MagneticMediaFed

I’m listening to a conference call right now with Jeff Probst, host of CBS’s reality-centerpiece Survivor. He’s on the line to address the show’s decision to split the new cast into racial “tribes.” His go-to line, and one I’ve read before, is that this is “the most ethnically diverse cast in the history of reality TV.” This may be true, though I feel like the first few seasons of The Real World would argue otherwise.

As expected, he’s 100% in favor of this decision and is certain it will revive the brand. He also calls out those who may criticize the decision without ever seeing the show– pretty standard responses whenever a show is confronted with controversy.

The series usually picks its contestants from videos mailed in by people who want to be on the show. It just so happens that the type of person who applies for a reality show in this manor is frequently white. Because of this, the casting for the new season was much more aggressive. They went out into the communities and sought out the contestants.

In response to questions about Mark Burnett’s sordid history with diversity and reality programming Probst argued that the apparent stereotypes seen in previous seasons (and shows), might have been caused by the overwhelming white presence these shows have had over the past six years. When there’s only one African-American on a show of sixteen people, anything they do that fits into a stereotype gets magnified.

It should also be noted that while various advertisers have dropped their spots from the show, in recent months (weeks?), Jeff Probst is just the show’s host and really doesn’t know all that much about the CBS balance sheet. Should he? Seems like a lot to ask from the guy.

This thing is now reaching the hour-mark, and I have to go to work. So I’m jumping ship…

If I’m not mistaken that’s what Harry Shearer said about Katie Couric’s future performance on the CBS Evening News. Well, the time has come and gone, and he appears to be correct– she can read off a screen just like she were one of the boys. I don’t think anyone was tuning into CBS this past evening at 6:30 thinking they’d see anything all too crazy. Ms. Couric wasn’t going to explode a la Scanners. She wasn’t going to stop mid-sentence and pull a Howard Beale (maybe if she’d gotten the Judd Hirsch role in Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip). It’d just be the news as usual.

Maybe that was the problem. As someone who earns his paycheck working in broadcast news, I rarely sit down in front of my television to check out the evening news in my free time. If you put a gun to my head and asked me to remember the last time I flipped on any of the big three networks at 6:30pm on a weekday, I’d say, “I’ve lived a full life” and thank you for your time. So you can imagine my surprise when I discovered what most of America all ready knew: the evening news is awful. Keep reading by clicking below…

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Thank god it was Conan who was hosting that show last night or I might of had to pack it all up and quit by the halfway point. There has to be a better way to present all of these awards than to have an hour right in the middle where the only miniseries are mentioned. Miniseries at the Emmys is like the sound mixing and editing awards at the oscars. Just get on with it.

But here’s the problem, NBC (or whatever network) tries to sell this event to the public as a piece of entertainment. “Come see all of your favorite stars gathered together saying funny things” they bark. To the actual television academy, however, this is their super-bowl. This is their end-of-the-year bash. If the television industry were a tee-ball team, this would be trip to pizza-hut after the last game where one of the kids’ dad would hand out plastic “champs” trophies. There’s all ready a whole other section of the awards show that isn’t broadcast. In a way, it almost seems like none of this nonesense should ever really make it to air.

It’s like the Upfronts each spring. The masses don’t get to go (though one could argue that if the television community put on any show for the public, they’d be best off showcasing new programs), but the writers write about it and we find out the next morning– or the next minute, I guess, if they have a laptop.

In any case, the actual awards don’t matter (remember when Arrested Development won best comedy series three years ago? Whatever happened to that show?), but its fun to root for your favorites, even if the acedemy sees fit to constantly piss on your dreams.

Here’s what some others have been saying about the event. Comments range from “Conan was the best awards show host in a decade” to “I can’t believe the whole thing started with a spoof of an airplane crash” (there also seems to be much to do about a couple comments said by the winners, comments that in my opinion were so unoffensive I had completely forgot they said them until I read about it this morning. When did America get so squeamish? Oh, that’s right… always.)

Alan Sepinwall of the New Jersey Star-Ledger
Channel Island by Scott Collins
Aaron Barnhart of the Kansas City Star

I honor of the fourth season of The Wire, which will premiere on HBO Sunday, September 10th, I’d like to pose the following question to MMF’s readers:

Why do you or don’t you watch The Wire?

Leave a comment. I’d like to know.

Today CBS issued a press release saying that it would be airing several episodes of new and returning programs on the internet for free through their InnerTube video service. The online shows will be streamed and have commercials embedded that cannot be skipped (though considerably fewer commercials than when the shows air on television). ABC began offering more or less the same system last spring via their website. Both network’s only offer a handful of shows to be featured in their entirety. NBC and FOX have yet to put anything comparable on the table (though NBC did strike a deal with YouTube recently, which has yet to produce anything of note).

