best interests to avoid a prolonged proxy fight and have new board members immediately to help move the company forward. While there is clearly much work to be done, this is the right combination of talented executives to do just that.

http://www.deadline.com/2012/05/yaho...h-daniel-loeb/

Critic's Notes
NBC Is No Longer Playing It Safe
By Joe Adalian, New York Magazine's 'Vulture' Blog - May 13, 2012

Remember that classic scene in Risky Business, when Miles tells Tom Cruise's Joel, "Sometimes you just have to say, 'What the f***'! Make your move"? This, apparently, is the guiding philosophy NBC executives used in putting together their-just announced new fall schedule. Having played things relative safe last year, the network's still relatively new management team has now decided to take some very...interesting steps to get viewers back: Comedies on four nights! The failing newsmag Rock Center in the same timeslot which once housed ER and LA Law! Whitney and Community paired together in the same Friday night timeline! At first (and even second and third) blush, the Peacock's moves seem just plain weird. But two things are worth keeping in mind.

First, the network is actually adding just four hours' worth of new programming in the fall, which means it will be able to focus its marketing on just a handful of timeslots. And second, we're willing to bet that the schedule NBC announced today is nothing more than a first draft, with significant shifts still to come before new programming begins rolling out in August after the Olympics.

Until NBC makes such tweaks, however, all we have to go on is what's been announced. Let's start with those things which make sense, such as giving a new drama (Revolution) a chance to capitalize on a lead-in from The Voice, rather than simply keeping Smash there. The latter can use the time to reboot itself, while we're assuming the Peacock thinks Revolution is one of its better pilots and thus is deserving of a good lead-in. (The dystopian thriller does seem a bit male-skewing, however, to pair with the female-friendly Voice).

Also not the worst idea ever: Wednesday at 8: After all, Up All Night was actually doing decent business in the slot last fall, before shifting to Thursdays (where it strangely lost viewers). And the network has kept the lights on in the hour all season long with a mix of other sitcoms and Betty White. What's surprising, however, is that NBC would choose two brand new comedies for the hour, rather than shifting an existing series into the slot to help buoy a newcomer. One obvious suggestion: Move Up back to Wednesdays and pair it with Kids. NBC could then fill the hole left by Up with some SNL Weekend Update election specials (one of the few good ideas Jeff Zucker ever had for primetime).

And while we're on Thursdays, let's talk about what has to be the most head-scratching decision made by NBC. Despite quiet talk for months coming from inside the network about how desperately it needs to reboot Thursdays, NBC instead decides to pretty much return the night intact, with only Community banished from the night. Sure, we love all NBC's Thursday shows, but why the network wouldn't attempt to add at least some new starpower to a key evening is genuinely perplexing. Or why not attempt an ABC-style start-from-scratch comedy reboot, introducing it as The New Generation of Must-See TV? Moreover, how does NBC justify killing the higher-rated Harry's Law while not only renewing Rock Center but also giving it an amazing 10 p.m. Thursday timeslot? NBC chief Bob Greenblatt tried to tell us how much he believed in the show and hoped it would make enough tweaks during a summer of original broadcasts to boost fall numbers. If Williams decides to sex up Rock Center, maybe this works. Otherwise, we're actually pretty certain Rock will be moved to a new slot before the TV season officially begins.

Another hard-to-understand move by NBC is putting female-skewing comedies on Tuesdays at 9, where Fox already has a player with New Girl and ABC may very well decide to attack with comedies of its own. Assuming CBS shifts NCIS: LA to 10 p.m. Tuesdays, the 9 p.m. Tuesday slot could be a great place to put a big new drama, using The Voice as a lead-in. Why try to promote yet another batch of comedies? NBC chief Bob Greenblatt told us he simply believes the time is right to try as many half-hours as possible. Heading into development season, "Comedy was a real mandate for us," he says. "I have a new comedy team and I said to them, "Outdo yourselves.' And they did. Plus, comedy is a thing at the moment." We agree, and more comedy is likely to be a hallmark of other nets' new schedules. There's a comedy land rush going on, and NBC is wise to stake out its territory. But it would make much more sense for the network to spread its assets around and target them — comedy on two nights, with a mix of veteran and new shows.

Finally, there's the matter of Friday nights, where Whitney and Community are currently paired together from 8-9 p.m. It's almost as if NBC decided to go for karmic balance here, putting one of the worst-reviewed half-hours of this season next to a critical darling. Greenblatt's comments about why he made this move are telling: He explained to us as simply a means of helping out Grimm at 9 p.m., supplying it with a more male-skewing lead-in. This is probably true. What's more, as Fringe has proven, it's possible for a DVR-friendly show to survive for quite a while in the Friday night desert. But by admitting that he shifted Community to Fridays to boost Grimm, Greenblatt also concedes what most of us have long expected: He has little faith in the show, or its ability to ever reach a bigger audience. This may be disheartening, but at this point, Community fans can at least celebrate the fact that the show will be back and in a much less competitive timeslot.

Last year, Greenblatt told reporters he had three big goals for the season ahead: Relaunch The Voice, get Smash off the ground and make Wednesday nights safe for comedy. He accomplished the first two, and by putting comedy back on Wednesdays, Greenblatt is making the case that he at least planted some comedy seeds on the night. A year later, NBC has made some modest progress and just might beat ABC to end up third for the year with viewers under 50. His latest schedule seems once again to embrace the idea of go-slow rebuilding, and this is a good thing. What's not so good is that NBC appears to be trying to do so this year with a schedule that's desperately lacking in internal logic.

http://www.vulture.com/2012/05/nbc-i...g-it-safe.html

TV Notes
A 'Community' without its creator Dan Harmon? Just maybe
By Yvonne Villareal, Los Angeles Times' 'Show Tracker' Blog - May 13, 2012

Human beings: Imagine the Greendale Community College universe without its overlord Dan Harmon running the mothership ... because it's a real possibility.

The good news about the return of "Community" got sullied pretty quickly. For those already up in arms about "Community's" move from Thursdays to Fridays, you might be keeping those arms up. There's been speculation that its creator, Harmon, would step down as showrunner for the NBC comedy. And NBC President Robert Greenblatt did little to deny that was a real possibility.

"Those conversations are happening as we speak," Greenblatt said during a conference call Sunday with reporters. "I guess what I would say is ... I expect Dan's voice to be part of the show somehow. I'm just not sure exactly if that means him running it day to day or consulting on it."

Could Harmon's war of words with show co-star Chevy Chase be the reason? Much has been made of the spar between the veteran actor and Harmon, which resulted after some hostile voice messages were leaked. Greenblatt tip-toed around the issue in his denial.

"I don't think so," he said. "I know that was blown up into something. I don't really think we have determined him running the show or not based on one of the actors. I think it's a larger issue that has to do with a lot of things."

Harmon, for his part, said Thursday on Twitter that should he step down, it would not be because of Chase -- who he described in more colorful terms.

"That'd be like punching a wall because water's wet. Now CELEBRATE!" he added. Harmon wasn't immediately available for comment Sunday.

It won't be the show's only reshuffling. Harmon's co-showrunners, Garrett Donovan and Neil Goldman, are leaving the show to develop and supervise new projects for 20th Century Fox TV.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/ente...ng-device.html

TV Notes
HBO's 'Game Of Thrones' On Track To Be Crowned Most Pirated Show Of 2012
By Andy Greenberg, Forbes.com

Brace yourselves, HBO. The pirates are coming.

With its popularity swelling and no easy way to watch for viewers without cable, HBO’s hit series “Game of Thrones” is inspiring massive levels of piracy, according to numbers from the **********-tracking and analysis firm Big Champagne. By the firm’s rough estimate, the second season of the show has been downloaded more than 25 million times from public torrent trackers since it began in early April, and its piracy hit a new peak following April 30th’s episode, with more than 2.5 million downloads in a day.

“It certainly appears to be the most pirated show of the year,” says John Robinson, a senior media analyst with Big Champagne. He says it’s too early to measure definitively, but the company’s data so far as well as the popularity rankings on download site the Pirate Bay point to “Game of Thrones” as filesharers’ favorite show of 2012. “The fact that it’s consistently at the top of the Pirate Bay’s top one hundred TV show chart seems like a pretty in-your-face leading indicator of the huge volume at which this is being shared.”

According to the **********-focused blog and measurement site Torrentfreak, the first season of “Game of Thrones” was the second-most pirated show of 2011 behind the sixth season of Showtime’s “Dexter.”

But Big Champagne’s numbers show that downloads of the second season of “Game of Thrones” so far consistently top “Dexter”‘s piracy numbers from the same point in its season last year. (See chart above left.)

It’s worth noting that ********** is just one way that shows are pirated online–I was able to find streaming episodes of Game of Thrones on sites like free-tv-video-online.me and zzstream.com after just a few Google searches. But those streaming options are even tougher to track and measure than **********.

While “Game of Thrones”‘ filesharing rates are probably driven in part by its appeal to the young, geeky male demographic that’s most prone to using torrent sites, HBO hasn’t helped the problem by making the show tough to watch online for the young and cable-less. The show isn’t available through Hulu or Netflix, iTunes offers only Season 1, and using HBO’s own streaming site HBO Go requires a cable subscription. (The situation was captured in the widely read comic strip The Oatmeal, in which the author attempts the rage-inducing process of trying to watch “Game of Thrones” online before giving up and downloading it from a sleazy porn-ad covered torrent site.)

“This is absolutely a reaction to the show’s not being available elsewhere online,” says Big Champagne’s Robinson. “It’s a very tricky game trying to create this kind of scarcity.”

Update: Forbes contributor Erik Kain elaborates on why HBO has “only itself to blame” for the show’s piracy.

Update again: Reddit’s “Game of Thrones” forum has some interesting discussion around this post. Many of the users admit to pirating the show and explain why they do it.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygree...-show-of-2012/

TV Notes
Few TV Shows Survive a Ruthless Proving Ground
By Brian Stelter, The New York Times - May 13, 2012

Among the red carpets, celebrity appearances and musical performances, the upfronts almost resemble the Emmy Awards, television's annual self-congratulatory awards show. Except that the upfronts lack In Memoriam, the period of mourning for the industry's losses the year before.

This week at the network presentations for advertisers, there will be no mention of The Playboy Club, The Finder or The River. Or A Gifted Man, How to Be a Gentleman or Man Up! Or the other network television shows over a dozen and counting that were announced with great fanfare at the same presentations last year and have been canceled since then.

The failure rate for network television rarely changes only the names of the shows do. For most people in the television industry, it's perfectly normal for hundreds of scripts to be pared down each season, Survivor style, to just one or two hit shows. These people rarely stop and wonder if there's a better way of doing business.

But to others, this creative slaughter is stupefying. The most confounding thing about the TV business is the amount of waste, said Noah Hawley, who created The Unusuals, which ABC canceled in 2009, and My Generation, which ABC canceled in 2010.

There must be, he said, a better way to develop and nurture new shows. But the problem is, the system perpetuates itself. There's no time for anybody to have these big-picture conversations.

That's because the development process starts all over again after the upfront presentations in May. And the scripts and pilot episodes that aren't made into shows right away are usually thrown away. Generally speaking, the perception in the community is that they're tarnished, said Gary Newman, the co-chairman of 20th Century Fox Television, who called it unfortunate.

Mr. Newman said the process itself is necessary, though, to come up with gems like Modern Family, which his studio makes for ABC, and New Girl, which it makes for Fox.

In other industries, it's called research and development, he said. Not every idea that comes out of a television studio or out of a car company or out of a technology company is ultimately a good one, and there has to be some research.

The research starts in the summer when writers pitch hundreds of ideas. Each of the major networks (ABC, CBS, Fox, and NBC) commissions roughly 50 to 80 drama scripts and a similar number of comedy scripts, and they later receive others from agents on spec, meaning on an unsolicited basis.

