Come October 2000,
there will be 19 returning comedy hits on
network television. 19 you say? Isn't that number a bit low? That is,
after all, only 8.5 hours of tv out of the 101 that the big 6 shoot
at
viewers every week. Surely there are more than that.
The sad truth is that
there isn't. The number of comedies on network
tv has slid to near record lows lately, so the sitcom hits are far
and few
between. There are obvious ones like Friends & Frasier, but not
so obvious
ones such as Moesha and The Steve Harvey Show. But it's the flops that
really stick out like a sore thumb.
After all, how did
3rd Rock From The Sun manage to get back on
the schedual? The show has been declining for 5 seasons and finished
last
year in 93rd place with a paltry 8.3 million viewers. Yet it made the
cut,
winding up on Monday at 8:30, paired with sophmore Daddio.
That's the conundrum
of network tv. Comedies that should be
cancelled aren't. Norm (57 last season), Two Guys & A Girl (59)
and The
Hughleys (93) all survived. But The Grown Ups (127), a show that slipped
only slightly from The Parkers (123), got dumped. Not speaking on quality,
But ratings wise it may not have been such a sound decision.
Confidence in sitcoms is slipping
Thanks to irrational
renewals and cancellations, confidence in
sitcoms is near an all time low. Only 44 sitcoms are on the schedual
for
next season, down from 45 last season, 50 in 98/99, and 60 the season
before that. Yep, a quarter of all sitcom spots are now extinct. Sure,
you
can say that Who Wants To Be A Millionaire had a part in that, but
it only
resulted in the cancellation of 4 shows. It's clear that the sitcom
is dead,
at least temporarily.
And on top of all
this, the sitcom looks to be in even more trouble
this year thanks to the renewal of weaklings. Don't expect 3rd Rock
& Daddio
to stick around for long on Mondays, and unless Two Guys & A Girl
and Norm
can do a ratings miracle, ABC's Friday slate will be gone by the end
of the
season. CBS has never had luck airing sitcoms on Wendesday at 8, and
this
year it's airing two rookies. And despite the bewitching power Sabrina
had on ABC, don't expect it to carry over to the WB, where expections
of
the show are much higher.
It is not unreasonable
to predict the demise of these sitcom blocks.
So what would that leave network tv with 32 sitcoms, compromising just
15.8%
of the schedual. It is perhaps more frightening to mention that live
action
sitcoms would make up even less than that, at 28 shows or 13.8% of
what's
on.
Dramas on the rise
The number of sitcom
seasons (the combined number of sitcom's
individual seasons. ie- King of Queens = 1.0; Grapevine = 0.2), went
from 50.8 on the big 6 nets in 1998/99 to just 40.9 last season. That
was
a decrease of 20 percent in just one year. With a tightened pool, ratings
should have increased, right? Nope. The average rating went from 10.0
million viewers in 98/99 to 9.5 million last season. Meanwhile, the
number
of drama seasons went from 35.7 in 98/99 to 40.7 last season, nearly
toppling sitcoms. But don't forget, drama's last an hour. So in reality,
dramas nearly doubled the amount of airtime sitcoms got.
As sitcoms grow older...
But this problem is
not new. It all stems back to the networks
inability to launch a big sitcom and revitalize faith in the genre.
The
last one with a strong start was last seasons Malcolm In The Middle,
but
you have to go back to Cosby in 1996 to find a sitcom that got the
numbers
on it's own, without help from a lead-in nor lead-out.
And the average age
of today's hit sitcoms continues to spiral
upwards. Friends, tv's highest rated sitcom, is going into it's 7th
season,
Frasier into its 8th, and 3rd Rock into its 6th. Over on ABC, The Drew
Carey
Show is in it's 6th, Spin City in it's 5th, and Dharma & Greg in
its 4th.
On CBS the story is somewhat better. Everybody Loves Raymond is starting
it's 5th in September, King of Queens it's 3rd, the same as Becker.
The
real disaster is on Fox, where it's biggest, most profitable show,
The
Simpsons will start it's 12th (!) season in September. Even King of
The Hill
will be going into its 5th.
In fact, on the big
4, the average age of returning sitcoms is 4.6
years. Considering most big sitcoms last 8 years these days, it's doesn't
take a genius to figure out that means the retuners are now more than
middle
aged. And if there isn't a slew of new hits this season, the average
age
will be pushed up to well over 5 years.
New Hits This Season?
Only a handful of new
shows are getting slots that insure their
survival. Geena (Tuesday 9:30, ABC) has a slot to die for, but so did
Sports Night, and that show got nowhere fast. The Steven Weber Show
(Thursday 8:30, NBC) also has a killer slot, but Jesse also proved
that it
was possible to lose a huge chunk of Friends' audience. And a few sitcoms
have hype. The Bette Show (CBS) starring who else? and Don't Ask (Fox),
starring John Goodman as a gay dad (!), both are doing well in the
hype
department. But don't look too fast, they're up against each other
at 8pm
on Wednesday night. Both, however, are likely to be crushed by Millionaire
on ABC.
Another show with
a decent slot is Yes, Dear (Monday 8:30, CBS).
It just may prove to be the bridge between King of Queens & Everybody
Loves
Raymond that Ladies Man wasn't. But the show also co-stars Mike O'Malley,
who more than proved that he was worthless on his own show last fall.
Despite it's post Will & Grace slot, it was canned after just two
episodes.
The other new sitcoms
all have one thing in common: crappy slots.
People Who Fear People & Madigan Men will flop on Friday for ABC,
while
Welcome to New York will have a hard time holding Bette's little audience
on CBS. So where does all this leave the sitcom next season?
The Future
It leaves the genre
waiting. Fewer sitcoms means a better choice of
writers for the sitcoms that remain. (The Good News: perhaps the writers
responsible for Suddenly Susan & Veronicas Closet will never find
work
again) As the quality of the remaining sitcoms improves, more viewers
could
be drawn back into the laughs, and thus putting in a greater demand
for
sitcoms. The important thing to remember is that it's a cycle. And
while
dramas may be chic right now, in a few years another "Friends" will
come
along that will make us fall in love with comedies once again.
But until that day
comes, I'm sticking with Third Watch & Felicity,
thank you very much. Sorry Ms. Middler.