As far as a spinoff is concerned, I think John Stamos and the producers of ER are working on something for his character on the show.

The single/multi – laugh/none debate is sort of meaningless. HIMYM breaks lots of the rules of Serious Modern Comedy: it’s multicam, and has a laugh track. But it also borrows elements from singlecams — the quick cuts and flashbacks, after Arrested Development.

The problem with multicam arises when showrunners and writers and approving execs get stuck in ruts: it became easy to make formulaic multicam because the production fit more easily into a comedy-by-numbers template. But now there’s been enough singlecam done for that to become formulaic too, as Ted and ITM show.

For a niche show to dominate in the most important demo of all is truly amazing to me, especially considering how The Office just dribbled out of the gate initially. That it is now pulling those demos AND getting such boffo DVD sales has to be one of the most unlikely success stories since Seinfeld. Debate it until you are blue in the face, but The Office is hands down one of the biggest hits on television, at least as I define a hit, and that is that it is making HUGE-HUGE-HUGE dollars for all concerned.

And I don’t even watch it. Maybe I should start.

We can talk ratings, buzz, Emmys, and anything you want, but it all comes down to money, people. What makes a hit is making money. By all accounts, The Office does that as well or better than anyone else.

Certainly it has to be making a shitload more money than The Mentalist or any of those other geriatric CBS “hits.”

chuck

While I hate to disagree without feeling like I’m backed up by data, I don’t buy those reasons for NCAA ratings drops at least vs. last season.

I don’t think the difference in the alumni populations of these two groups is significant on a national audience basis.
Big (alumi) schools in the Sweet 16 (exclusive to each year)
2008: Tennessee, Wisconsin, Texas, UCLA, Washington St.
2009: Missouri, Oklahoma, Syracuse, Purdue

No Cinderella: You really think Davidson v. Wisconsin (the 1 Sweet Sixteen low seed matchup last year) drove big ratings last year?

Big star: Almost impossible to argue for or against. Who was the big star again that drove the Sweet 16 ratings last season. Stephen Curry?

vs. last years ratings I completely agree with Robert. NCAA vs. strike dreck, much less of a contest. That easily explains the difference.

plus nbc needs ro switch their thursday night around

Apparently you have no idea how advertising works in the modern age.

For the most part advertisers no longer care about total viewers unless they’re very small or very large, which isn’t the case for the majority of shows on network television. What advertisers care about are various demographic breakdowns of the audience for any given show because advertisers know exactly who they’re selling their products to so they match their target audience with the demos shows are achieving.

It doesn’t matter if The Office is ‘only’ being seen by 8 million people because it’s the ‘right’ 8 million to produce big demo numbers. Two and Half Men for example has to nearly double The Office’s total audience to score a 0.5 higher in the 18-49 and it gets absolutely destroyed when you compare the 18-34. So whilst Two and Half Men is averaging 6-8 million more viewers then The Office advertisers don’t care because The Office is scoring excellent demo numbers.

You even contradict yourself – the other networks are 18-49 dependant and yet you can’t see why The Office is a major hit and you’re trying to argue that viewing figures are important when the networks are demo dependant. And only in yours and CBS’ dreamland is Two and Half Men the biggest money making comedy on television right now.

“You saying The Office is a huge hit is a spin by you… NBC was banking on The Office scoring huge and reflecting on its original rating and instead it still fails to score over 10 million viewers and repeats poorly.”

Me saying The Office is a hit is a statement of fact.

You’ll find very few shows on television that can beat The Office in 18-49 and even less that can top its 18-34. Like it or not The Office is one of the biggest shows of television right now where it really matters. Its Super Bowl performance and lack of long term gains from it are completely irrelevant.

“Multi-cams are more likely to succeed that’s why Steve had to axe every single-cam he’s had so far except the ones he has now airing and they will be too in the future.”

Multi-camera shows are more likely to succeed? That’s why ABC green lit two new single camera comedies and one multi-camera comedy? That’s why the only network who has any multi-camera comedy hits in recent years is CBS? NBC in particular stopped making traditional mulit-camera sitcoms because people didn’t watch them, you get that right?

“One thing about 30 Rock is that had it been a laugh track or studio audience type sitcom it might succeed and be doing better than The Office actually reaching 10+ million viewers.”

Again viewers aren’t important and I would say that 30 Rock is a success – only three of the ‘incredibly popular’ multi-camera comedies score higher 18-49 and only one scores a higher 18-34 and it gets about the same total viewers as CBS’ apparently successful Wednesday night comedy block.

“The proof is already on the wall when SNL aired their specials earlier this season and hit 11 million viewers with healthy demos and SNL is a smart sketch multi-cam comedy show that fit well with the rest of the lineup. It looks like besides the SNL name the multi-cam factor worked for it.”