From the resulting pool of scripts, each network orders 20-some pilot episodes, at an average cost of $2 million for a sitcom and $5.5 million for a drama, according to FilmL.A., a Los Angeles permitting agency. This year, CBS ordered 15 pilots, ABC ordered 23 and NBC ordered 24. Fox, which has seven fewer hours of prime time programming than the other three, also ordered 15. Depending on the schedule needs of the network, up to a dozen might be ordered to series and announced this week.

Pilot season is like mixing the measured strategy of the N.F.L. draft with the manic frenzy of a supermarket sweep, said David Hornsby, who created How to Be a Gentleman last year. CBS withdrew it from its schedule within weeks of its premiere.

The frenzy, he said, comes from the compressed timeline of the pilot-making period. Everyone is competing for the same talent in every department: actors, directors, writers, casting directors, he said. You're just trying to make the best decisions you can over a short period of time and hope it works out.

Network executives test the pilots with focus groups before they choose which ones to order. But it is a largely unscientific process, they say, one that has far more to do with art than science. They talk in terms of swings, home runs and batting averages, but there is no Moneyball of television, yet.

Cable television is cited by many in the TV industry as a better way. While broadcast is akin to a buffet, cable is made to order; cable channels develop fewer ideas and approve more of the ones they do develop, generating less waste along the way. The process isn't as wedded to the upfront calendar, so writers and producers have more time to change scripts and cast actors.

The Web, too, may point to a better way. Netflix commissioned new episodes of the canceled Fox sitcom Arrested Development in part because its internal data demonstrated that the old episodes remained popular among its users. The data is far more precise than the Nielsen television ratings can be.

Of course, a data-driven development process removes a crucial element of television production: risk. We've found that our biggest successes frequently have been our scariest ideas, Mr. Newman said.

For the studios and networks, one or two hits a year offset the costs of all the trial and error. But the waste still nags at some. Before Comcast took control of NBC, the network tried producing fewer pilots and replacing scripted dramas with Jay Leno at 10 p.m., but those experiments were scrapped; Comcast hasn't similarly tinkered with the model since it took over.

The pilots that aren't picked in the spring go into desk drawers and filing cabinets, rarely to be heard from again. The Hollywood trade publication Variety calls these busted pilots. Occasionally one is revived: The Big Bang Theory was piloted twice before it was ordered in 2007, and Breakout Kings was turned down by the Fox network before it was bought by the cable channel A&E in 2010.

This year, CBS considered ordering a show by the comedians Louis C. K. and Spike Feresten that was first conceived 13 years ago. Over the weekend, though, it appeared unlikely to go forward.

But those are the exceptions. The pitches start anew while new shows begin, most bound to fail. In 2009, The Futon Critic, a TV Web site, counted the number of series that had started on the broadcast networks in the previous 10 years and found that 70 percent were canceled or ended within one season. An additional 11 percent ended within two seasons. Rarely does anyone question whether this is appropriate.

Circle of life, the actress Laura Allen wrote on Twitter on Friday when NBC canceled the show she was on, Awake, two episodes short of the end of its first season. She was, she declared, back in the ring!

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/14/bu..._r=1&ref=media

TV Review
'Johnny Carson: King of Late Night' goes behind throne
PBS' 'American Masters' documentary examines the 'Tonight Show' host's private life and late-night TV comedy legacy.
By Robert Lloyd, Los Angeles Times - May 13, 2012

Johnny Carson did not invent late-night television — he wasn't even the first (or second) host of "The Tonight Show," which he captained for 30 years until he quit the business cold in 1992 — but he is the most important person ever to have made it his home. His name may mean increasingly little to younger generations, but late-night is still very much the thing he created, shepherded by hosts formed in his image. Any time a talk-show host plays disaster for comedy, building more laughs on the back of a dud joke than he might be getting with a live one, you are watching the shade of Johnny Carson.

It's 50 years since Carson inherited "The Tonight Show"from Jack Paar, and 20 since he ceded it to Jay Leno, who later temporarily ceded it to Conan O'Brien; in the late-night wars, going back to Leno vs. Letterman, competition for the "Tonight Show" chair was less about the brand or the time slot than it was about the man who most famously occupied it. The truth, Jerry Seinfeld says in Peter Jones' documentary "Johnny Carson: King of Late Night" is that "there never was a 'Tonight Show.' It was Carson."

At nearly two hours, the Kevin Spacey-narrated documentary, which premieres Monday as part of the PBS series "American Masters," covers its notoriously private subject as thoroughly as could be expected. Jones had access to Carson's own archives, from old home movies to "The Tonight Show" itself, and has called as witnesses an impressive gallery of colleagues, co-workers, comics and friends, including fellow talk-show hosts Dick, Dave, Jay, Conan, Arsenio, Ellen and Jimmy (Fallon, but not Kimmel). Even when, in an attempt to touch every base (some of them repeatedly), the film wanders, it is still good to watch — especially since, as a celebrity in a golden age of photojournalism, Carson was photographed often and well.

Though brief clips give a sense of his style and method, they don't give the full flavor of his art, which had a slow attack and a long release and was meant to be savored over the course of the 60 (at first, 90) minutes it took to do a "Tonight Show." He was a host in the truest sense of the word, the person who provides a setting in which his guests can shine — Joan Rivers calls him "the best straight man ever" — and, in a way, "The Tonight Show" was the chronicle of his reactions. Even a funny story, says Conan O'Brien, "would not be half as entertaining as seeing Johnny entertained by these people." Says Mel Brooks, "He'd be like a little kid just waiting for the next candy cane."

We see several stars in their first, career-making appearances: Drew Carey fights back tears remembering his; Garry Shandling, who would create the Carson-inspired "The Larry Sanders Show," calls it "a test ground, a firing range," and Jay Leno remembers it being like "your first girlfriend. You're not very good, it's over very quickly and you just want to do it again."

If to know Carson was to find him unknowable, there nevertheless seems to be remarkable agreement among observers about who he was off-camera: smart, decent, loyal but also demanding loyalty, a person whose natural shyness was amplified by his Midwest roots and whose ambitions were fueled in part by trying to impress a hard-to-please mother: "That wasn't funny," Ruth Carson told a Time reporter who had come to watch her watch his monologue. (It was found after her death that she'd kept a box of clippings that tracked his career; Carson kept the box until his own death from emphysema, in 2005.)

And yet, if he was remote and sometimes troubled in his private life — he was a distant (though also proud) father, a philanderer married four times — and constrained by his fame from a normal public one, he was fully present on TV: genuine, open, spontaneous, playful, curious, generous, qualities all the best talk-show hosts share at least in part. A magician and a musician in his off-hours — a clip of him accompanying himself on guitar on the jazz standard "Here's That Rainy Day" is a small revelation — he was at home with intellectuals, celebrities, eccentrics and exotic animals.

"Whatever was going on … in America," says comedian David Steinberg, "eventually showed up sitting across from him at the desk."

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment...,1177468.story

TV Notes
Shows on the Brink, Saved by the Fans
By Brian Stelter, The New York Times - May 13, 2012

When the idiosyncratic sitcom Community returned to NBC's prime-time schedule in March after being on the bench for months, the writers, producers and actors worked together to promote the comeback.

On Twitter, they told their followers to Watch Community' tonight. Not the next day on Hulu, not over the weekend via a digital video recorder or a cable video-on-demand system: tonight. That's one way to try to save a television show.

Most campaigns to keep a beloved program in production can't change the collective mind of a cost-conscious TV network. But network executives do hear the feedback and say they do take it seriously. Sometimes they find creative ways to keep shows humming along and these days there are more ways than ever to do that. Just last week, for instance, the three-year-old sitcom Cougar Town was moved to TBS from its original home, ABC.

Earlier this season, the co-creator of Cougar Town, Bill Lawrence, hosted screenings of the show in cities across the country. That's another way to generate attention for a TV series; yet another is a letter-writing campaign, which has been tried by fans for decades, with mixed success. (One such campaign is credited with getting a third season of Star Trek onto NBC back in 1968.)

Fans have become more creative (or maybe desperate) over time, sending symbols as well as letters to networks. There were peanuts sent to CBS by fans of Jericho, Tabasco sauce sent to UPN by fans of Roswell and bags of Sour Patch Kids sent to ABC Family by fans of Kyle XY. There were donations of October Road DVDs to libraries organized by fans of that ABC show, and blood drives organized by fans of Moonlight, a CBS series. Imagine that: people giving blood for their favorite TV show.

Occasionally these campaigns receive major media attention, putting further pressure on networks to spare a low-rated show. This seemed to happen with Chuck, an NBC series, in 2009. Fans were encouraged to buy foot-long subs at Subway because the sandwich chain had sponsored the show, and NBC subsequently sold the chain on a broader partnership that motivated the network to order another season. Chuck Saved by Subway read a New York Times headline afterward.

But Chuck is over now, as are almost all the other shows that fans have tried to save. Strongly worded letters seem only to delay the inevitable; to save a show, a sufficient number of viewers must be watching it in the first place. That's why the cast of Community pushed fans to tune in Thursdays at 8 p.m. in March, rather than on their own schedules or Web sites. The Nielsen ratings system seems old-fashioned, but it's the standard; TV executives, producers and fans all have to play by its rules.

The day after Community came back on March 15, the Nielsens showed that it had earned its highest rating in a year. You guys did this, Neil Goldman wrote on Twitter to the show's fans. Mr. Goldman, an executive producer of the series, told them, It was largely because you guys watched LIVE in addition to DVRing. NBC has renewed the series for another season, but has scheduled it on Friday nights in the fall, usually a sleepy night for network TV so the cast and crew's campaigning can't stop yet.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/14/bu...ref=television

Revolution sounded interesting until I saw the trailer. Boy does that look bad. Speaking of...anything with Dane Cook in it and I'm out.

Definitely interested to see what Fuller does what Hannibal.

Link to a comic at The Oatmeal that nails the problem of watching this show. It's a bit blue in the last panel so I didn't repost here.

http://theoatmeal.com/comics/game_of_thrones

TV Notes
NBC Will Air Full Season of The Office
By Joe Adalian, New York Magazine's 'Vulture' Blog - May 13, 2012

It's official: The Office will be back for a full season of 22 episodes next season. There had been speculation that NBC might attempt a shortened season of the series, but NBC chief Bob Greenblatt tells Vulture the show is not being put out to pasture just yet. "We haven't determined" whether this will be the last round for the show, he said.

What's more, Greenblatt said he's not ready to say it's over for 30 Rock just yet, either. "I now that's the speculation that's been out there, but it is not yet official," he said.

http://www.vulture.com/2012/05/nbc-w...he-office.html

TV Notes
Four Big TV Gambles That Failed This Season, and What That Means for the Next One
By Tim Molloy, TheWrap.com - May 13, 2012

If next season turns out to be a tame or even timid one on network television, you can thank the season that's winding down.

This week, networks are debuting their plans for next season at their upfront presentations to advertisers -- and their decisions about what new shows to air are rooted in hard looks at the big gambles of their 2011-12 lineups.

From Fox's multimillion-dollar dino-drama "Terra Nova" to NBC's sexy '60s set piece "The Playboy Club," networks took some very big risks this season – and few of them panned out.

Fairly safe shows like singing competitions and sitcoms were the biggest hits. Fantasy series – like ABC's "Once Upon a Time" and NBC's "Grimm" – fared surprisingly well. But shows set in the past – from the 1960s to the Mesozoic era – didn't succeed. Neither did high-concept science fiction like Fox's "Alcatraz" or NBC's "Awake." They were canceled last week, joining "Terra Nova" and "The Playboy Club."

The networks' most successful gambles this season were with existing shows, not new ones. CBS successfully revamped "Two and a Half Men" with Ashton Kutcher in place of Charlie Sheen. NBC ran "The Voice" in midseason against a CBS Monday night lineup, anchored by "Men," that had looked bulletproof in the fall. "The Voice" ended up briefly surpassing Fox's "American Idol" as the top-rated non-NFL programming on television, though "Idol" eventually retook the lead.

