Smash moving to Saturday nights- Page 2

[Wynbish]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 9:33pm

But Doctor Who is coming back on March 30th for 1st of 8 new shows...

My loyalty is with the Doc, but I'm DVRing Smash.

Saturday nights, for me, used to be Snick night on TV

[beensince1987]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 9:39pm

I am DVRing Smash too but Sat nite is all BBCAmerica for me with Nerdist and Black Orphans (which looks interesting) so I will watch Smash a day or two later

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 9:40pm

I don't think reality programming taking over network tv is necessarily a bad thing. There are plenty of other channels to watch quality scripted programming. Do you think Mad Men, American Horror Story, Homeland or the Dallas reboot would be half the shows they are on network tv? Even sweeter/teen shows can thrive on cable like Bunheads and Pretty Little Liars.

And to say all reality tv is a flash in the pan that audiences will grow bored of simple isn't true. Survivor, Amazing Race and Big Brother have some of the loyalest viewers. Especially Suvivor and TAR which consistently get in 2.4-2.8s in the market shares. And they have both fall and spring seasons!

Let network tv be Dancing With Stars, Idol and The Voice. There's a place for all programming. The sad thing is all the potential was wasted on NBC when it could have had 6 seasons on Showtime and truly been great, great television.

[mikem]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 10:01pm

I'm in the "glass half full" camp. The move to Saturday nights means that NBC is essentially giving up on the show. Saturday night is the lowest rated night of the week, so the ratings will probably go down even more. But it's not a big ratings hit for NBC to air the entire season on Saturdays, so we will see the whole season.

NBC is in big trouble in general. It was actually the No. 1 network in the fall, largely thanks to football, The Voice, and Revolution being the highest-rated new show, but it has completely cratered since then with all three now off the air. In the February sweeps, it actually came in fifth, not just behind CBS, ABC, and Fox, but also behind Univision, the Spanish-language network. That's the first time that Univision has EVER beat out one of the Big Four networks in February.

And it's not because Univision was so popular. NBC went from a 2.9 rating in the 18-49 age group in November to 1.2 in February. That is a really horrible rating. (For comparison, ABC, CBS, and Fox were all at least 1.7, so NBC is at least 30% lower than any of them.)

Updated On: 3/13/13 at 10:01 PM

[James885]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 10:23pm

I'm not a Smash fan, but I think it's a blessing in disguise for the fans that NBC is actually moving it to Saturdays and airing the rest of the season. If Smash was on any other network than NBC it probably would'n't have even seen a second season.

At least this way the fans of the show can have a little closure.

[BrodyFosse123]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 10:27pm

Yup. Its over, folks. A friend who worked on the crew of Season 2 of SMASH just got the word that there won't be a Season 3. Now he's back to the job hunt during what should have been his hiatus.

[yankeefan7]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 11:31pm

Very sad there will not be a Season 3 because I do enjoy the show. I understood from the beginning that a show about Broadway was fighting the odds against other network programming. In addition, the majority of the music was orignal songs so it was not like GLEE which basically did their version of known hit songs which the audience knew already. Like others, glad they will at least let all the episodes air and give the show a series finale. I am willing to bet that the show will end with "Bombshell" winning the Tony for Best Musical.

[FireFingers]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 11:35pm

At least they aren't Firefly-ing us and showing the rest of the series.

[beensince1987]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 11:39pm

How is SNL's ratings these days? Maybe if Smash follows SNL, then more people (at least 18-49) might watch it on 1am.

[ucjrdude902]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 11:41pm

What time will it air on Saturdays?

[Bettyboy72]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 11:46pm

I don't think a show about Broadway is a gamble. I think most would say its a brilliant concept. I think it's too bad the writing sucked and the focus was completely lost. That's the true shame. All that money and talent wasted.

[beensince1987]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 11:48pm

I believe it will be at 9pm

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 11:51pm

Ah, multiple threads. So confusing...

"what the hell is NBC thinking why aren't they keeping this put so it can be behind The Voice in two weeks? If they think its to keep Revolutions numbers up, that show better not crash and burn."

