NBC to Continue to Go Cheap with Leno on Five Nights

Reported on at least three distinct places now, is the fact that Jay Leno will be on 5 nights a week, come next year, but at ten in the evening. This means that people will get to see Leno at 10,  catch the monologue, Jay walking, and the like, and be in bed by 10:30 – this will be a hit in the farm belt, but I doubt it will charm anywhere else.

Let’s face it, Leno’s charm is in his joke telling, and the ability to work a routine, such as Jaywalking, Headlines, and other schtick. His up close and personal interviewing skills are lacking in a big way, and the less bleary audience of 10 PM will get this right away. It won’t work for long.

It also shows that NBC is giving up on new programming, putting the programming choices off on the production staff that Leno has for the new slot. Just because NBC has had junk on at 10PM lately doesn’t mean that no one will watch in that time slot any more, it means that the networks have to compete with premium and cable choices, which have become much more innovative, and are certainly miles above the quality of the garbage on the Shrinking 3 networks. For example, look at the re-runs of Monk, aired on NBC lately. Monk is one of the best shows on television, and it was put on USA, as though it was a second rate show, instead of NBC prime time. Now, if the show is not doing well on Sunday nights, it is less because of the quality of the show, and more because the viewing audience has probably seen it on USA a few seasons ago.

The dolts who are in the top slots on the Shrinking 3 are as stupid about television as the pinheads who run GM, Ford, and Chrysler are about cars. They simply aren’t willing to break out of that 70’s, before the advent of cable, mentality, and realize that there is much more competition than ever before. This means that the idea of a hit show needs to be re-tooled. Smaller numbers are to be expected. But all is not lost. Look at how TBS has had some great hits lately (10 items or less, Frank TV) , and FX as well (Nip/Tuck, Damages), and these shows don’t cost as much as the typical Shrinking 3 show. This doesn’t even include the great stuff that NBC ‘hides’ on its cable counterparts, USA and Sci-Fi. Monk is a hit, plain and simple, Burn Notice would do well on NBC, just as Psych could find a home on the regular airwaves.

Why has no one at NBC seen this? I regularly answer e-mails from NBC about my viewing habits, and have made it clear that I watch little to no shows on NBC proper, but am watching USA and Sci-Fi almost half the time I watch television. Is no one reading this? I am not alone, as I know others that respond in kind. It is not as though we are part of some small enclave – I have spoken to others, over a wide range of social situations, and the feelings are essentially the same.

CBS has already given up on Saturday nights, with re-runs of the week shown there, now NBC gives up on 10PM – the Shrinking 3 are ruining themselves. The top execs kvetch about the profits drying up, but do nothing about it. The Leno move is akin to owning a restaurant, having customers dwindle because your ‘signature meal’ is judged poor, so you shrink the menu to include only your signature meal.

NBC deserves what it gets. CBS is already farther down the path, and ABC can’t get their stuff together, because it doesn’t know whether it wants to have ‘family shows’ that no one watches (because they are already watching the Disney or Hallmark channels) or something edgier, that might occasionally get a complaint.

The Shrinking 3 of television will mirror the shrinking 3 of Detroit, but there will be no bailout here.

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