For the sake of full disclosure, an aside: We like risky shows. They keep TV fresh and interesting, and without some rolls of the dice, we would never have gotten "Seinfeld," "Modern Family" or "Lost." But for every risk that pays off, there are many more that make average viewers shake their heads and wonder what those network executives were thinking.

This was a season that seemed to depressingly reinforce stereotypes about the TV landscape: Networks remain the main home for mass-market reality shows, broad comedies and procedurals, while cable is the domain of novelistic period shows like "Mad Men" and "Boardwalk Empire" and hit genre series like "Game of Thrones" and "Walking Dead."

Whatever is happening doesn't seem to be good for TV: Overall, according to Nielsen, viewing was down 0.5 percent, or about 46 minutes per viewer per month in the fourth quarter of 2011 that included the start of the season. The decline came after years of consistent year-over-year growth.

Every show is a huge potential risk, and getting one on the air requires beating the odds again and again. But some shows are bigger gambles than others because of their setting, subject matter, complexity or flat-out weirdness. The flip side? Dark, complex, jarring shows are often the best ones, from "Lost" to "Breaking Bad."

Networks have already taken some gambles for the upcoming season -- but none that seem as risky as the ones from this one.

NBC's midseason "Hannibal," about the cannibalistic "Silence of the Lambs" villain, would sound insane if not for the success of the Hannibal Lecter film franchise.

NBC's "The New Normal," from "Glee" veterans Ryan Murphy and Allison Adler, features an extended family consisting of a gay couple and the surrogate mother of their child. That might be more challenging to traditional notions of family if not for the fact that "Modern Family," which is tied for the top-rated sitcom on TV, hadn't featured a gay couple with an adopted daughter for the last three seasons. NBC winkingly says the show features a "post-modern family."

One of the most ambitious shows of the upcoming season is NBC's "Revolution," produced by "Lost" co-creator J.J. Abrams, which imagines a world in which all power suddenly disappears. Past "Lost"-influenced network shows in which a bizarre occurrence suddenly changes the world – from ABC's "Flash Forward" to NBC's "The Event" – haven't fared well. But NBC is giving the show a plum timeslot after "The Voice," its biggest hit.

Fox's upcoming series -- including "The Following," a serial-killer drama led by Kevin Bacon, and a comedy starring "Office" vet Mindy Kaling, sound fairly straightforward -- especially compared to last season's Fox slate.

CBS is rolling the dice with another '60s set show, "Vegas," about a rodeo cowboy-turned-sheriff. Star power should help the show's odds: It stars Dennis Quaid in the lead, and it also features Michael Chiklis, Carrie-Anne Moss, and "Terra Nova" vet Jason O'Mara. CBS's "Elementary," a Sherlock Holmes update set in modern-day New York, finds Jonny Lee Miller saying the magic word to a female Watson played by Lucy Liu.

ABC's edgier offerings, meanwhile, include "666 Park Avenue," about a young couple managing a historic apartment building that is home to dangerous supernatural happenings, and "Last Resort," about a nuclear submarine crew that goes rogue after getting a sketchy order to deploy their weapons.

Here's a look at some of the current season's swing-and-a-misses, God rest their souls, and what lessons can be learned from them:

Terra Nova

The story of a family catapulted from the near future to the distance past died from a thousand cuts, administered by too many cooks. Too mixed metaphorical? Okay: It had a dozen executive producers, to go along with a massive budget, and tried to hedge by offering something for everyone. There was sci-fi. Family drama. Teenage romance. Action. A dystopian future. But in trying to please everyone – you know how this one goes, right? – it ended up pleasing very few. Fox canceled it amid low ratings. Still, good for Fox for giving it a shot. It's impressive whenever a top-rated network strays from what's safe, and this was the season's biggest gamble by far.

The Playboy Club

Some people will take it as a good sign that the fastest-canceled show of the season was also the one with the most T&A. "The Playboy Club" was beautiful to visit, and not just because of its cast. The set design was lovely, the music was hot. The idea to include musical numbers in every episode was a lot of fun, like when country stars used to drop in at the Boar's Nest on the Dukes of Hazzard. But "The Playboy Club," like "Terra Nova," didn't seem to have a soul. Like "Terra Nova," it was all over the place with subplots, none of them very original. You'll keep watching a good-looking but dumb show, the way you'll keep dating a dim bulb because of their physical attributes. But if they don't have a soul, you can't keep time with a person or a show.

ABC's "Pan Am," had lots of similarities with "The Playboy Club": Good looks, a swinging '60 setting, and, unfortunately, storylines that didn't really grab you by the throat. It was canceled last week.

Alcatraz

This one didn't look like much of a gamble at all, at least to "Lost" fans: It starred endearing Lostie Jorge Garcia, was produced by Abrams and other "Lost" veterans, and was co-created by "Lost" writer Elizabeth Sarnoff. It was set partly on an island, for gosh sakes.

But since the rather open-ended conclusion of "Lost," viewers have been awfully careful about mythology-filled shows that may or may not go anywhere. "Alcatraz" had one big central mystery – how did the former prisoners disappear in 1963, and why do they keep reappearing in modern times? "Alcatraz" hedged its bets, doling out clues as it kept viewers occupied from episode to episode with an escaped criminal of the week. The half-and-half approach didn't engage enough of them.

Awake

The NBC drama was your humble correspondent's favorite network show of the year. But it took some of the same have-it-both-ways approach as "Alcatraz." The LAPD detective lead character was split between two realities – one in which his wife is alive and his son is dead, and another where the reverse his true. He also solved crimes in both worlds. The idea was that viewers would be entertained by the procedural within each episode, even as all the crimes – which may or may not be in the lead characters dreams – brought him closer to deciding which reality was real. If either one was real. Yes, it's complicated. And attention spans are short. We really don't know what "Awake" could have done differently. Its setup either fascinated or repelled viewers, and seems mostly to have repelled them. We'd like to wake up in a world where a show as strange as it "Awake" could survive on a major network.

http://www.thewrap.com/tv/article/fo...next-one-39351

Actually, "DWTS" and "The Bachelorette are each 90 minutes.

I'm just getting started with re runs of season 1 of Fringe but so far I like what I'm watching. One of the first TV action shows where the female lead character is believable. Also - it doesn't surprise me about Grimm. Way too many strings that just don't tie together nicely. I'm sure I'll kepp watching it though.

TV Notes
Fox’s Fall Schedule: All-Comedy Tuesday, ‘Glee’ Moves To Thursday, ‘Touch’ To Friday
By Nellie Andreeva, Deadline.com - May 14, 2012

After testing the waters for an all-comedy block on Tuesday this spring, as expected, Fox is making it a permanent feature next season with Raising Hope and New Girl returning as a 8 PM and 9 PM anchor, respectively. Also as expected, Mindy Kaling’s new office comedy, which had been groomed as a companion to New Girl, will launch behind the Zooey Deschanel half-hour. (It has been renamed from It’s Messy to The Mindy Project). Sandwiched between Raising Hope and New Girl is new adult sibling comedy Ben And Kate. With Tuesday taken over by half-hour comedies, musical dramedy Glee, which anchored the night for the past two years, is relocating to Thursdays to air after The X Factor results show in the fall and American Idol results in midseason. This marks a reunion of sorts as Glee‘s preview and first season aired behind the Idol performance show on Tuesdays. The series, which is airing after Idol‘s results show now, midseason drama Touch, will relocate to Fridays, paired with another paranormal drama, departing Fringe.

In addition to the two new comedies on Tuesday, Fox also is introducing a new drama series in the fall, medical drama The Mob Doctor, which is taking over the Monday 9 PM slot currently occupied by Fox’s departing medical drama House. Fox’s other newly picked up drama series, Kevin Williamson’s The Following starring Kevin Bacon, will also premiere on Monday but it midseason. Per Bacon’s deal, the series will film 15 episodes a season, making a midseason launch a logical option. Also held for midseason is a second new comedy series about siblings, The Goodwin Games. After getting benched for sports in the fall, veteran Cops is slated to return for its 25th season in midseason, which is when Fox’s new animated Saturday late-night block is also eying a launch. Here is the schedule with synopses of new series:

MONDAY
8:00-9:00 PM BONES
9:00-10:00 PM THE MOB DOCTOR
THE FOLLOWING (new) joins in midseason.

TUESDAY
8:00-8:30 PM RAISING HOPE
8:30-9:00 PM BEN AND KATE (new)
9:00-9:30 PM NEW GIRL
9:30-10:00 PM THE MINDY PROJECT (new)
THE GOODWIN GAMES (new) joins in midseason.

WEDNESDAY
8:00-10:00 PM THE X FACTOR (fall) / AMERICAN IDOL (midseason)

THURSDAY
8:00-9:00 PM THE X FACTOR Results (fall) / AMERICAN IDOL Results (midseason)
9:00-10:00 PM GLEE

FRIDAY
8:00-9:00 PM TOUCH
9:00-10:00 PM FRINGE (fall)
HELL’S KITCHEN returns in midseason.

SATURDAY
7:00-10:30 PM FOX SPORTS SATURDAY (fall)
COPS returns in midseason.
ANIMATION DOMINATION HIGH-DEF(new) will join late-prime in 2013.

SUNDAY
7:00-7:30 PM NFL Game (fall) / ANIMATION DOMINATION (encores)
7:30-8:00 PM THE OT (fall) / THE CLEVELAND SHOW
8:00-8:30 PM THE SIMPSONS
8:30-9:00 PM BOB’S BURGERS
9:00-9:30 PM FAMILY GUY
9:30-10:00 PM AMERICAN DAD



NEW SERIES SYNOPSES

The following new comedies will premiere this fall on FOX:

BEN AND KATE
What happens when an exuberant, irresponsible dreamer who always says “yes” moves in with his overly responsible little sister to help raise her five-year-old daughter? BEN AND KATE, a new single-camera young ensemble comedy, follows these odd-couple siblings as they push each other out of their comfort zones and into real life. KATE FOX (Dakota Johnson, “The Social Network”) followed the rules all her life…until she got pregnant in college and dropped out just shy of graduation. After the birth of her daughter, MADDIE (Maggie Jones, “We Bought a Zoo,” “Footloose”), Kate put her twenties on hold. Now working as a bar manager to make ends meet and maximize her time with five-year-old Maddie, she’s uber-prepared for every possible catastrophe – except for the arrival of her older brother, BEN FOX (Nat Faxon, “Bad Teacher”). Ben likes trouble a lot more than his sister does. His infectious energy makes you want to follow him into any number of bad ideas. He’ll totally screw up your life, but somehow, you’ll feel good about it. Where Kate is all about planning and preparing, Ben is big on spontaneity and out-of-the-box ideas. But don’t let the Velcro wallet fool you – he’ll probably be a millionaire someday. When Ben comes to crash on Kate’s couch for a few days, he finds a sad state of affairs. Kate’s surviving, but not living. Ben realizes that for the first time in their lives, Kate needs his help and he’s determined to bring some much-needed chaos into her overly stable world. He starts by offering to help look after Maddie so Kate can get back to experiencing her mid-twenties and making mistakes, since the one real “mistake” she’s made turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to her. Always there to help with Ben’s crazy schemes is his partner-in-crime, TOMMY (newcomer Echo Kellum), who worships Ben like a hero and nurses a serious crush on Kate. Kate’s British best friend, BJ (Lucy Punch, “Bad Teacher”), is a cocktail waitress at the bar that Kate manages and an all-around hot mess who would do anything for Kate, even if her advice is often questionable and occasionally illegal. From writer/executive producer Dana Fox (NEW GIRL, “What Happens in Vegas”) and executive producer/director Jake Kasdan (NEW GIRL, “Bad Teacher”), BEN AND KATE is a heartwarming story of deeply mismatched siblings: a sister who needs to go for her dreams and a brother who needs to get his head out of the clouds.
PRODUCTION COMPANIES: 20th Century Fox Television, Chernin Entertainment
CREATOR/WRITER/EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Dana Fox
EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS: Peter Chernin, Katherine Pope
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER/DIRECTOR: Jake Kasdan
CAST: Dakota Johnson as Kate, Nat Faxon as Ben, Maggie Jones as Maddie, Lucy Punch as BJ, Echo Kellum as Tommy