I really like this model, though I can imagine its driving the affiliates crazy. They need the networks to survive. The opposite used to be true, but now that there is iTunes (whose video impact has yet to be measured), and these new programs that give viewers what they want (whole shows) and keep the finance department happy (unskippable advertising) the local affiliate is becoming less and less important in that happy circle of broadcast television life.

The big problem, as I see it, is that the type of people who don’t have a problem watching video online (people like me), aren’t going to be using these services to get new content. If I want to see the new Lost, then by-God I’m going to see the new Lost when it airs (or DVR it, or anything that will let me watch it as soon as possible with the fewest distractions). The rest of the television populace doesn’t care. Casual viewers aren’t going to seek out a website so they can see a new show glorious, grainy, streamed video. So where’s the win/win? Click below and I’ll tell you…

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Tonight after work I sat down in front of the television to take in the season premiere of the Showtime comedy Weeds. It’s an unremarkable show on an unremarkable network, but they’re both trying and that’s usually worth something. Showtime has no easy hill to climb. If you ask and Tom, Dick or Larry on the street where you’re going to find the best programming on cable they’re going to say HBO. Maybe Larry will accidentally say Showtime, but that’s only because he’s a big Red Shoe Diaries fan.

Though if they’re ever going to make a move, now is precisely the time to do it. HBO is limp. It’s top show, The Sopranos seemed to hemorrhage viewers this past season (maybe because people don’t like having to wait 20 months between seasons, or maybe because the shows sexiness has apparently bored the creators). Its top comedy, Sex and the City is long gone and nothing seems poised to take the reigns. HBO still makes great shows (this week’s Deadwood was awesome and exactly what a ‘payoff’ episode should be), and even the greatest show, The Wire, which I’ll be talking about in more depth later in the week. But none of these shows have the buzz that the network once had. Showtime, if it played its cards right, could finally start to chip away some of HBO’s viewers.

Weeds is a big part of that plan. It’s a crowd-pleaser (maybe too much so). Throw in The L Word and Brotherhood and you’ve got yourself a respectable one-two-three.

ANYWAY, I’m watching the show (on the SHO) and laughing occasionally at the occasionally funny moments on this occasionally interesting series about a pot-selling suburban mom when something happens. Something that should never happen on a premium channel. What was it? Click below to find out…

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Tonight was the season finale of The Hills on MTV (btw, did anyone check out VH1 Classic’s replay of the first 24 hours of MTV this week? Also, does anyone else find it shocking that MTV was founded in the fall of 1981 and yet didn’t play any videos from black artists until the spring of 1983 (Billie Jean). Anyway.), a new episode of 30 Days, and last night I missed Rescue Me. I’ll end up watching all of these shows, but I just can’t right now. It’s too damn hot. There is no A/C in our living room. Plus, Con Ed and the mayor have convinced me that using things like “televisions” and “lights” will certainly cripple the city.

I also can barely bring myself to blog as the climate has sucked all the life from my being. Wait, maybe I should start a blog about how great it is to lay on ones bed in front of a fan blowing cool air and play Tetris on the DS (267 lines!).

I did come across an interesting story about my man Stephen Colbert, and you can read about it by clicking below…

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First of all, I feel I’m not going to be able to write nearly as much in this post as I should given the amount of notes that I’ve been jotting down over the past three days. I suppose that’s the problem with not posting everyday. Ideas build up and then the getting them out begins to seem overly daunting for something that’s suppose to be fun.

But anyway.

Tonight, MTV will be airing a documentary called Iraq Uploaded at 8:00pm EDT. The subject of the doc is about the videos that have been uploaded to sites like YouTube by soldiers who were or are currently in Iraq. More so, its a doc about unfiltered news video (I haven’t seen it yet, but this article does a good job of setting things up).

Thanks to the ease of both uploading and watching web-video, it has suddenly become possible for people all over the world (specifically in war zones) to shoot and distribute first-hand accounts of these wars– sometimes (oftentimes) in a way that is exponentially more raw than anything the nightly news would dare broadcast. Keep reading by clicking below…

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So Tina Fey is leaving SNL. That’s the word on the street, and by ‘word on the street’ I obviously mean, ‘what she told Jay Leno on the Tonight Show.’ I assume she has no reason to lie. Frankly, this (along with her costar Rachel Dratch’s departure from the Saturday staple to network programming) was about the least shocking thing to come from Hollywood since the revelations that Suri Cruise is actually a composite of several different celebrity babies. If you remember this years finale of SNL, you’d recall that Fey and Dratch were very thank-youey during the goodbye.