As, I think Whizzer, or someone implied in the other thread, The View still gets pretty strong numbers, one of the few NBC shows that does (and I doubt that will change this season.) They obviously see it at this point as a waste to use it to bump a show they don't intend to continue and want to try to have other shows take advantage of the spot (so that next year when they move it away from The Voice it will crash as well.....)

I think Revolution will drop hugely in the ratings. It was a minor hit, but a similarly hyped NBC sci fi serial, The Event was an even biger hit--it went on the SAME hiatus half way through that Revolution did, the audiences had all lost interest, and it was canceled. Watch history repeat itself.

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 11:54pm

"As much as I'd like to get 6 more seasons of Smash, this is better than going the Do No Harm route. Even if Eva Longoria's dating show pulls in the exact same ratings as Smash, it has to be a fraction of the cost to produce. "

Apparently Do No Harm was very expensive (though I doubt it would have been as expensive as Smash.) They did hype the premier a lot, but the second episode had sub-Smash ratings, and more importantly I guess they had only shot two other episodes. Smash, in a way, was lucky to wait till Feb to come back since NBC had already paid for the majority of the episodes, if not all, by the time this happened.

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 3/13/13 at 11:55pm

Bettyboy is right, I think. A show about Broadway wasn't the issue. No one tuned into Dallas or Dynasty because they were interested in the oil industry, and when the plot did focus on Ewing Oil or Denver Carrington it was believable AND entertaining.

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 3/14/13 at 12:30am

Whizzer said, in reply to why NBC in particular is failing:

"I really think the best thing for NBC to do is wipe the slate clean and start from the ground up with a new schedule. Show the public that they have changed and present the public with a clear vision of where the network is going."

I agree with all you say. Just a few things--I think NBC actually has tried to find an identity and it's been the wrong one.

They've had trouble for YEARS now--at least five or so--the MustSeeTV era is a decade old and has been thriving off good will for ages. I mean when The Office is now their top comedy--and I don't know anybody still watching and it (wisely) is ending, they're in trouble.

Tartikoff turned NBC, which was extremely low rated in the 70s, around in the 80s (ironically partly by putting his faith in non-hits like Cheers and Hill StreetBlues and being patient and then building hits like Cosby Show). After a few successful followup execs, in 2001 NBC began having serious issues again, with Jeff Zucker overseeing the whole NBC head. They had a lot of things that seemed like hits and then crashed and burned (Heroes) or big profile misfires (like Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip--the Smash of its time--and Joey), and only gained some traction with cult hits like Office.

Zucker finally left after the whole Tonight Show/Conan/Jay debacle, and Robb Greenblatt, whio had done so well exec producing shows like Six Feet Under on HBO and then heading Showtime had caused them to rival HBOwas brought in (and he brought Smash which was in development with him.) Greenblatt can be brilliant, but I think his sense just doesn't work for the current network tv situation.

NBC has been overall more ambitious under him than the other networks--a block of quirky "cult" audience type comedies, high concept shows that would work better on cable (everything from Playboy Club to, well Smash or Do No Harm)He attempted to bring back old-school sitcoms with flops like Are You There Vodka, Whitney and Guys with Kids. Had a huge hit with The Voice but not so much with other reality attempts--their only successful new drama really is Chicago Fire which is stylistically a throwback (and Revolution to a lesser extent but I see that crashing and burning...)

As whizeer said, I think it's just that now people look to cable for these, for lack of a better term, "novelistic" serialized drams. Many people I know don't trust the networks in the first place with high concept serials and say they won't start watching until thesecond season when they know it won'tbe canceled before a n ending is shown (which of course means less people watch and it gets canceled.)

Also, I don't think it's even so much that cable can have more explicit content. With these current shows network tv wants to attract the loyal, cult audience cable shows get with more complex stories, different concepts, etc--but they still need to at the same time appeal to the broadest audience possible to get the advertisers. And it just simply rarely works (Lost's success got everyone excited to do sci fi serials, but they largely all forgot that Lost's pilot was mainly about survivors of a plane crash--something many people can relate to, at least in their imagination--vs doing a serial about some weird mystery around clocks or aliens from the opening scene.) It also means that so many people have to give story approval, etc, that the product ends up more often than not watered down. I don't think Smash on Showtime, where it had much of the same creative team attached, would have been necesarrily better, but I am sure that aspect played a part in what we got.