THE MINDY PROJECT
THE MINDY PROJECT is a new single-camera comedy from Emmy Award-nominated writer/producer and New York Times best-selling author Mindy Kaling (“The Office”) that follows a woman who, despite having a successful career, desperately needs to break bad habits in her personal life. After all, how many doctors make inappropriate toasts at their ex-boyfriend’s wedding, nearly drown at the bottom of a stranger’s pool and get arrested for disorderly conduct just moments before having to deliver a baby? Funny, impatient and politically incorrect, MINDY LAHIRI (Kaling) can quote every romantic comedy starring Meg Ryan that exists. She loves the good ones and the bad ones, because the girl always gets the guy. Mindy is determined to be more punctual, spend less money, lose weight and read more books – all in pursuit of becoming a well-rounded perfect woman…who can meet and date the perfect guy. Mindy is a skilled OB/GYN and shares a practice with a few other doctors, none of whom make life any easier for her. JEREMY REED (British writer/comedian Ed Weeks) is the walking definition of total bad news. He not only shares a practice with Mindy, but sometimes her bed as well – despite her best efforts to resist. He is funny, self-absorbed and super sexy. In contrast, DANNY CASTELLANO (Chris Messina, “Damages”) is a hothead and guys’ guy who has a habit of stealing Mindy’s patients. Danny criticizes her for everything, including her struggling love life and her lack of professionalism – even though it’s obvious to everyone except Mindy that he secretly admires her work. His blue-collar childhood gives him a big chip on his shoulder, but he is a dedicated physician, which Mindy can’t stand to admit because he’s always getting on her case. Rounding out the office staff are the receptionists – BETSY PUTCH (Zoe Jarman, “Huge”), young, earnest and easily excitable, who thinks the world of Mindy and is always trying to impress her; and SHAUNA DICANIO (newcomer Dana DeLorenzo), a self-assured Jersey Girl who is indifferent to Mindy, always knows where the cool party is and carries a poorly concealed torch for Danny. Mindy is in constant communication with her beloved best friend from college, GWEN GRANDY (Anna Camp, “The Good Wife”), who also happens to be the governor’s daughter. Gwen is a hilarious, sometimes too-blunt friend, and secretly a former carefree party girl (which only Mindy seems to remember). Although Gwen is now happily married to a financial analyst, with a six-year-old daughter, this lawyer-turned-Pilates mom remains squarely in Mindy’s corner. As Mindy attempts to get her career off the ground and meet a guy who passes her red flag test (no drug habits, no skinny jeans and no secret families, among others), only time will tell if she gets her romantic comedy ending.
PRODUCTION COMPANIES: Universal Television, 3 Arts Entertainment
CREATOR/WRITER/EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Mindy Kaling
EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS: Howard Klein, B.J. Novak (pilot)
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER/DIRECTOR: Charles McDougall (pilot)
CAST: Mindy Kaling as Mindy, Chris Messina as Danny, Ed Weeks as Jeremy, Anna Camp as Gwen, Zoe Jarman as Betsy, Dana DeLorenzo as Shauna

The following new dramas will debut this fall on FOX:

THE MOB DOCTOR
For most physicians, the Hippocratic oath is sacred. But for one Chicago doctor, who is indebted to the mafia, saving lives isn’t her only concern. THE MOB DOCTOR is a fast-paced medical drama featuring a brilliant young female cardiothoracic surgeon who is split between two distinct worlds as she juggles her promising medical career with her lifelong debt as a doctor to Chicago’s Southside mob. DR. GRACE DEVLIN (Jordana Spiro, “My Boys”) is a top resident at Chicago’s Roosevelt Medical Center. Smart and self-assured, she’s heralded as one of the country’s most promising young surgeons. But family ties keep her glued to her Southside roots. To pay off her brother’s life-threatening gambling debt, she makes a deal with the devil and agrees to work “off book” for the mafia men she once despised. During the day, Grace must deal with the emotionally compelling cases at Roosevelt Medical – a toddler in need of a heart transplant, an elderly man desperate to donate a lung to his sick wife, the mass chaos in the wake of a two-train collision on the ‘L.’ But in her other vastly different world, she must juggle an onslaught of mob-related demands, including operating in mob-sanctioned locations, removing bullets from dead bodies to hide incriminating evidence, saving a juiced-up race horse and covertly helping an aging mobster with his erectile dysfunction. All the while, Grace must keep her dual life a secret from everyone: her protective best friend, NURSE ROBERTA “RO” ANGELI (Floriana Lima, “Glory Daze”); her handsome, blue-blooded boyfriend, DR. BRETT ROBINSON (Zach Gilford, “Off The Map,” “Friday Night Lights”); her boss at Roosevelt Medical and Chief of Surgery, DR. STAFFORD WHITE (Zeljko Ivanek, “The Event,” “Damages”); her rival, DR. OLIVIA WATSON (Jaime Lee Kirchner, “Necessary Roughness,” “Mercy”); even her well-meaning screw-up brother, NATE (Jesse Lee Soffer, “As the World Turns”), and her overly dramatic mother, DANIELLA (Wendy Makkena, “NCIS”). The only one who knows the true scope of Grace’s activities is the man to whom Grace owes her debt: the charming and diabolical Southside mob boss CONSTANTINE ALEXANDER (William Forsythe, “Boardwalk Empire”), an oddly compassionate killer whose relationship with Grace is more than it seems. Recently released from prison, the former head of the Chicago mob looks to reclaim his place in the organization, with the help of his right-hand associate – and Grace’s ex-boyfriend – FRANCO (James Carpinello, “The Good Wife”). As Grace tries to heed the demands of these two conflicting worlds – not to mention the needs of her own slightly dysfunctional family – her moral center comes into direct conflict with the very immoral things she’s asked to do. But with nerves of steel and a tough-as-nails exterior, she somehow manages to make it all work – at least for now.
PRODUCTION COMPANY: Sony Pictures Television
CREATORS/WRITERS/EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS: Josh Berman, Rob Wright
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER/DIRECTOR: Michael Dinner
CAST: Jordana Spiro as Dr. Grace Devlin, William Forsythe as Constantine Alexander, Floriana Lima as Nurse “Ro” Angeli, Zach Gilford as Dr. Brett Robinson, Jaime Lee Kirchner as Dr. Olivia Watson, Zeljko Ivanek as Dr. Stafford White, James Carpinello as Franco, Jesse Lee Soffer as Nate Devlin, Wendy Makkena as Daniella Devlin

The new drama set to debut midseason is:

THE FOLLOWING
THE FBI estimates there are currently over 300 active serial killers in the United States. What would happen if these killers had a way of communicating and connecting with each other? What if they were able to work together and form alliances across the country? What if one brilliant psychotic serial killer was able to bring them all together and activate a following? Welcome to THE FOLLOWING, the terrifying new thriller from creator/executive producer Kevin Williamson (“The Vampire Diaries,” “Dawson’s Creek,” the “Scream” franchise). When notorious serial killer JOE CARROLL (James Purefoy, “Rome”) escapes from death row and embarks on a new killing spree, the FBI calls former agent RYAN HARDY (Emmy-nominated actor Kevin Bacon, “X-Men: First Class”) to consult on the case. Having since withdrawn from the public eye, Hardy was responsible for Carroll’s capture nine years ago, after Carroll murdered 14 female students on the Virginia college campus where he taught literature. Hardy is a walking textbook of all-things Carroll. He knows him better than anyone; he is perhaps Carroll’s only psychological and intellectual match. But the Ryan Hardy who broke the Carroll case years ago isn’t the same man today. Wounded both physically and mentally by his previous pursuit of this serial killer, it’s been a long time since Hardy has been in the field. This investigation is his redemption, his call to action. In contrast to nine years ago, Hardy isn’t calling the shots on this case. He works closely with an FBI team, which includes all-business and tough-as-nails JENNIFER MASON (Jeananne Goossen, “The Vow,” ALCATRAZ) and young, razor-sharp MIKE WESTON (Shawn Ashmore, “X-Men”). The team considers Hardy to be more of a liability than an asset. But Hardy proves his worth when he uncovers that Carroll was covertly communicating with a network of killers in the outside world. It quickly becomes obvious that he has more planned than just a prison escape, and there’s no telling how many additional killers are out there. The FBI’s investigation leads Hardy to CLAIRE MATTHEWS (Natalie Zea, “Justified”), Carroll’s ex-wife and mother of the criminal’s 10-year-old son, JOEY (newcomer Kyle Catlett). Close during Hardy’s initial investigation, Hardy turns to Claire for insight into Carroll’s next move. The tension rises when Carroll’s accomplices kidnap his intended last victim from nine years ago. Hardy becomes ever more determined to end Carroll’s game when he realizes that this psychopath intends to finish what he started. The thriller will follow Hardy and the FBI as they are challenged with the ever-growing web of murder around them, masterminded by the devious Carroll, who dreams of writing a novel with Hardy as his protagonist. The reinvigorated Hardy will get a second chance to capture Carroll, as he’s faced with not one but a cult of serial killers.
PRODUCTION COMPANIES: Warner Bros. Television, Outerbanks Entertainment, Bonanza Productions Inc.
CREATOR/WRITER/EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Kevin Williamson
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER/DIRECTOR: Marcos Siega
CAST: Kevin Bacon as Ryan Hardy, James Purefoy as Joe Carroll, Jeananne Goossen as Agent Jennifer Mason, Natalie Zea as Claire Matthews, Kyle Catlett as Joey Matthews, Shawn Ashmore as Agent Weston, Valorie Curry as Denise, Adan Canto as Billy Thomas, Nico Tortorella as Will Wilson

The new comedy slated for midseason is:

THE GOODWIN GAMES
Where there’s a will, there’s a way. And when that will’s worth more than 20 million dollars, you can bet someone’s going to find a way to get the cash. From the executive producers of “How I Met Your Mother,” THE GOODWIN GAMES is a single-camera comedy that tells the story of three grown siblings who return home after their father’s death, and unexpectedly find themselves poised to inherit a vast fortune – if they adhere to their late father’s wishes. If any of the Goodwin kids feel like they deserve the money, then it’s HENRY (Scott Foley, “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Felicity”), the eldest child and an overachieving surgeon. He sees himself as a role model for his less successful siblings – and reminds them every chance he gets. Returning home will force Henry to question the choices he’s made, especially as he reconnects with his first love and true soulmate, LUCINDA (Felisha Terrell, “Days of Our Lives”). Middle sibling CHLOE (Becki Newton, “Ugly Betty”) was a child prodigy in math, and her unofficial role as “the smart one” of the family still sends Henry into fits of jealousy. But long ago, Chloe gave up academics in favor of being the popular girl. Now, through a series of hidden messages, her late father will lead Chloe back to her old love of numbers – and back to the person she’s meant to be. Of the three siblings, the youngest, JIMMY (Jake Lacy, “Better With You”), could use the inheritance the most. A small-time ex-con and dull-witted guitarist who’s deep in debt to a loan shark, Jimmy may be the family screw-up, but he has more heart than anyone. Like his siblings, Jimmy’s also returning to something in this town: his eight-year-old daughter. Pulling the strings from beyond the grave is the children’s late father, BENJAMIN (guest star Beau Bridges, “The Descendants”), a college math professor. Guilty over not parenting his kids better, Benjamin has left behind a series of unique challenges – administered by his estate attorney APRIL (newcomer Melissa Tang). Through these tasks, Benjamin hopes he can get his children to rediscover their true selves and learn the lessons he failed to instill in them while he was alive. Their potential reward? More than 20 million dollars – a fortune that they never knew their father had – and the chance to become the people their father wanted them to be. So let THE GOODWIN GAMES begin!
PRODUCTION COMPANY: 20th Century Fox Television
CREATORS/WRITERS/EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS: Carter Bays, Craig Thomas, Chris Harris
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER/DIRECTOR: Peyton Reed (pilot)
CAST: Scott Foley as Henry, Becki Newton as Chloe, Jake Lacy as Jimmy, Felisha Terrell as Lucinda, Melissa Tang as April

http://www.deadline.com/2012/05/foxs...uch-to-friday/

TV Notes
'Glee' scoop: Kate Hudson, Sarah Jessica Parker join season 4
By Lynette Rice and James Hibberd, EW.com's 'Inside TV' Blog - May 14, 2012

Here's how to interest Glee fans in 10 seconds: Kate Hudson and Sarah Jessica Parker have been cast in season four.