Are you seriously trying to argue that because Saturday Night Live election specials did well multi-camera shows are more popular? Really?

Unfortunately we lack a lot of historical data for the NCAA tourney, but the period of 2001-2008 was remarkably consistent over the entire tournament, and so far this year does not appear to be inconsistent with last year.

DVD sales are in important too and Men does very well in syndication but it goes towards studios and if the studio is combined with the network which is why you keep seeing Jim on ABC.

SW is a million times better than in the motherhood, better production/editing/acting, everything… yet its stuck behind an outright awful show.

i had been pulling for motherhood given the set of actors and being a fan but the show was completely forgettable. the show spent hardly any time introducing the characters, the acting was off, the editing jumped around too much, the parts that should have been entertaining (megan pretending to be pregnant and using it for advantage) fell absolutely flat.

its always hard to watch actors you like play horrible roles and keeping this show on for the full run without changing channels was difficult. unless next weeks episode can fix this train wreck i cant imagine how it wont sink like a rock.

The Office is most likely much more profitable for NBC than 2.5 Men for CBS because the DVDs sell like crazy. Even if 2.5 Men had great DVD sales, CBS wouldn’t see a penny of that.

Demos are all that matters. That’s what advertisers are paying for. Period.

CBS is NOT successful on Wednesdays. Beating the horrible ABC lineup by .1 or .2 does not equal success. They are trying to spin it as a success, but it is not. CBS is lucky enough to be in the position that they can afford to be patient and see if that block ever does start to work, though I really doubt it ever will.

The post-Super Bowl spot doesn’t mean much at all ever. There are rare exceptions where you see some very slight long term effects, but that’s the rare exception, not the norm.

Multi-cams are just as likely to fail as single-cams. The networks wouldn’t have so many single-cams if they hadn’t had failure after failure for multi-cams. The TV industry is a business and they go with what will make them money.

You saying The Office is a huge hit is a spin by you. There’s still a ton of people who don’t even know what The Office is and it failed out of Super Bowl a couple of months ago. Most shows like Friends did back in ’96 are supposed to improve drastically out of the Super Bowl. Grey’s did the same thing recently back in ’05. NBC was banking on The Office scoring huge and reflecting on its original rating and instead it still fails to score over 10 million viewers and repeats poorly.

Multi-cams are more likely to succeed that’s why Steve had to axe every single-cam he’s had so far except the ones he has now airing and they will be too in the future.

CBS is even successful with them on Wednesdays at 8pm where they have no absolute support for lead-in sake and its been historically a bad slot for CBS since the 80s.

One thing about 30 Rock is that had it been a laugh track or studio audience type sitcom it might succeed and be doing better than The Office actually reaching 10+ million viewers. People say this is why they think its overrated b/c Lorne Michaels promised them it was going to be a multi-cam back in ’06 but NBC changed their minds and made it a single-cam with no laugh track.

The proof is already on the wall when SNL aired their specials earlier this season and hit 11 million viewers with healthy demos and SNL is a smart sketch multi-cam comedy show that fit well with the rest of the lineup. It looks like besides the SNL name the multi-cam factor worked for it.

All currently airing sitcoms based on overnight data from the last time they aired an original episode in their regular timeslot:

18-49 Rating:
4.8 Two And A Half Men
4.3 The Office
3.8 How I Met Your Mother
3.7 The Big Bang Theory
3.4 30 Rock
3.4 Rules Of Engagement
2.3 Gary Unmarried
2.1 In The Motherhood
2.1 Samantha Who?
2.1 Old Christine
2.0 Scrubs
2.0 My Name Is Earl
1.8 Better Off Ted
1.7 Kath & Kim

18-34 Rating:
5.2 The Office
3.7 How I Met Your Mother
3.7 30 Rock
3.3 Two And A Half Men
2.7 The Big Bang Theory
2.2 Rules Of Engagement
1.9 In The Motherhood
1.9 Scrubs
1.7 Samantha Who?
1.7 Better Off Ted
1.6 Kath & Kim
1.5 My Name Is Earl
1.3 Gary Unmarried
1.2 Old Christine

And Schmoker I agree the laugh track they used for Sports Night was horrible and things got much better when they finally let Sorkin get his own way and removed it.

But, boy, it was so jarring and poorly used on the one Sports Night clip I saw that I could never have watched that show on a regular basis. It completely took me out of the show.

Two of the most youngest-skewing single cams, however, are Big Bang and Mother. I have to give kudos to those two for being some of the most youthful shows on the eye net.

Right now you’re working under the mistaken idea that multi-camera shows are somehow more likely to succeed and they aren’t. The reason CBS is the only network that has a traditional multi-camera comedy block is because they’re the only network that’s been able to get people to watch them. None of the other networks have been able to find a multi-camera hit and that’s why NBC in particular have gone in the direction of single camera shows – those are what worked.

