Post by mandyblue on May 2, 2014 1:23:45 GMT -5
Prime-time shows are finding that Fridays are fine
Bill Keveney, USA TODAY 5:23 p.m. EDT May 1, 2014
Once a dumping ground for shows on the way out, the time slot is picking up now.
Prime-time TV is showing signs of life on Friday.
CBS' Hawaii Five-0, now paired with the night's most-watched series, Blue Bloods, has increased its audience 11% despite moving from Mondays to the second-least-watched night of the week. And ABC's Shark Tank and NBC's Grimm, which lead among young-adult viewers, match ratings for shows on more heavily viewed nights.
"We've had tremendous success this year "with the Five-0/Blue Bloods combo, says Glenn Geller, who oversees CBS' returning programs. "Every network has a little something to crow about, and it's great for network television. Audiences show up for good TV, and there's a lot to choose from on Friday night."
The smaller Friday audience also tends to be older than on other nights. Studios that pay a premium to run movie commercials on Thursday may be less inclined to do so on Friday, when they hope many viewers are out at the theater, network executives say. Over the years, Fridays have been a dumping ground for shows on the decline, such as Fox's recently canceled Raising Hope.
But networks can charge advertisers for viewing up to three days after a show's initial broadcast, and with DVR playback peaking on weekends, series that run late in the week benefit financially from a delayed ratings bump.
"Friday is perfectly viable," says NBC scheduling chief Jeff Bader. "When you're looking at what constitutes a successful show now, the numbers on Friday aren't that different from other nights in some instances, so there's definitely opportunity there."
Shark Tank has helped ABC climb 8% on Fridays this season for its best showing since 2005-06.
Executive producer Mark Burnett says the business-competition show has become "destination viewing," particularly for families.
"I love that Shark Tank is on Friday. Over the years in my career, I've heard people say Friday is a wasteland, that if you're put on a Friday, it's a huge mark that the network doesn't like the show. In the case of Shark Tank, that is the complete opposite," he says. "It was planned by us and ABC to be on Fridays, and that strategy worked. I know around the country that millions of families plan their nights around Shark Tank, especially fathers and their kids."
Five-0, averaging 11.6 million viewers, is trying to tap into a family audience, and executive producer Peter Lenkov says it makes a good fit with Blue Bloods, another fourth-year police drama, and a top-15 show (13.7 million) that this season had its most-watched episode since its premiere in 2010.
For Lenkov, the move to an earlier time slot (9 p.m. ET/PT) may be at least as important as the switch in nights.
"I always thought we were better suited for a 9 o'clock show no matter what night we we were on," he says. "I think we're lighter in terms of our procedural stories and character interactions. We like to think there's a lot of humor in the show. I always felt like the 10 o'clock shows always seemed a little edgier and darker," while competition on Mondays was "like a street fight."
Lenkov hopes to end Five-0's first Friday season in style. This week's episode will feature Steve McGarrett (Alex O'Loughlin) and Catherine Rollins (Michelle Borth) traveling to Afghanistan to help a family, while the May 9 season finale will continue the story of Captain Lou Grover (Chi McBride) and feature an appearance by archvillain Wo Fat (Mark Dacascos).
Grover had "always been an outsider with them. Slowly, we've built to a place where there's a real relationship, a trust," Lenkov says. "That's really going to pay off at the end of the season."
Although several Friday shows could stand ratings improvement, the night doesn't appear to be headed in the direction of Saturdays, the week's least-watched night, which hasn't featured broadcast scripted programming in about a decade and instead is mostly a wasteland of repeats. NBC has weighed the cost of programming against the available audience on Friday, "but I think people are trying to find a way to program it" like other nights, Bader says.
CBS remains committed to the night, Geller says. "We've always believed in Friday."