That's right, the Almost Famous and Sex in the City actors are coming to Ohio (or New York or Los Angeles there's a lot of locations potentially in the mix for next season).

Who will they play, what will they do? Well you see uh we don't actually know. The only information Fox is releasing at this time is that Hudson has joined the cast for a six-episode arc, though Parker told Kelly Ripa this morning on Live! that she would be playing a mentor of sorts in the new season. She, too, will have a multi-episode arc.

Glee moves to a new night this fall on Thursdays following The X Factor. The network teases that the new season will be a show within a show since key characters are graduating from McKinley High.

http://insidetv.ew.com/2012/05/14/glee-kate-hudson/

Looks like only 1 night of Fox for me. Looks like it might be an easy DVR season in the fall.

I'm middle of the road as far as the amount of tv that I and my friends watch.

So far with NBC and Fox schedules, I have 3 hours of returning shows and 5 hours of new ones (which will turn into 2 new ones if history is a guide).

Seems like a slightly worse record than other years.

SUNDAY's fast affiliate overnight prime-time ratings -and what they mean- have been posted on Analyst Marc Berman's Media INsight's Blog

Nielsen Overnights (18-49)
A last ratings bump for 'Desperate Housewives'
ABC comedy's series finale averages a 3.2 in 18-49s
By Toni Fitzgerald, Media Life Magazine - May 14, 2012

"Desperate Housewives" left the air the same way it came on eight years ago: As the No. 1 show on Sunday.

The two-hour series finale of the comedy helped lead ABC to a first-place finish last night.

"Housewives" averaged a 3.2 adults 18-49 rating from 9 to 11 p.m., according to Nielsen overnights, up 19 percent over last week's 2.7.

It tied as the highest-rated episode of the season for the show, which was once the top-rated scripted show on television and ranked behind only "American Idol," averaging a 10.4 in its first season.

Its ratings fell gradually, and by this season it was no longer even the top-rated show on ABC on Sunday nights, falling behind new drama "Once Upon a Time."

But for its final episode, some of those lost viewers returned. "Housewives" had been averaging a 2.7 this season.

The show peaked with a 3.4 at 10:30 p.m., and it averaged 11.1 million total viewers for the entire finale.

"Time's" finale also averaged a 3.2 18-49 rating at 8 p.m., tying with "Housewives" as the top show of the night and clocking its best rating in 10 weeks.

The "Housewives" series ender may have taken a bite out of CBS's competing "Survivor" finale from 8 to 10 p.m. and the reunion episode that followed.

The "Survivor" finale averaged a 2.8, the show's lowest-rated finale ever, and the reunion show drew a series-low 2.4. Both were down double-digit percentages from last spring.

ABC was first for the night among 18-49s with a 2.8 average overnight rating and an 8 share, its highest-rated Sunday with regular programming in one and a half years.

CBS was second at 2.3/7, Fox third at 1.7/5, NBC fourth at 1.3/4, Univision fifth at 0.9/3 and Telemundo sixth at 0.3/1.

As a reminder, all ratings are based on live-plus-same-day DVR playback, which includes shows replayed before 3 a.m. the night before. Seven-day DVR data won't be available for several weeks. Forty-four percent of Nielsen households have DVRs.

At 7 p.m. ABC led with a 1.6 for "America's Funniest Home Videos," followed by CBS with a 1.2 for "60 Minutes." Fox was third with a 1.1 for a repeat of "The Simpsons" (0.9) and a new "The Cleveland Show" (1.3), NBC fourth with a 0.8 for "Dateline," Univision fifth with a 0.4 for "Intimamente, Compartiendo Entre Amigas" and Telemundo sixth with a 0.3 for "Pa'lante con Cristina."

ABC was first again at 8 p.m. with a 3.2 for "Time," while CBS remained second with a 2.7 for "Survivor." Fox was third with a 1.8 for a new "Simpsons" (1.9) and "Bob's Burgers" (1.8). NBC and Univision tied for fourth at 1.0, NBC for the now-canceled "Harry's Law" and Univision for "Nuestra Belleza Latina," and Telemundo as sixth with a 0.4 for the movie "Twilight."

At 9 p.m. ABC finished first with a 3.2 for "Housewives," and CBS stayed in second place with a 2.9 for more "Survivor." Fox was third with a 2.2 for "Family Guy" (2.3) and "American Dad" (2.0), NBC fourth with a 1.6 for "Celebrity Apprentice," Univision fifth with a 1.2 for more "Latina" and Telemundo sixth with a 0.4 for its movie.

ABC completed the sweep at 10 p.m. with a 3.3 for the second half of "Housewives," followed by CBS with a 2.4 for a "Survivor" reunion episode. NBC was third with a 1.9 for more "Apprentice," Univision fourth with a 1.0 for the final 30 minutes of "Latina" and "Sal y Pimienta" and Telemundo fifth with a 0.4 for the final hour of "Twilight."

Among households, ABC led the night with a 5.8 average overnight rating and a 10 share. CBS was second at 5.6/10, NBC third at 3.5/6, Fox fourth at 2.2/4, Univision fifth at 1.3/2 and Telemundo sixth at 0.4/1.

http://www.medialifemagazine.com/art...ousewives-.asp

TV Notes
Telemundo Announces More Than 800 Hours of New Programming
By Kimberly Potts, TheWrap.com - May 14, 2012

Telemundo announced a whopping 800 new hours of original programming on Monday, marking a nearly 40 percent increase in the network's original programming.

Among the new shows: six telenovelas, "El Rostro de la Venganza" ("The Face of Revenge"), "El Señor de los Cielos" ("The Lord of the Heavens"), "La Patrona" ("The Patron"), "Pasión Prohibida" ("Forbidden Passion"), "Nace un Idolo" ("An Idol is Born") and "Fina Estampa" ("Fine Pedigree"); a pair of daytime shows, "Cuauhtemoc" and "Virgen Morena" ("The Virgin of Guadalupe"); and a reality competition series, "Yo Me Llamo" ("My Name Is").

The network also unveiled a new logo in an effort to capture "the essense of the Hispanic experience in the U.S.," according to a release, and launched Telemundo Entertainment App, which allows viewers access to Telemundo content "wherever and whenever" they want it.

"This season we are presenting our most ambitious original programming slate ever, a testament to our commitment to produce the most relevant Spanish-language content for the largest Hispanic audience possible," Telemundo media president Emilio Romano (pictured at left) said. "Fueled by our record-breaking performance and the support of Comcast and NBCUniversal, together with a leading team of executives, our mission is to become the number one Hispanic media company in the U.S. and the leading producer of Spanish-language content in the world."

Descriptions of the network's new shows, as provided by Telemundo: [CLICK LINK BELOW]

http://insidetv.ew.com/2012/05/14/glee-kate-hudson/

TV Notes
NBC Greenlights Pirate Drama From 'Luther' Creator
By Lesley Goldberg, The Hollywood Reporter's 'Live Feed' Blog - May 14, 2012

NEW YORK -- Thrown into a mix of stars, trailers and network hype at Monday's upfront presentation was NBC's announcement that it's adding drama Crossbones to its schedule.

Luthercreator Neil Cross will adapt Colin Woodard's book The Republic of Pirates, which is set in the 1700s during the Golden Age of Piracy and revolve around legendary pirate Blackbeard.

Husband and wife duo Walter Parkes and Laurie MacDonald (The Kite Runner) will produce the drama, which hails from indie studio Georgeville Television and Motion Picture Capital. NBC has ordered 10 episodes.

Crossbonesbecomes the network's second straight-to-series order, following Bryan Fuller's Silence of the Lambs prequel, Hannibal, and NBC's fifth drama ordered to series this month.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/liv...-luther-323982

Business Notes
Best Buy Founder Gives Up Chairman Role After Mishandling Former CEO's Affair
By David Lieberman, Deadline.com - May 14, 2012

Richard Schulze will remain on the board to the end of his term next year but will just have an honorary title at the consumer electronics retail chain after the board's Audit Committee said in a report that he helped to cover up former CEO Brian Dunn's inappropriate relationship with a female employee. That's a big come-down for Schulze, who became a multi-billionaire by turning his Sound Of Music Store founded in St. Paul in 1966 into one of the country's largest sellers of consumer electronics and entertainment.

The report says Schulze found out about Dunn's relationship in late 2011 but kept it to himself after the CEO adamantly denied any impropriety. The board first learned of the relationship in March. Dunn resigned last month. He was paid $6.6M as part of his separation agreement. In addition to the changes at the top, Best Buy says it will now support annual election of all board members a change favored by corporate governance activists. Best Buy shares are down 17% so far in 2012 as the chain struggles to keep up with competition from online retailers led by Amazon.

Here's Best Buy's announcement:

MINNEAPOLIS, May 14, 2012 - The Board of Directors of Best Buy Co., Inc. (NYSE:BBY) announced that on Saturday, May 12, 2012, it elected director Hatim Tyabji to succeed Richard Schulze as Chairman of the Company, effective at the conclusion of the annual meeting on June 21, 2012. Mr. Tyabji, currently Chairman of the Audit Committee, has served as a director since 1998.

When Mr. Schulze steps down as Chairman, he will become Founder and Chairman Emeritus, an honorary position. Mr. Schulze will serve out the remainder of his term as director through June 2013.

Hatim's history of leadership combines technology, retail, financial and mobile experience at the most senior levels, said lead independent director Matthew Paull. He has founded companies, chaired and served on boards and successfully led enterprises through long-term growth and change. The Board is grateful for his many years of service and is pleased to expand his role to Chairman.

The story of Best Buy is a remarkable American success story, said incoming Chairman Hatim Tyabji. Dick's leadership and vision changed the landscape of American retail, and he will forever be remembered as an iconic entrepreneur. We join Best Buy's 167,000
employees in thanking him.

The Board also publicly released the results of an independent investigation into personal conduct allegations involving former CEO Brian Dunn, who resigned in April. When these allegations, which were unrelated to the company's operations or financial controls, were brought to the Board's attention, the Audit Committee immediately initiated an investigation. Prior to the completion of the investigation, Mr. Dunn resigned.

When the Audit Committee was first informed of the allegations in mid-March 2012, it hired outside law firm WilmerHale to conduct an independent investigation. In the interest of transparency and accountability, the board made a commitment to publicly release the findings.

Key findings of the investigation include:

The CEO violated Company policy by engaging in an extremely close personal relationship with a female employee that negatively impacted the work environment.

The CEO's relationship with the female employee demonstrated extremely poor judgment and a lack of professionalism, but the inquiry revealed no misuse of Company resources. The inquiry also revealed no misuse of aircraft.