But yeah, NBC's attempt at having a "cable-lite" identity is not working. CBS has its procedurals. ABC is doing relatively well with soap-lite series (though they have not had the type of success that Lost and Desperate Housewives brought them, but Scandal seems to be bringing in the Grey's Anatomy audience, and Revenge could still pull through despite its mess of a season). CW needs only to bring in its very loyal, young female audience (which they've broadened this year to more males with Arrow) to survive.

But network scripted programming, at least anything that's particularly interesting in concept is pretty much DOA.

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 3/14/13 at 12:56am

Beensince, it makes zero sense to air it after Sat Night Live (I'm not sure the Nielsons would even bother recording the ratings,) although SNL is doing better than last year and is one of NBC's stronger performers...

"Do you think Mad Men, American Horror Story, Homeland or the Dallas reboot would be half the shows they are on network tv?"

And look at Dallas this season--a lot of fans have been unhappy creatively and they are averaging 2.9 mill (last year they averaged 5 mill), though like many cable stations I don't know the demos.

[broadwayfever]

Posted: 3/14/13 at 1:31am

Every single show on NBC's Tuesday lineup is failing. If anything they should've led off with Smash instead of Off their Rockers.

I'm just glad we're going to be able to see the entire season.

[jayinchelsea]

Posted: 3/14/13 at 8:33am

It really is like watching a weekly train wreck, and wondering how much worse the writing is going to get before it implodes. But we do keep watching it...

[yankeefan7]

Posted: 3/14/13 at 8:46am

EricMontreal22 - It seems FOX can make quality series that last like "24", "House", "Bones" and to some extent "Glee".

[yankeefan7]

Posted: 3/14/13 at 8:54am

Whizzer - Just a quick question. Do you think the general public who has a casual interest in Broadway really knows how accurate the show potrays Broadway or even cares. It is different on this board because there are plenty of people who are in the industry and know better. IMO - the main problem this show has had was that it did all of these sub plots last year with Julia which took focus away from what people wanted to see (a show trying to make it to Broadway). They started this year with focusing on Jennifer Hudson instead of what they are doing currently which everyone likes much better.

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 3/14/13 at 9:20am

yankeefan, I agree that the general public doesn't really care how accurately Broadway is depicted on Smash. That's why I brought about the examples of Ewing Oil and Denver Carrington. No one cared if that was really the way an oil company was run. We didn't watch saying, "Oh come on! Blake would never have done that with Rashid Achmed!" What was amazing was how they tied the business side of these shows in with the more melodramatic plotlines.

I disagree with you a bit that the show people wanted to see was watching Bombshell go to Broadway. Bombshell and Broadway should have been to Smash what the oil industry was to Dynasty and Dallas. It's a very important backdrop that propels the plot forward, but shows/soaps should always be about characters.

The melodramatic plots shouldn't be eliminated- they were just handled so poorly last year. Take Dev and his White House press secretary love interest. It was so clumsily handled and we didn't care about her character at all. She was trying to steal Karen's man, but we couldn't even root for her in a fun Heather Locklear on Melrose sort of way.

I don't think accuracy in show is as important as believability, and there is a big difference. I'm sure if you watched ER with doctors and nurses they could point out a million inaccuracies, but when I watched that show felt real and believable, even when it got a little crazy. With Smash, co-workers and other non-theater interested friends has expressed that the show feels like an unbelievable mess. I think most audiences will go along with something if they feel like they are presented with a strong vision of the truth, and they can believe in the reality created by the writers. Unfortunately Smash never quite succeeded here.

[ClydeBarrow]

Posted: 3/14/13 at 9:24am

[suestorm]

Posted: 3/14/13 at 9:26am

im not into country but i love the show NASHVILLE. unftly the show must be sick expensive to produce so bringing in another brainless reality dating show is cheaper. i guess NBC is turning into another Bravo or E!

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 3/14/13 at 9:38am

I also don't care for country music and LOVE Nashville. The songs are great and the drama is so addicting! We see how Nashville supposedly works- people are writing songs, albums are recorded, arena concert tours are planned- but these are just the background for the real interest on the show which is the human relationships.