The fact that she has a must succeed sit-com premiering in the fall (30 Rock) obviously has some impact on the whole thing. (NBC has some info/video.) Based on the clips that are available, and the assumption that Tina Fey is a pretty decent comedy writer, I’d say that 30 Rock will be a good show despite the fact that I’m putting the odds of survival at 4:1. Keep reading by clicking below…

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John Hodgman was on The Daily Show Wednesday night talking about the Net Neutrality Act. It makes this blog due to its crossover in being not just about television BUT ALSO the internet.  See, that’s how MMF rolls, y’dig?

It is nice to see TDS being up on this legislation– it seems to be slipping through the cracks in most of the mainstream media (is The Daily Show considered mainstream media now? I suspect it draws more viewers than most of the shows on the 24-news networks).
Read more about it here.

Here is an e-mail I received Friday afternoon:

Here’s the deal. Sci Fi.com has posted a pilot episode of The Amazing Screw On Head on its website. Its an animated show based on a comic by Mike Mignola (creator of Hellboy) produced by Bryan Fuller (creator of Wonderfalls) and features the voice work of Paul Giamatti as the title character. Its damn hilarious and looks amazing to boot. Now here is where the readership of MMF comes in. After you watch the pilot, Sci Fi wants everyone to fill out a survey about the pilot and based on viewer reaction, they will then decide whether or not to pick up the show and make it into a series. Crazy, no? The suvey itself is only 9 questions and takes about a minute to fill out. So please, for the love of God, post about this on MMF Rick. This might be the only chance I get to care about the Sci Fi channel.

Also, it might be wise to remind people that the pauses in the show (I thought my comp froze) are just where the commercials would be. It is a full 20 minute pilot.

http://www.scifi.com/amazingscrewonhead/

AK

Who am I to say no to that?

So I went to the site and watched the pilot. It was good. It was really good. Its the type of animated program that is cool for the same reasons Batman the Animated Series was cool, but funnier. In fact, it continued to get funnier as it went along. After the first minute or so it just appears to be an action show (though with an amazing look and feel), but then there’s this monkey with a gun and…

Look, just check it out.

Though what struck me about this whole thing is that it seems illustrate the exact trend Chuck Klosterman wrote about in this month’s Esquire (even if his take on the issue was suspect at best).

I’m curious what everyone else makes of this idea– the idea being that of media companies attempting to give the people EXACTLY what they want instead of just guessing blindly.

More from me after some sleep (and some rock and roll).

–Rocky from Bottle Rocket

This past weekend, the hipster punchline of the past 4 years (pirates) managed to turn itself into the ultimate in mainstream phenomena. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest brought in an astronomical $136 million, in domestic ticket sales over a three day period, shattering just about every box office record it came across. It even has a shot at tackling the domestic gross taken in by Titanic sitting at nearly three-quarters of a billion dollars. For all intents and purposes we just have to assume that Pirates of the Caribbean is going to be the premiere film franchise of the current generation. Even if it never leaves the cultural dent that Star Wars or even The Matrix did, Pirates will forever be a smash hit.

And yet for all the press and all the talk and all the energy spent on convincing people that story-based entertainment is most powerful when projected upon a screen, the sad reality is no one remembers a blockbuster. Keep reading by clicking below…

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Last night Comedy Central aired the first of three “lost episodes” of Chappelle’s Show. By “lost” I’m sure they mean “those episodes that have been sitting on a shelf for the past year and a half waiting for the perfect way to market them to the masses in an attempt to recoup some of the audience that has fled the network since Mr. Chappelle decided he’d rather have his dignity than fifty million dollars,” or something like that.

Obviously I watched.

As a stand alone episode, it wasn’t one of the series strongest. That said, there was definitely something compelling about it. As I watched, I kept thinking to myself that I probably wasn’t suppose to be seeing any of this in the first place– almost like Comedy Central had stumbled across someone’s home movies and just decided to air them. You can’t really blame the network for wanting to get something, anything, from their initial investment, but you also can’t blame Mr. Chappelle for wishing the episodes didn’t air. It didn’t help that the sketches were introduced by Charlie Murphy and Donnell Rawlings giving the whole show a bit of an F-You vibe to the series star. It reminded me of a Q&A with River’s Cuomo that appeared in Rolling Stone a few years back

RS: Was the quote-unquote failure of Pinkerton made all the more painful because you’d put so much of yourself into the lyrics?