In addition, as part of the investigation, it was determined that the Chairman of the Board of Directors acted inappropriately when he failed to bring the matter to the Audit Committee of the Board of Directors in December 2011, when the allegations were first raised with him.

In December, when the conduct of our then-CEO was brought to my attention, I confronted him with the allegations (which he denied), told him his conduct was totally unacceptable and contrary to Best Buy's policies and everything I, and the Company, stand for. I understand and accept the findings of the Audit Committee, said Mr. Schulze.

In light of these findings, the Audit Committee of the Board will launch an effort to review and enhance, if appropriate, Best Buy's relevant corporate policies and procedures. The goal of this review is to ensure a positive and consistent workplace environment for all employees at all levels.

In addition to electing a new chairman, the independent directors of the board have moved from a neutral position to a recommendation that the shareholders approve the shareholder proposal recommending declassification of the Board, which would require every director to stand for reelection on an annual basis.

As a Board, we support the proposal for annual elections as an additional demonstration of our commitment to strong corporate governance practices. Each of us - with no exceptions - will be subject to approval by the shareholders on an annual basis, said Mr. Tyabji.

http://www.deadline.com/2012/05/best...r-ceos-affair/

TV Notes
The Do-Over
How Happy Endings lived up to its name.
By Alex Morris, New York Magazine - May 13, 2012

When the ABC sitcom Happy Endings finished filming its first season, the cast and writers did what any self-respecting sitcom crew would do: They rented a party bus and set course for Vegas. The bus had neon lights and a stripper pole and was outfitted to be a Damn Good Time. It ended up sitting in eight hours of bumper-to-bumper traffic while the cast—who had wrapped at 4 a.m., a mere handful of hours before the party bus departed the Paramount lot—tried with varying degrees of success to cover up the fact that no one really wanted to be going to Vegas. “Everyone was kind of like, ‘What are we doing?’ ” says Casey Wilson, an SNL alum whose character, Penny, is the show’s perpetual optimist. “People were nauseous and sick. Damon [Wayans Jr.] was lying down on the seats with pillows over his eyes trying to sleep. So it wasn’t quite like the party bus that you know and love.”

In the way that life can imitate art, the first season of Happy Endings also tried with varying degrees of success to be a Damn Good Time and turned out instead to be an Okay Time With Potential. The key elements were certainly in place—*talented writers, esteemed producers, and an enviable cast with a solid improv pedigree. But the show was hemmed in by a premise established in the first two minutes of the pilot, in which Elisha Cuthbert’s character, Alex, leaves Zach *Knighton’s character, Dave, at the altar for a guy who glides into the church on Rollerblades, while their four closest friends (played by Wilson, Wayans, Eliza Coupe, and Adam Pally) look on in horror. The setup allowed the audience to delve into an established friendship circle in medias res at a defining moment when the group had to decide whether to splinter. But it also meant that one character was locked into spending a season dealing with the emotional repercussions of having been jilted in a brutal and public fashion (those Rollerblades!) while the other was locked into apologizing for said jilting. What was intended to be an ensemble show ended up being rooted in the two straight-men characters while their more hilarious sidekicks were sidelined. Tellingly, the network aired the two episodes that were meant to follow the pilot—and dealt most directly with the fallout of the ruined wedding—very late in the first season, relying on other episodes to try to hook its audience. The show still managed to pull ahead of the season’s other Friends-type spawn (Perfect Couples, Traffic Light, Mad Love) with little to no network promotion, but the cast and crew didn’t pin their hopes on getting a second season. When they did, “I got shitfaced immediately,” says the show’s creator, David Caspe.

“I bought a new house. Well, my wife bought a house, and I came along with her,” adds executive producer Jonathan Groff.

Regrouping for a second season provided Happy Endings with the opportunity to capitalize on its underdog mentality, what Pally calls “a ****-you attitude that is very apparent and important to the show. I think it’s let us kind of say, ‘We’re going to do what we do no matter what, because it’s not as if anyone’s watching.’ ” Rather than improve ratings by noticeably changing course (as Parks and Recreation had done after its first season), the cast and crew leaned into the weirdness of their comedy. Coupe and Wayans, who play married couple Jane and Brad turned their characters’ initial overachieving-bobo quirks into a full-blown orgy of neuroses—the second season finds Brad wearing a shirtdress because “Daddy likes a deep tuck,” and Jane stalking a kid she thinks might be her egg-donor baby (in fact the parents didn’t use her egg because they thought she seemed just the kind of crazy who would stalk her egg-donor baby). Wilson gave her singleton an ability to rebound that verges on masochism. And Pally’s gay character, Max, so brilliantly overhauls TV’s go-to flamboyant stereotype that in one episode he slovenly hibernates for the winter, like a bear. “It’s like we’re all kind of sharing a brain, and we’re just like, ‘Yeah, this is the direction [the show] needs to go in,’ and we all pushed it into that direction,” says Coupe. “We’ll come up with stuff together and be like, ‘Let’s do this.’ And sometimes there will be a director who’ll say, ‘Please give us a normal take,’ and we’ll be like, ‘No, we want to do it our way.’ And what’s funny is they’ll cave in.”

Luckily, the studio also followed suit. “Maybe we showed just enough promise in the pilot and in the first few episodes that nobody ever went, like, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa’ and sort of freaked us out or made us change course in a way that was inorganic,” Groff says. “To their credit, they left us alone a little bit. They didn’t get nervous or lose sight of what they liked about it originally, and they had confidence that we would get there.”

The largest, and most deliberate, overhaul was allowing Cuthbert’s and Knighton’s characters to develop beyond type. “As long as you give me a joke every few weeks, I’ll be the straight guy,” Cuthbert had originally told the writers. “Let me do a couple of comedy things here and there along the way, and that’s good enough for me.” But once they realized that Cuthbert could be funny, they began incorporating her offscreen behaviors into the script, like her invisible hula-hoop dance, or her Renée Zellweger impression. (“They asked, ‘Can you say anything while you’re doing that Renée?’ And I was like, ‘No, it’s just a look.’ ”) Knighton’s character became the kind of guy who gets an idea—like marriage—in his head and blindly sticks to it, even if it’s clearly not going to end well. Suddenly the show’s most traditional characters were “kind of the craziest people in the group,” he says. And Caspe had assembled the ensemble cast he’d always wanted: “That was really my goal from the beginning. You know, depending on who you ask, people’s favorite character is Max or Penny or Jane or Brad or Dave or Alex. I really am proud of that.”

“The great thing about David Caspe,” explains Coupe, “was that he really just wanted to get the people he thought were the funniest and then have them fit into the part, as opposed to the people who could do the part the best.” This made for characters that needed time to fully develop around the actors. But once they did, that freed the show to do what it had always done well: unfold a sitcom that understands that it exists in a post-sitcom era. (A favorite Max quote: “Wait, you’re breaking up with another boyfriend-of-the-week that I never get invested in except through dialogue?”) As Wayans tells me, “I thought that season one was kind of the bone structure of what the show was going to be, and this season we were adding muscles and tendons, and I think next season we’ll add some skin—you know what I mean—maybe a penis or a vagina. Boobs.”

And as the characters began to fill the shoes (or curves) of the actors who played them, the ensemble chemistry also began to take shape in a way that few could have anticipated. Pally and Wilson had been pals since their days at New York’s Upright Citizens Brigade—“We came in as freshmen together, and I was very interested in dating her, but immediately she got snatched up by the older dudes,” he says—but the rest of the group began bonding the night of the very first table read, when they went for drinks at the Chateau Marmont and ended up at Cuthbert’s house, where it became clear that this group of “friends” was actually going to be friends. “I hope he forgives me for saying this, but, I mean, Zach wore a fedora the first night we hung out, and it was just over,” Wilson says, laughing. “Adam and I were like, ‘Take the fedora off or we can’t move forward.’ It’s just like that—a questionable amount of openness.” Soon, the cast was going to Bikram yoga and getting margaritas after filming and encouraging Cuthbert to get a hot tub they could all hang out in and watching Happy Endings episodes at a now-*defunct West Hollywood bar called the Silver Spoon. “I’d go around to everyone at the bar and very nicely go, ‘Do you mind if we watch this show? We’re on it,’ ” Wilson says. “And it’s always painful because the people in the bar are like, ‘We don’t watch the show.’ So we’re, like, watching them not watch the show.”

Even after filming together for fourteen hours, they’ll “tailgate” outside their trailers. “Guest stars hate it, because no one’s interested in talking to them,” Pally says. “We just want to know how everyone’s weekend was. Most of the time, we’ve spent it together. It’s disgusting.” In fact, there’s such a level of chumminess that the cast’s offscreen stories sound eerily like plots for a future episode, like the time Pally, Wayans, and Knighton got invited to the Playboy Mansion. “Those parties are just kind of crazy, you know what I mean?” says Pally. “Like, obviously, they’re exactly what you think of. Chris Evans was there, and he recognized Zach, and he was like, ‘Dude I love you, you’re a great actor, but that show you’re on is ********.’ I don’t even think he was talking about Happy Endings, I think he was talking about FlashForward, but I was a little under the influence, and so I got up in Chris Evans’s face like an idiot—because he would have destroyed me, he would have ripped my arms off—and I was like, ‘Whoa, not cool, Captain America.’ And then Damon backed me up, and I was like, ‘We’re going to kick the **** out of you, Chris Evans.’ And then security broke us up. So there you go.”

A third season is most likely on the horizon, viewership has doubled (reaching as high as 8.3 million), and the cast is remaining optimistic that the show will continue apace. Says Groff, “You kind of hope for the best and prepare yourself for the worst by laying in copious amounts of hard drugs.” And about that ill-fated party-bus trip: They turned that vibe around, too. “We *decided to go see Bite, which is a lesbian vampire revue. That tagline alone was enough for me to just turn my credit card over and buy everyone a ticket,” says Wilson. “It was, like, off the strip, basically in an outdoor mall. It was just madness.”

http://nymag.com/arts/tv/upfronts/20...ndings-2012-5/

TV Notes
'America's Got Talent': Enter Howard Stern
The shock jock joins NBC's longtime No. 1 summer show
By Louisa Ada Seltzer, Media Life Magazine - May 14, 2012

"America's Got Talent" has been summer's biggest hit for years, but tonight it could jump to new heights.

For the first time, the reality show is premiering during the regular season, when more people are watching television.

Secondly, and probably more importantly, the program has a huge change in store for the seventh season, which debuts tonight at 8 p.m.

Shock jock Howard Stern takes over as one of the judges, replacing Piers Morgan, the program's only remaining original judge, who left to concentrate on his CNN talk show.

Stern's hiring was predictably controversial. NBC has always marketed "Talent" as a family show, and Stern, who loves to swear and is prone to having strippers on his Sirius XM Radio show, is not known as a family-friendly guy.

The Parents Television Council was so upset about Stern joining the show that it contacted more than 90 past advertisers on "Talent" and urged them to pull their sponsorship, predicting that Stern will push the boundaries of good taste.

For his part, Stern insists that he will be on his best behavior. As he told reporters last week, "It is a family show, it is not 'The Howard Stern Show,' it is a show that I love. I have been watching it for years and I don't want to come in and do 'The Howard Stern Show.'"

Still, many may be curious if Stern can live up to his pledge, and that could help pump ratings. Last year "Talent" premiered to a 4.3 adults 18-49 Nielsen rating on May 31. It also drew 15.3 million total viewers, its best bow ever.

http://www.medialifemagazine.com/art...ward-Stern.asp

Business Notes
Pursuing Advertisers With Big-Top Spectacle
By Amy Chozick, The New York Times - May 14, 2012

This week, the biggest television networks will battle it out for their share of the more than $60 billion in advertising dollars spent by the world’s largest marketers on television commercials each year.

The networks’ weapons? A 40-foot sushi bar, a 125-foot star-studded red carpet and 14 flavors of doughnuts (including candied ginger and hibiscus).

