ABC and Showtime interested in picking up Arrested Development

[B Dids]

Christ.

So this year, Stacked is getting the best ratings?

Everybody must pay.

[Aloysius]

Dids - 2004/05 was last season (ending May 2005). This season is 2005/06. Sorry that might've been confusing. Stacked is doing OK this season, and as noted above AD on pace to do much worse in 2005/06. My "WTF Stacked?" referencing last year's performance, and somewhat this season's current performance.

-Al

[B Dids]

So that was last season, when it preimiered, what's the avg rating for a new show? I assume for most shows that bomb- their best night is going to be their first?

[Soul Daddy]

[ QUOTE ]
This season, AD is on pace to do much worse than 2004/05

[/ QUOTE ]
Could that not be absolutely attributable to its new time slot? Was it considerably less of a loss to run with last season's ratings.?

[Aloysius]

Dids - yeah for failed series (ones that get cancelled in a season or 2) usually premiere night is its highest rating (sometimes week-to-week competition changes, and a failed series will have a better second airing, but as a rule of thumb pretty true).

Hence, as you point out, Stacked looking so good in 2004/05, with its premiere night weighted in there. (I don't think it has bested its premiere night ratings to-date.)

In general, an absolute avg. rating of new show < important than how it fares against the competition that night. That's why a show might have an overall final nielsen ranking that's not so great, but could be winning its time slot (or coming in 2nd or something) and we're ok with it. Things like this, as well as random senior mangement tastes, strong demos in niche audiences, nothing else to air, etc., keep low-rated (which always means unprofitable, but the question is how unprofitable?) series on the air.

For 2005/06, all Fox sitcoms look off last year's pace and should do worse... bad news for them.

-Al

[pryor15]

[ QUOTE ]
For 2005/06, all Fox sitcoms look off last year's pace and should do worse... bad news for them.

[/ QUOTE ]

if Fox's ratings are off across the board, then could it be a problem that's less AD and more Fox?

I would think the potential cost of finding and producing a new series would outweigh what Fox is losing by keeping AD and promoting it, since i'm sure there's a ratio of pilots to actual shows and all those pilots cost money. Especially when you consider the critical acclaim, DVD sales and potential for syndication.

i know film libraries are quite valuable to studios, so i'd think having enough eps of AD that they could air it over the next, say, 20 years on cable would be a pretty strong argument to at least keep it long enough to get there. what are they, 2 or 3 seasons away?

or am i way off?

[Aloysius]

SoulDaddy - the move from Sundays at 9pm to Mondays at 8m definitely had an impact on overall ratings. Last year ended at a 2.8, this year probably comes in around 2.2 or so, ~20% drop off. Is it safe to assume at Sundays at 9pm AD would stay at similar ratings level? I think so.

However - Fox was unhappy with those Sunday ratings. Just because AD stays on at Sundays, doesn't necessarily diminish the chances it get cancelled. AD's ratings last year were boosted by strong lead-ins (Simpsons, etc.) when compared to this year, where it has no lead-in.

Fox had high expectations (due to Emmy, and of course high price tag). That I think was a main driver for AD's move to Monday - they thought it could break out and establish itself as an achor show. Rather, AD had to do this, in order to stay on the air. So it had no lead-in, but it also had less stiff timeslot competition on Mondays. AD fell woefully short of expectations.

Main question is - did AD get a fair shot this year to be a hit? Sampling numbers from Monday night's AD performances (the number of people who tune-in) are pretty high. Similar to Sunday's numbers. It just has no retention. People simply do not want to watch this show. That's why it has bad ratings. Bad ratings on Monday. Better (but still bad) ratings on Sunday.

So while the ratings drop off is definitely attributable in part to the timeslot switch, I don't think it has a material impact on its staying on the air. And hey, the people have spoken - and they are retarded.

Sidenote: for its primetime Fall Launch, Fox is always kinda screwed because of baseball - especially for a serialized show like AD. Kills the momentum for a series to go away for like a month, especially while other nets get to air their stuff and build an audience.

-Al

[B Dids]

I would also guess that for a more serialized show like AD, moving timeslots is probably a worse idea than for shows that have eps that stand alone.

[Aloysius]

Pryor - Yes, there is probably alot of pressure on Fox's comedy development people right now, as they need new comedies badly. Then again, all the networks do.

The industry ratio for pilots produced that are picked up for series is around 5:1 or so for comedies. This would mean cancelling AD would require about 5 pilots produced. If AD is losing $, say $1m an episode or so (probably more), then it is way cheaper to produce those 5 pilots (cost of producing a pilot, script talent everything, not that high). You are also getting another at-bat and might make some $ off the replacement series, vs. def. losing $ with AD.

Fox must look at the syndication value (and any other value of AD, on-line, VOD, of course DVD) in making their decision. It's just that AD might not command alot in the syndication market (serialized shows do not sell well, e.g. Alias, self-contained eps much better e.g. L&O), and DVD sales might not be great enough to bring the series to profitability.

Even if Fox could be profitable on a nominal basis if it got AD to syndication, they'll be taking a P/(L) hit up front waiting for ancillary market revenues to flow in. They might not want to do that for budgeting reasons / management pressure.

-Al

[Aloysius]

Dids - yeah... I think you're right, I'm sure research would back that up makes sense to me that moving serialized shows around is much worse than procedural (self-contained).

While it's true Monday night audiences rejected AD (this is indisputable), maybe there's a chance that AD could've grown its audience on Sundays. Personally, I think they should've just kept it on Sundays, and hoped they could get a hit that way. It was probably asking too much of a series to break out on a new night with no lead-in.

-Al

Edit - OK I'm done now... not surprising 2+2'ers smarter / ask better questions about the biz than people I work with...