Fan Fare

In rerun of 2008, top Emmys go to “30 Rock” and “Mad Men”

For those of you watching the other channel, or otherwise indisposed, here’s what happened at the 61st annual Primetime Emmy Awards in Los Angeles on Sunday night.

5:01 p.m. Host Neil Patrick Harris takes the stage with a cabaret number extolling us to “put down the remote … don’t touch the dial … don’t hit the loo.” 

5:06 p.m. ”Here’s hoping Kanye West likes ’30 Rock,’” Harris jokes, referring to the rapper’s wee contretemps with Taylor Swift at the MTV Video Music Awards last Sunday.

5.12 p.m. BEST SUPPORTING COMEDY ACTRESS: KRISTIN CHENOWETH (“PUSHING DAISIES), her first win. 

5:13 p.m. “I’m unemployed now, so I’d like to be on Mad Men. I also like ‘The Office’ and ’24,’” says the co-star of the canceled show, which picked up three Emmys at the “creative arts” portion of the Primetime Emmys last Saturday. 

5:21 p.m. BEST WRITING FOR A COMEDY SERIES: MATT HUBBARD (“30 ROCK”). His “Reunion” episode beat three other “30 Rock” episodes.

5:25 p.m. BEST SUPPORTING COMEDY ACTOR: JON CRYER (“TWO AND A HALF MEN”). His first win after four Emmy nominations. “I used to think that awards were just shallow tokens of momentary popularity,” he said. “But now, I realize they are the only true measure of a person’s worth as a human being.”

from MediaFile:

The fall TV season, beyond Jay Leno

What's that? Jay Leno is moving to prime-time? You don't say!

Frankly, it's hard to remember the last time there was such hubbub about a TV show. It was, after all, the cover story in Time magazine. Not to be outdone, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Reuters, AP, and probably every local news outlet between New York and Hollywood had a story about the talk show host -- more often than not raising the question of whether he's going to save network TV.

(You've got to give it to the public-relations machine on this one. They really worked the story. Of course, their spinning was augmented by a huge marketing effort. Stuart Elliott of the New York Times today estimated that NBC put out more than $10 million in promoting the show).

But there is more to the fall TV season than Jay Leno. The media buyers and planners over at  RPA offer a useful road map to the season in a recent report.

Their take on the fall season is fairly upbeat (maybe network TV doesn't really need Leno to save it).

"For the first time in two years, network fortunes will not be held hostage to the industry's labor problems, but will be determined, as they used to be, by content quality and scheduling... Based on what we've seen, the overall quality of that content looks better than it has in the past two seasons," the report says.

Here, according to RPA, are some things to keep in mind heading into the season:

Watch TV’s Emmy Awards live instead of on TV

American TV fans are being offered the chance of a seat “next to some of the biggest stars in Hollywood” at the annual prime time Emmy television awards next month.

CBS, which will broadcast the Emmy ceremony live from Los Angeles on Sept. 20,  has invited fans to enter a “best seat in the house” contest by submitting a 30-second video explaining why they are “TV’s Number One Fan.”

One prize winner, over the age of 18, will attend the Emmy Awards and will be seated  among the stars for the glitzy three-hour award ceremony.

Bill Binenstock, vice president of CBS.com, said the contest was a “great way to get fans involved” in the TV industry’s biggest night.  Actor Neil Patrick Harris, star of the  TV comedy “How I Met Your Mother”, will host the ceremony, and comedy “30 Rock” and drama series “Mad Men” are expected to be  be among the big winners.

from MediaFile:

Good days for cable TV

A year ago, the big story around Emmy nominations was the acclaim showered on cable programs like "Mad Men" and "Damages." A quick glance at today's nominations indicates little has changed.

Just look at the best drama category, where Fox's "House" and ABC's "Lost" will face stiff competition from cable's "Big Love" (HBO), "Mad Men" (AMC), "Damages" (FX), and "Breaking Bad" (AMC).

While the Emmy awards aren't everything -- ratings are still the holy grail -- they certainly don't hurt. Particularly when it comes to cable networks, which have built a reputation for developing more sophisticated, bolder programs than the broadcast counterparts.

While ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox are under heavy pressure from advertisers (and their corporate parents) to show immediate results, the cable networks can take more care with their programs. After all, they draw some revenue from carriage deals and subscriptions, which buys shows like "Breaking Bad" some time to develop.

That seems to be paying dividends -- and not only when it comes to awards. While broadcast TV advertising rates are still at a sizable premium to cable, most advertising executives say the gap is shrinking. Couple that with carriage fees and a generally lower cost structure and you see why TV executives like NBC Universal's Jeff Zucker spend so much time talking up their cable assets.

Keep an eye on:

Will Carrie Underwood steal Kenny Chesney’s crown?

Carrie Underwood has become country music’s biggest star since she exploded onto the scene after winning American Idol in 2005, but so far she’s been passed over as the Academy of Country Music’s Entertainer of the Year, which has gone to only six women in 39 years.

In fact in recent years, country superstar Kenny Chesney has had a lock on the Entertainer of the Year award, taking it home in 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008.

But this could be the year for Carrie, who has achieved enormous crossover success, winning four Grammy awards already in her short career. She is the lone woman nominated in 2009, facing off against Brad Paisley, George Strait , Keith Urban and – of course – Chesney. (Updates to four Grammys).

And remember, Chesney touched off a country music furor last year when, after winning Entertainer of the Year for the fourth straight time, he criticized the Academy for allowing the award to be chosen by fans voting on the Internet.

“I don’t think its right that they picked the one award that means the most, that all the artists sacrificed the most for, and turned it into a … sweepstakes,” Chesney said at the time.