What began in the 1960s as a glorified trade show for television executives to woo marketers and sell advertising time upfront to support the coming fall TV schedule has evolved into a full-fledged bacchanal that can cost networks upward of $1 million.

Today the upfronts look more like Fashion Week than a business transaction. This week, celebrity D.J.’s will spin dance music in elaborate tents complete with lounges where marketers can sip specialty cocktails alongside stars.

The addition of social media means the upfronts are not just a tool for connecting to advertisers, either. Joe Earley, Fox’s president of marketing and communications, compared the event to Comic-Con as a first and “crucial” chance to tell the most devoted fans about the fall TV season.

“It’s a chance for us to show ourselves at our best because God knows the reality of ratings will set in soon,” said Alan Wurtzel, president of research and media development at NBCUniversal.

In the go-go 1990s, when advertising dollars poured into TV and networks did not face threats from the Internet or cable competitors, the upfronts “almost became a game to top what the other guy was doing and get the most buzz for your upfront,” said Tim Brooks, a television historian.

Back then, NBC held its party in the sprawling ballroom of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York. Other parties took place at the Plaza Hotel. Presentations featured live animals and Broadway-style spectaculars complete with confetti and chorus lines of dancers.

Indeed, as television evolved and networks had to fight harder for advertisers’ attention, the lavishness of an upfront presentation became inversely linked to a network’s fortunes (or lack thereof). What a network lacked in ratings, it tried to make up in passed hors d’oeuvres and party-favor panache.

Most of the big-ticket deals with advertisers were still struck in conference rooms over stale Chinese takeout, Mr. Brooks said. “It was a lot of money down the drain, but no one wanted to be the first one to stop doing it,” he said of the upfront parties. “Incrementally, they all started to pull back.”

The down economy in 2008 forced the networks to scale back even more. The iPod party favors disappeared, and the shrimp cocktail towers seemed a little skimpier, if they existed at all. ABC stopped hosting a party after its presentations, held at Lincoln Center’s Avery Fisher Hall.

Lately, the glamour has slowly returned, partly because of improving economic conditions and partly out of necessity. The big four broadcast networks — ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC — face more competition than ever. Cable channels and Web services like Hulu and YouTube hold their own elaborate upfronts and compete for the same advertising dollars.

In 2010, fourth-ranked NBC colored a flock of New York taxicabs in its peacock rainbow and hosted a luncheon that required 350 pounds of raw fish from the sushi restaurant Haru. This year NBC will return its event to Radio City Music Hall, after several years in a worn ballroom at the Hilton, and will offer about 800 guests evening appetizers and drinks at the expensive Italian restaurant Del Posto.

“There will be some peacocks present, but it will be subtle and understated,” said Francine Spray, vice president of events and operations at NBC.

CBS initially declined to comment on its upfront presentation and party. “We’re in a cone of silence,” said Phil Gonzales, a spokesman.

When pressed, Mr. Gonzales, after getting approval from senior executives, said that the CBS party held in a tent behind Lincoln Center would have an “elegant motif” and that the catering would feature pigs in a blanket, miniature cupcakes and sliders.

USA Network, one of the oldest and highest-rated cable channels, this year decided for the first time to hold its upfront the same week as its broadcast competitors’. Its event will feature a 125-foot red carpet with more than 50 actors from USA series stretched out along 66th Street, outside Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall. Waiters will be outfitted in “preppy chic” gingham polo shirts and slate-blue bow ties to fit in with the channel’s sunny shows like “White Collar” and “Royal Pains.”

“We wanted it to feel like a visual spectacle with a sense of awe at every touch point at every part of the event,” said Alexandra Shapiro, USA’s executive vice president of marketing and digital.

At the Fox party on Monday, the judges for the show “MasterChef,” Gordon Ramsay, Graham Elliot and Joe Bastianich, will personally serve a menu that includes organic salmon ceviche and a deconstructed Caesar salad accompanied by brioche Twinkies. An international dumpling station will include flavors like chicken mole.

“Having those three guys plan your menu really affects your budget,” Mr. Earley said. But, he added, “it puts the show front and center and helps awareness, so we think it’s worth it.”

Fox expects 2,300 guests to crowd under a tent featuring midcentury modern décor and set up over Central Park’s Wollman Rink. Tomiko Iwata, Fox’s senior vice president of creative services, said her team had spent over eight months planning the party, including a citywide doughnut tasting test. (They settled on using Dough in Brooklyn.)

Madison Avenue regulars said advertisers should feast on Fox’s veal meatballs with black truffles, Manhattan mules (a variation on the Moscow mule, which has vodka, ginger beer and lime) and steak tacos while they can, before the antiquated upfront ritual disappears.

The traditional 52-week TV schedule is less critical to advertisers than it used to be, in the days when General Motors signed on early to introduce a new Chevrolet during “Bewitched.”

“The world is changing at lightning speed, and we are still forced to make decisions for next year upfront?” said Bill Koenigsberg, the founder and chief executive of Horizon Media, a media planning and ad placement firm. “Down the road there will be less of a need to run to the altar before Memorial Day weekend.”

In the meantime, enjoy the doughnuts.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/14/bu..._r=1&ref=media

TV Notes
NBC Upfront Presentation Live Blog
By Nellie Andreeva, Deadline.com - May 14, 2012

Out of the Hilton Hotel ballroom and back into Radio City Music Hall, NBC is presenting its first schedule developed by chairman Bob Greenblatt and his team, which features four nights of comedy and a total of 10 half-hour series. The programming part of the presentation opened with a video featuring former SNL Weekend Update co-anchors Jimmy Fallon and Tina Fey previewing NBC's lineup for next fall set to them by Bob Greenblatt, who Fallon thought was the Asian judge on The Voice. The preview which constituted of the casts of such NBC series as Law & Order: SVU, The Office, Grimm, 30 Rock during musical versions of their shows, and, the highlight, Meet the Press anchor David Gregory belting out a tune surrounded by a group of showgirls.

The presentation kicked off with a performance by Smash stars Katharine McPhee and Megan Hilty and the emergence on the stage of the four Voice spinning chairs. They turned around to reveal series stars Christina Aguilera, Cee Lo Green and Adam Levine sitting in the first three and the NBC chairman Bob Greenblatt in the last.

Known for his love for Broadway, Greenblatt, for whom Smash has been a passion project, felt right in his element on the Radio City Music Hall stage. But he was quick to note that despite speculation, I'm not hijacking the network and turning everything into a musical.

Greenblatt presented the network's new shows in tandem with NBC entertainment president Jennifer Salke or, as Greenblatt referred to it, the next Channel 4 team.

They noted that new post-apocalyptic drama Revolution, which got the plum post-Voiceslot, was NBC's highest-testing drama pilot this year. If we didn't love it, we wouldn't put it there, Salke said.

She called the the Tuesday 9 PM comedy block of the Matthew Perry-starring Go On and Ryan Murphy's The New Normal distinctive classy and attention-grabbing comedies.

At the end of the fall lineup presentation, Greenblatt said that the network's priorities will be the Tuesday 9 PM and Monday 10 PM hours, but it was another new comedy series that stole today's show, the Justin Kirk-starring Animal Kingdom that airs on Wednesday. Kirk's sidekick on the show, a small monkey, which was in attendance at the presentation, was the highest-testing character on an upcoming NBC series, Salke said.

During the Thursday portion of the presentation, Greenblatt confirmed that, sans Mindy Kaling who has a new show on Fox, all other Office cast members will return next season.

Greenblatt's take-away point from the upfront NBC: Comedy is king. As for the actual presentation, it was music that reigned. In addition to the opening Smash opening number, it also featured a performance by the winner of The Voices second season and closed with another song from Smash. And keeping with the theme, Greenblatt's closing line to advertisers was was: I hope you head to the Fox presentation this afternoon thinking how Bob Greenblatt will turn NBC into one big musical.

http://www.deadline.com/2012/05/nbc-...ion-live-blog/

Q&A
Upfronts 2012: Joel McHale and Dax Shepard Tease Donald Trump, Diss Justin Bieber and Talk 'Community' and 'Parenthood'
By Jordan Zakarin, The Hollywood Reporter's 'Live Feed' Blog - May 14, 2012

Despite the early hour and dreary weather in New York, Joel McHale was all smiles on Monday, and with good reason: after the roller coaster ride that was the third season of his cult-hit comedy Community, showing up on the red carpet meant that the series would be returning for a fourth year. And given that the show was seemingly written off by NBC when it went on hiatus mid-season, only to be saved by internet activism, he knew just who to thank.

"Community fans I think are a special breed," he told The Hollywood Reporter. "They're like X-Men. They're mutants. They're more evolved than other human beings."

After discussing what he envisioned for his character, charismatic and grudgingly kind ex-lawyer Jeff Winger (on whether he'd graduate, he said, "My friends, and this is nothing to disparage the community colleges, but a lot of my friends took a little more than four years to get through"), McHale was joined by Dax Shepard, his friend and a star of another one of the networks' renewed shows, Parenthood.

As the pair spoke with THR, a few things became clear: they would love to guest on each other's shows (Shepard would want to play a headhunter from a for-profit college that tries to recruit Winger on Community, while McHale sees himself as a murderous gospel recording artist on Parenthood), and they share strong feelings on both Justin Bieber and Donald Trump.

"I saw the documentary [Never Say Never], fell so in love with him from the documentary," Shepard said, recalling his initial feelings about the 18-year old pop star. That led him to volunteering to direct an episode of Punk'd, hoping he'd appear with Bieber, but his luck came up short; while he helmed the episode, there was no Bieber in sight. And that was only the start of his seismic shift in feelings towards the young star.

"Now I hate Bieber because he rented a house behind our house, and now there's parties nonstop, and now there are paparazzi living everywhere around us," he said.

"This reminds me of the people in Damascus who were being shot at while trying to buy milk," McHale teased, and though he laughed, Shepard added, "it sounds like a trivial concern. But if you heard Bieber fans partying from midnight til four AM every night of the week, it really starts wearing on you. So I'm no longer a Bieber fan."

As for Trump, McHale made a radical charge: while he and Shepard have "the best shoulders on NBC," Trump's shoulders are prominent only because he has copious amounts of shoulder fat.

And if the real estate magnate were to appear on Community? "He'd play Chevy's [Chase] brother. Chevy's humble brother."

Read the entire conversation below:

THR: Congrats on the pickup.

McHale: Thank god, yes, I'm very happy.

THR: When did you find out?

McHale: Oh jeez, I found out on Thursday.

THR: Did you immediately sign on to Twitter and see everyone exploding in excitement?

McHale: Yeah, I mean my account went nuts. It blew my phone up. Thank you everyone who watches the show. Because without our fans - obviously, any show would be off the air - but Community fans I think are a special breed. They're like X-Men. They're mutants. They're more evolved than other human beings.

THR: When you guys went on hiatus this winter, did you expect you'd be standing here?

McHale: No, because I thought I was going to be a paraplegic. I thought I'd still be in the hospital. I'm doing a lot of cliff diving these days.

THR: So you've got 13 episodes, and we don't know if it's going to be the last season, but what do you want to see happen to Jeff? Graduation? What is your vision for him coming up.

McHale: Well, you know, I've always been kind of, when scripts are written, I trust the mind of Dan Harmon and the writers so implicitly that I'm always kind of like, I don't know where it's going to go, but I can't wait for it. So it's kind of like being in a hot air balloon; it's going to be hopefully beautiful while you're there. You know like, right now we've been expelled, and everyone's always going like, what's going to happen in four years, because you're gonna graduate?' My friends, and this is nothing to disparage the community colleges, but a lot of my friends took a little more than four years to get through. Having us stay longer than four years is not a difficult layup for Dan.

THR: You have lost a bunch of top creative people, so do you think you're going to have more of a say in the creative process? Would you?