As I said before some might argue that the younger skewing single camera successes like The Office and 30 Rock would perhaps suggest that the reason CBS has been able to sustain the traditional sitcom is because they skew older and that’s what CBS has a reputation for doing. Its worth noting that 30 Rock for example is essentially a traditional multi-camera sitcom minus the laugh track, it isn’t like The Office which wouldn’t in a million years work with a laugh track.

Julia you’re right when you say season 1 of Sports Night had a laugh track it was however I think removed by the end of season one or during season two.

My Name Is Earl was up a tenth to 2.1, The Office (R) was down a tenth to 2.0, the original The Office at 9pm was up two tenths to 4.5, while ER settled at 3.5.

American Idol was up to 7.7, and Hell’s Kitchen dropped to a 4.5.

128boy, what if Surviving Suburbia fails?
Obviously its going to be a let down for the multi-cam genre and will end the possibility of them coming back on NBC and ABC but CBS will keep at them thankfully.

I would give SS at least two weeks before judging it ratings wise. The NCAA Basketball Championship Game will hurt it in week 1 and week 2 has Rules. Its going to be tough for SS to be a hit but at least it can be a solid ratings player for them.

Alex: Hot Pocket did you seriously just claim that The Office doesn’t repeat well after it just pulled a 2.1 in repeat against American Idol and NCAA? The Office isn’t the strongest repeating force known to man but when its beating original programming in repeat I think you have to give it some credit.

HP: It doesn’t repeat well at all and that claim of a 2.1 is a complete by you. Two and a Half Men got 11 million viewers and a 3.5 demo out of a weak lead-in. You know what’s even worse for The Office they can’t even get over 10 million viewers for originals. Men is the real hit and The Office is not and its a wannabe hit. Anytime you have to look at demos first before viewers that’s a bad thing. It should be the other way around. The Office barely beat anything in its repeat airing. Again maybe in demos but not viewers. Under 5 million viewers is horrid and you can’t try to spin that. I will give it some credit on the demo side, its demo’s performance are amazing and nobody can deny that but advertisers also expect more viewers to go along with those healthy demo numbers.

Alex: The bigger problem here is that you’re hanging your ‘multi-cameras are coming back’ on very little and it would seem on your own desire to see them back. Right now your whole theory seems to be dependant on the fact that ABC green lit Surviving Suburbia, which is unless I’ve missed something the only new multi-camera sitcom showing up anytime soon. Do you think ABC are going to rush to produce more multi-camera shows if Suburbia flops? And what do we think has the bigger chance of success, multi-camera Surviving Suburbia or single camera Parks & Recreations? Parks seems like the much safer bet right now and that’s saying something given that Parks is on NBC.

HP: Of course ABC is not going to produce more multi-cams if Surviving Suburbia flops but there’s a lot riding on Surviving Suburbia’s performance after DWtS. I don’t think its going to do that well considering its competition on CBS with the NCAA Championship the first week and Rules the week after. Right now I think SS will be more safer b/c it will have the casual viewers on its side unlike P&R which will fail but knowing NBC they’ll keep it like they did 30 Rock. With personal feelings aside P&R will survive b/c NBC believes in their Thursday roster so much and it won’t have to do anything in the ratings. Expect another Kath & Kim from P&R. LOL! ABC made the right decision in deciding to get back in the multi-cam game b/c this is the network where these type of shows thrived the most in something for the whole family to watch.

Alex: You also seem to be forgetting that multi-camera shows are just as hit and miss (success wise) as single camera shows and are just as likely to flop as a single camera show. There’s a huge list of traditional sitcoms that flop and flop hard.

HP: This is probably you’re best point yet. I won’t debate with you on this b/c this is 100% true. Anything can miss and we can’t do anything about that.

Alex: ABC’s problem is that their comedies have no identity.

HP: They don’t and this is another good truthful statement made by you. They really don’t have an identity and they’ve been in that crisis ever since the late 90s when TGIF failed them then they went with fathers as the main leads earlier in this decade to much success then the single-cams came and washed them away for no reason. I think ABC should go with family oriented comedies that relate to people in America dealing with hardships and that kind of thing. The other alternative is going with women focused comedies like One Day at a Time back in the day but In the Motherhood failed so bad for them last night. That was b/c it was not a multi-cam.

Alex: CBS has fast become the home of traditional multi-camera sitcoms thanks to the success of their Monday night block. NBC spurred on by Earl and now The Office has seemingly made the decision to go the single camera route, which sets their Thursday block apart from CBS (and for the record I think NBC has made the right decision going for the single camera shows). Fox meanwhile have cornered the market in animation with their Sunday block.