Those remarks prompted some wags to suggest that he should give the trophy back.

The suspense ends on Sunday night at the 44th annual Academy of Country Music Awards, which will be handed out at a ceremony hosted by Reba McEntire at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas and broadcast live on CBS.

AFI’s 10 Greatest Films in Classic Genres. Do you agree?

The American Film Institute unveiled its list of the “10 Greatest Films in 10 Classic Genres” in a three-hour CBS Television Network special this week. A jury of 1,500 film artists, critics and historians named the following films as the very best in their genres but do you agree?:

2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (Science Fiction) – CITY LIGHTS (Romantic Comedy) – THE GODFATHER (Gangster) -  LAWRENCE OF ARABIA (Epic) – RAGING BULL (Sports) – THE SEARCHERS (Western) – SNOW WHITE AND THE SEVEN DWARFS (Animation) – TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD (Courtroom Drama) – VERTIGO (Mystery) - THE WIZARD OF OZ (Fantasy).

For a full list of the honorees in each category go to the AFI Web site.  

U.S. tunes in, turns on to “Swingtown”

The reviews for “Swingtown” may not have been great, but U.S. television audiences — at least those not watching the National Basketball Association championship game — didn’t seem to mind as some 8.6 million total viewers tuned in to Thursday night’s premiere of the new CBS program about sexual adventurism in 1970s suburban America.

“Swingtown” garnered 8.6 million total viewers and a 2.7 rating among adults 18-49, while a rival program in the same 10 p.m. hour, ”Fear Itself,” had 5.2 million viewers and a 2 rating among adults 18-49.

On the east coast, “Swingtown” competed with the widely-watched NBA game between the Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Lakers, which won first-place and relegated “Swingtown” to second. “Fear Itself” came in third.

“Swingtown” replaced “Without a Trace” in the 10 p.m. slot for CBS. By comparison, last week’s episode of “Without a Trace,” which was a rerun, had 8.5 million viewers and a 2.1 rating among adults 18-49, according to Nielsen. 

“Swingtown” has won a lot of media attention because it covers a topic – married couples with multiple sex partners — that typically would not be on a broadcast network like CBS and would likely show up on cable TV where standards over what can be put on TV are less restrictive.

While reviews were rough, several of our Fan Fare readers seemed to like it. You can check out the comments on the blog posting from yesterday “‘Sex’ sold, but will ‘Swingtown’? Reviews are in.”

“David” writes “I don’t care what those stuffy newspapers say, I loved Swingtown!”

“Sex” sold, but will “Swingtown”? Reviews are in.

That old advertising axiom, “sex sells,” certainly held true for the film “Sex and the City,” which debuted at No. 1 in U.S. movie theaters last weekend with $56 million in ticket sales and has since added about another $12 million.

But a new “sex sells” question mark will be raised Thursday night when the CBS broadcast network debuts ”Swingtown,” about suburban sexual adventurism in the 1970s, complete with orgies, drug use and a touch of nostalgia.

The show has caused speculation over whether a broadcast network can truly do justice to the idea of a lifestyle with multiple sex partners because broadcasters face far greater restrictions than cable networks over the amount of sexual and other adult content in programs.

So far, a few critics are weighing in and several have expressed doubt.

The New York Times said: “Just because an era is amusingly kitsch does not mean it is ripe for dramatic exploration.” The paper noted that cable TV show “Mad Men,” a similar sort of program set in the 1960s that has been a hit with critics, ”plays with all the familiar cues of the period — the music, clothes and raffish ambiance — to frame a mystery that holds viewers’ attention.” “Swingtown,” it said, “has ’70s mystique, but not much mystery.”

The Boston Globe writes that “the older-skewing CBS is almost as far as you can get from HBO … And so while “Swingtown” is racy by network standards, and includes not just sexual situations but all kinds of drug use, it still doesn’t have the freedom to get into the nitty-gritty of a subject that is nothing if not nitty-gritty.”

“For all the industry chatter, the new CBS drama might as well be called ‘That ’70s Sex Show,’” the Los Angeles Times wrote in its review. “A network daring to tread in the R-rated territory previously left to the cable stations — imagine!”

Britney: Is she back “In the zone”?

When a California court granted Britney Spears’ father control of her business and personal affairs on Feb. 1, the troubled 26 year-old pop star had just been released from a Los Angeles hospital after being held for psychiatric evaluation.

It was the second time in one month that her mental state had been questioned by doctors, so there was little question at the time as to whether the court was acting in her best interests. That control — legally known as a conservatorship — has been extended until July 31, and a host of attorneys have been brought in to make decisions for her and audit her business deals.

Yet, this week news has surfaced that Britney is back at work. She released a new video, and is rehearsing and taping an episode of U.S. television comedy “How I Met Your Mother.” Less than 45 days since she was first considered legally unable to make her own decisions, she’s evidently okay to take a job and function on a TV set. One has to wonder just how sick she really is. Put another way, is she back “In the Zone,” which was the name of her 2003 record.

New details may emerge about her mental state at a hearing set for this coming Monday, March 17. It deals with a temporary restraining order against her former self-styled manager Sam Lutfi , who was the man controlling her life until her January hospitalizations. Some people think he is to blame for her problems, but others source her problems to her current handlers including her father. 

What will be said at those hearings is anybody’s guess. But for now, Britney says in a statement she is “having a blast” on the set of “How I Met Your Mother.” And to be sure, it has been weeks since the Louisiana native has been photographed outside her home in Los Angeles wearing those pink wigs and talking in a British accent.