McHale: Because I'm not in the writers' room and I don't spend the hours that they do writing the show, no. I would never presume to go like, we need to go to Sweden as a cast for this episode, dammit!'

[Donald Trump walks nearby.]

McHale: Look at Trump. Look at the hair. His hair is going to kill him.

THR: It's more the tan that bothers me, his spray tan.

McHale: Yeah, but his eyes, not tan. It looks like he's been on the side of a mountain or something.

[Dax Shepard then approaches, joining the conversation]

McHale: Look at this guy. Look at the coat. I don't even know who that is.

Shepard: Well, Caulfield Preparatory, and I think like Holden Caulfield.

THR: He also got kicked out of school.

McHale: He shot himself.

Shepard: Well, we don't know that, do we?

McHale: Didn't he commit suicide?

THR: Maybe in the future he jumps off a building?

Shepard: The Catcher in the Rye. What are you talking about? He didn't jump off a building.

McHale: Oh, wait, I'm talking about Anne of Green Gables.

Shepard: Oh, Anne of Green Gables. But how's this going?

McHale: I've talked about Parenthood for the past 20 minuets.

Shepard: Oh, I've been talking about Community. Let me talk about Community.

THR: [to Shepard] So, your character in Community, how would you like to see his arc go next season?

Shepard: I'd like to see him get a little more action.

McHale: Yeah!

Shepard: I think we could sex up the show with just a litany of whoever is hot currently.

McHale: We're gonna have those two guys from Smash who kissed come on Community and kiss.

Shepard: It's going to be a three-way kiss, Jersey Shore style.

McHale: Yes, and it'll be in Italy.

Shepard: Do you wanna come on Parenthood?

McHale: Yes! I would come on in a heartbeat.

Shepard: Okay. I'd come on your show in a heartbeat.

McHale: Dan Harmon, Dax Shepard would like to come on the show, and I'm all for it.

THR: Who would you play?

Shepard: I would play a guy who owns one of the strip mall colleges, I come in and I'm head hunting. I'd come in and try to wrangle you away. You like that? I'd be wining and dining you.

McHale: He'd be like a headhunter for other community colleges On Parenthood I could play

Shepard: You're a new recording artist who has to record at the Luncheonette and you somehow rip us off or something.

McHale: I seem like I'm a really good guy but it turns out it's dark.

Shepard: It turns out you're doing some kind of religious-themed album, so our guard is down.

McHale: Like I run a cult? Maybe I'm like, this is going great, we just need one human life, for this to be the greatest selling album of all time.

THR: Put the blood in the recording mix.

McHale: That sounds great, I love it.

Shepard: I'd come in to find you sacrificing.

McHale: And I'd be like Oh oh oh, hey! Whoa!' I'm putting a knife away, I'm pantomiming.

Shepard: I don't think there's any doubt that Joel and I have the nicest shoulders on NBC.

McHale: Yeah, without any doubt.

THR: I don't know, Trump's right there, he's got some shoulders.

McHale: That's shoulder fat, not shoulder.

Shepard: Wait, Trump is here?

McHale: Right behind you. [Impersonating Trump] I am giving the most fabulous interview to TV Guide, the most fabulous, stupendous thing that has ever happened.

THR: If you had Trump on both your shows, who would he play?

McHale: Oh, he would definitely play Chevy's brother. Chevy's humble brother.

Shepard: And likewise he would play Craig T. Nelson's brother on Parenthood... Shepard: You know that 30-for-30 sports thing they do?

THR: On Coach?

Shepard: The one on the NFL spinoff league that Trump owned two teams in.

McHale: Not the XFL.

Shepard: No USFL? Yeah. There's a 30-for-30 about that. He owned two teams in the USFL and there's all this footage of him from the 70s and 80s. He was actually good looking.

McHale: Look at his daughter. She's beautiful.

Shepard: Let's take a long look at his daughter.

McHale: Didn't they pay like Marshall Faulk like $1 million in that league or something?

Shepard: Herschel Walker.

McHale: Herschel Walker, yes.

Shepard: He played for him.

McHale: They paid him a ton of dough, and it didn't work out.

Shepard: Some things you can't buy your way into success.

McHale: Remember the ABA?

THR: They merged with the NBA.

Shepard: That was a happy ending.

McHale: The ABA used multi-colored balls.

Shepard: White and red.

McHale: I couldn't tell between the ABA and the Harlem Globe Trotters.

[Peter Krause from Parenthood comes by.]

Krause: I just heard you're doing Punk'd, it's scaring us down the line. We've got to watch our backs.

Shepard: I already did it, I'm done.

McHale: You did what?

Shepard: I did an episode of Punk'd this year.

McHale: The new one? The Bieber Punk'd?

THR: Did Bieber punk you?

Shepard: No no, I was directing an episode.

McHale: Did Bieber give you notes?

Shepard: Bieber wasn't around. But it's funny - I know you're joking, but I sincerely ended up on that show because of Bieber. Because I saw the documentary, fell so in love with him from the documentary, called Jason Goldberg and said, I heard Bieber is going to be your host on Punk'd, I want to pass him the torch.' He said awesome, we'll do that. Then I ended up in an episode by myself, no Bieber.

THR: He showed you up.

Shepard: He didn't show me up. I just got bamboozled by the brass at Punk'd. I got promised an episode with Bieber. But now I hate Bieber because he rented a house behind our house, and now there's parties nonstop, and now there are paparazzi living everywhere around us.

McHale: Man, Dax, you guys have problems.

Shepard: We have big, big problems.

McHale: This reminds me of the people in Damascus who were being shot at while trying to buy milk.

Shepard: Yeah, quite similar. On par, for sure.

McHale: Did he really rent behind you?

Shepard: Yeah, it sounds like a trivial concern. But if you heard Bieber fans partying from midnight til four AM every night of the week, it really starts wearing on you. So I'm no longer a Bieber fan.

THR: You would think most of his fans have curfews.

McHale: You must live in a pretty incredible neighborhood to have the Biebs behind you.

Shepard: Yeah, I live in a nice neighborhood.

McHale: I saw your wife at Gelson's [supermarket], and she lectured me about getting plastic bags.

Shepard: She did. That's very her.

McHale: Totally lectured me.

Shepard: She was probably carrying around our big, green Costco bags.

McHale: Yeah, and I think I had a whole roasted chicken, and I was like, would you like some? And she said no, I'm a vegetarian, and I'm like, there's a surprise!

Shepard: Do you live by there?

McHale: I live right above there.

Shepard: What's your address?

McHale: Canyon. They found that head and hand in the park.

THR: Were you a suspect?

McHale: Look, I got fingered if you know what I mean, I was of interest - while I was being fingered.

Shepard: But never directly implicated.

McHale: But your life is lovely, let me say that.

Shepard: She's the greatest of all time.

McHale: That run she did on [Late Late Show with Craig] Ferguson was awesome, in Paris.

Shepard: I think she's been on that show now in the 40s. She's done on the show like 40-something times.

McHale: It makes me mad at Craig now because I haven't been on that much.

Shepard: I've only been on two or three times.

THR: He's an elitist?

Shepard: No, he's a perv. He just likes young, hot girls.

McHale: Whoa. I don't know what's pervy about that.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/liv...-bieber-323983

Business Notes
Hard Time: Liquor Advertising Pours Into TV
Looser Restrictions, Raft of Launches Lead More Booze Brands to the Tube
By E.J. Schultz, Advertising Age - May 14, 2012

Sold in the U.S. for decades, Jägermeister could be found in most bars but never on TV. That changed this month when the imported German cordial took the plunge, breaking the first TV ad in its history.

"We felt that it was important to speak to our core consumer [of 21- to 29-year-old men], and in order to do so we needed to have a presence on television," said Amanda Blanco, brand manager for Jägermeister and VP at Sidney Frank Importing Co.

In doing so, Jägermeister followed what lately has seemed like a stampede of liquor brands to TV as marketers seek broad awareness for product launches or to build new buzz on old brands.

One reason for the new interest is that broadcast networks have loosened their rules, creating more opportunities for national buys. CBS, for instance, began accepting liquor ads during late-night programming within the last year. ABC has been taking hard-booze during "Jimmy Kimmel Live" for several months. And this spring, NBC began accepting spirits shows airing after 11 p.m.

Eastern as long as 90% of the audience is of legal drinking age. (Industry self-regulations allow beer, wine or liquor ads only on programs where at least 71.6% of the audience is 21 or older.) More broadcast deals are "in the works," one industry insider told Ad Age.

TV grabbed $142 million in advertising from liquor brands in 2010, or about 34% of all media spending by the category. That's up from $102 million and 23% just five years earlier, according to the latest data available provided to Ad Age by the Distilled Spirits Council of the U.S. (Discus), a liquor trade group. Magazines led with a 41% share, though that was down from 58% in 2005.

Liquor brands' TV spending fell to a little more than $141 million last year, according to Kantar Media. But it seems poised to grow again in 2012 as a host of products roll out TV campaigns, from Skinnygirl Cocktails to Wild Turkey, a 157-year-old bourbon brand that this month introduced its first TV spot, "Give "Em the Bird."

Liquor ads did not appear on any TV, national or local, for much of the 20th century, with the industry honoring a self-imposed ban from 1948 to 1996. Crown Royal, then owned by Seagram, broke the seal that year with a spot that aired in Corpus Christie, Texas. A growing number of TV affiliates have begun taking ads in recent years, and marketers have found more opportunities on cable networks such as Comedy Central, E! and ESPN. Cable still gets more than 90% of the spending, according to Kantar.

But the new acceptance from broadcast networks is a victory for the spirits industry, which has sought parity with beer and wine since it lifted the ban.

"Just as the federal government doesn't distinguish between beer and wine and spirits, [so] most of these broadcasters are recognizing that alcohol is alcohol," said Frank Coleman, senior VP of Discus.

TV is benefiting from aggressive innovations as marketers seek awareness on fresh offerings such as flavored whiskeys and other line extensions.

"The way to talk about a new product broadly and uniquely is TV, because it's efficient," said Kevin George, chief marketing officer at Beam Inc. And marketers are moving to TV even as they spend more on digital.

After pulling most TV advertising a few years ago, Beam is back in strength. It's dedicating 43% of its brand investment to TV in 2012, up from 34% last year. In the past year, Beam has put five brands on TV for the first time, including Maker's Mark, which launched a campaign last year on Discovery Channel paired with digital content on discovery.com. The buy was expanded this year to TNT, TBS, TRU and the History Channel.

Later this month, Beam will introduce its first TV campaign for Skinnygirl, a lower-calorie, ready-to-serve cocktail line, including offerings like White Cranberry Cosmo and Margarita.

Diageo-owned Captain Morgan rum was the biggest liquor TV advertiser last year, spending $17 million, according to Nielsen. (That's still a far cry from the nation's biggest beer brand, Bud Light, which spent more than $230 million on TV in 2011, according to Kantar Media.) The campaign, which launched about a year ago, put the iconic character on TV for the first time, casting him in the 1600s as real-life privateer Captain Henry Morgan.

While the effort includes plenty of digital, "TV was a great place to launch that idea and tell the story in a compelling and visually stimulating way," said Diageo spokesman Dan Sanborn. In a move to reach more Hispanics, the marketer made a major upfront buy last year on Univision Communication's Galavision cable network for brands such as Ketel One and Johnnie Walker, as well as on every Univision-owned and -operated station. Diageo expects to continue the relationship this year.

Even brands that swore off TV are back.

Take Brown-Forman's Southern Comfort. It moved to an all-digital strategy in 2009, telling Ad Age then that it was having a hard time breaking through the spirits brands crowded into a few nightly cable shows. But SoCo returned to TV in 2010 and 2011 to launch lime- and pepper-flavored versions.

The brand's TV investment will grow this year, a spokesman said, because "we've seen increased consumer response during the time periods when we are on air."

http://adage.com/article/news/hard-t...urs-tv/234733/