RC: Yeah, I felt really burned. After we put out the first record, it seemed like a lot of the fans were really interested in me and were encouraging me to expose myself more, so that’s what I did on the second record, and everybody hated it. I was really embarrassed.
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If season 3 of Chappelle had gone all the way through, its no question, based on this first episode, that Dave’s money was going to play into the sketches. In the first on last night’s show Dave is shaken down for a hair cut or while getting his car fixed because his salary was published in the media. The longest bit of the night was a Kill Bill parody in which Dave seeks revenge on those who wronged him in his life (in one instance calling on the help of Spike Lee). All in all, the sketches were surprisingly revealing, if not genuinely hillarious.

If these three episodes go over moderately well with the audience, they will indeed represent Chappelle’s Pinkerton. With no new series in the works, this is going to be how the fans remember him for the foreseeable future: emotionally open and coming to terms with being indeed the next Pryor. Rivers was never slated to be that big, even after their first record when platinum several times over, but its understandable why Pinkerton continued to haunt him well into this decade.

The good news is that Rivers has mellowed out a bit and now performs songs from that record on tour, despite what he told Rolling Stone a few months after the above interview was conducted.

“The most painful thing in my life these days is the cult around Pinkerton,” he says when asked of the record’s new status. “It’s just a sick album, sick in a diseased sort of way. It’s such a source of anxiety because all the fans we have right now have stuck around because of that album. But, honestly, I never want to play those songs again; I never want to hear them again.”
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Chappelle’s fans, the die-hard ones, the ones who admire the star for just walking away from a pile of money most of us will never see, are likely going to love these last three “lost” episodes because they show us a comedy god working through his own problems right there on the screen (and we’re expected to laugh). Of course, the man himself would probably rather those sketches just stay lost.

There was a bit in last night’s show that had nothing to do with Dave, money, or fleeing the country. It was about how Tupac records keep coming out and its pretty damn funny.
Note: link via YouTube, so expect it to be taken down by the end of tomorrow

It’s the summer, and thus TV is slow.  Because of this, MMF is going to attempt to get the conversational juices flowing internet-stylin’ by posing a simple question to its readers.  Feel free to post responses in the comments section (as opposed to, say, responding out loud to your monitor, who might I add, secretly resents you).

So here we go:

“Do you own an HDTV, and if ‘no’ at what point will you seriously consider buying one?”

To get the ball rolling, I’ll go first.  I do not have an HDTV monitor, but I find myself watching more and more HD content with each passing day.  This was especially true before I had cable and instead downloaded most of my favorite shows.  They were frequently HD copies (compressed, but still widescreen) and, while stollen, made me start contemplating this hefty purchase.

That’s really the biggest obstacle, the price.  It seems more practical, in a way, to invest in a computer monitor that can displaya HD content and double as a TV instead of dropping 2K on a plasma with Ambilight, especially for apartment living (some of those things are just too damn big).

But the real problem for the mainstream to go HD seems to be that there is so little momentum to make the change.  More and more network programming is available in HD every year, but a lot of what is currently shown is already in widescreen.  In a way it seems people are reacting more strongly to the format change than to the picture quality (luckily, it seems like widescreen is finally getting mass support).  If you can watch The Office in 16:9 on a standard definition set, why on earth drop the coin just so we can see how normal looking everyone in that cast actually is?

Thoughts?

The Tony awards were held this past Sunday at Radio City Music Hall and brought in 7.8 million viewers for CBS (up 20% from last year). These numbers were likely padded thanks to the help of Julia Roberts who starred this year in “Three Days Of Rain” and Oprah who produced “The Color Purple” (both presented at the show).

That explains this year’s numbers, but overall, why on earth are the Tony awards even broadcast on CBS? There are scores of award shows broadcast every year, and each of those shows has a built in audience. Country fans will turn into their award show to see their favorite performers, television fans turn into the Emmys, etc. Plus, those audiences can translate nationally. Everyone in the country watching about the same television or listens to the same music. The problem with the Tonys is that its an award show based on Broadway plays and musicals. This means the only possible people it could attract are New Yorkers and theater-junkies (or star-gawkers, but even then we’re talking about the stars of the theater world, not films or tv).

I’m simply amazed that CBS feels no risk in putting this event on every year. Perhaps the Tony audience is more affluent and they can charge more for the ads. One would think it might find more success on a cable channel like Bravo or A&E. Of course, ratings were up this year, so maybe I don’t know what the hell I’m talking about.

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