HP: This is where I think NBC needs to keep their single-cams but there is no balance on this network. Its too exclusive to single-cam and this might explain part of the reason why the network has been failing in recent years. Its totally abandoned the multi-cam audience. If NBC was getting ratings like the Tiffany Network (CBS) did then they can get away with going exclusive to single-cam but they simply aren’t. NBC should be ashamed of themselves for displacing Must See TV Thursdays like that for a bunch of unwatchable single-cams for the casual viewers. NBC needs to have their comedy roster with half single-cams and half multi-cams, its just that simple. I’m surprised NBC didn’t really try to premiere a multi-cam this season as I think a successful would help their network out. At this point I think they would’ve been better off with Joey to carry the network than Earl. Problem with Joey was it was rushed and terrible so I don’t blame NBC for going with Earl as it was hot out the gate back in ’05. FOX is alright with their animation and they just got to figure out a way to get their live-action comedies in the successful direction.

Alex: All of that has left ABC with very little to call their own and what they now seem to be doing is trying to combine all three. They’ve got a new line of single camera shows and Suburbia tackling multi-camera and they’ve got a new animated show set to debut and aren’t they picking up King of the Hill next season? ABC just seems to be throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks.

HP: I think its better for ABC to experiment and see what works. They’ll get lucky with something and build around it. ABC looks like their going to have the best balance in their comedy roster offering something for every fan but most of it needs to be multi-cam if they want the ratings. King of the Hill is a rumor but with him working on Goode Family I highly doubt it and there’s some talk of him going back to Beavis & Butt-Head.

Alex: I don’t think we’re going to see a run of new multi-camera sitcoms and I don’t think we’re going to see the single camera comedies die either. The balance already exists and will continue to.

HP: I think were going to see a run of multi-cams if Surviving Suburbia is successful but single-cams won’t die and they don’t need to. Obviously people out there like them but multi-cams have been treated very badly this decade and they just woken the beast which starts with Surviving Suburbia.

TIME TO PLAY THE GAME!

Will be interesting to see if the show gains some ER viewers when that medical show ends.

Is Private Practice the only show from the 2007 writer’s strike season that seems a sure bet for renewal next season ? Samantha Who, Chuck and Terminator all look on shaky ground.

Alan & the128boy SHUT UP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The two funniest shows on television to me are BBT and The Office, which are not only filmed in different formats but are also written in two very, very different tones. What they both have in common, however, is that they are hilarious, which I think is the reason both are successful.

Sure, Arrested Development was funny and no one watched, so you could perhaps blame that on the single camera format, but that would be ignoring the eleventy-six multi-cam comedies that have come and sucked water and been cancelled quickly over the last five years.

Somehow networks cannot understand that comedies have to be funny in order to succeed. If they make people laugh, I don’t think the average person cares if it is filmed through a cell phone.

But I know the suits at the networks need to justify their existence, so they will go back and forth between proclaiming the death of single cam format or the mult-cam format, mainly because those men and women who run the nets have no sense of humor and so therefore cannot use any other criteria.

By the way, it mystifies me how funny BBT can be, yet a show from the same producers and writers, TAHM, is not funny at all. Of course, given TAHM’s ratings, I guess the last laugh is on me.

As for ER, it also mystifies me as to why they are ending it. If it were any other network, I guess I’d understand it, but how NBC can axe one of its top performing shows is beyond me. It must be hideously expensive or something, because all they are going to end up doing is filling that slot with Leno, who will get half the ratings ER is getting. And whatever show they put into the 9pm slot they could have given to ER will also likely get half the ratings ER is getting.

But, hey, they would not be NBC if they weren’t all idiots. To maintain that reputation they have to make sure and keep doing stupid things every other week.

NO, humor doesn’t change over time. What’s POPULAR changes over time.

i AM talking about what is funny now, in 2009. Seinfeld is still on tv, is it not? It is still funny. And it still gets more viewers in syndication than several first run comedies i can name.

What you are talking about is what is POPULAR. What is popular isn’t always funny (unless someone thinks it is… because funny is SUBJECTIVE), and what is “funny” is always popular.

How in the world do you think you can announce what is “funny” and what “isn’t”?

Question: “You mentioned earlier about the show being single camera. Was that always the way you were going to do the show or was multi-camera ever discussed?”

Donald Todd: “It was a personal choice for me. I had done multi-camera most of my career and I had made a choice to leave multi-camera because I had gotten burned out on the process. Obviously there are plenty of successful multi-camera shows and more to come but I just didn’t feel like doing it anymore so I had left to go to drama. I had done several dramas so when this opportunity came along it really was always a single-camera opportunity for me and I don’t think it was ever pitched as anything else. I suppose if it were pitched now given the economic realities people would consider doing it multi. I know that Christina didn’t want to do multi. It was a good mix for all of us. Single camera is much harder work day to day for the actors and the producers but for me it’s just a more satisfying job at the moment. Maybe I’ll go back to multi someday. “