Fan Fare

VP Joe Biden to visit Jay Leno on Friday

Days after it was revealed that “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” posted its lowest-rated second-quarter since rival talk show “The Late Show with David Letterman” launched on CBS in 1993, NBC is looking to the Obama administration for help.

The network said on Tuesday that Vice President Joe Biden would stop by Leno’s show for the third time on Friday. Biden first visited the Burbank set in March 2007, as a U.S. senator. He returned in October 2008, as a vice presidential nominee.

Biden is scheduled to share the spotlight with Adrien Brody and musical guest Chris Isaak. Maybe, Biden and Leno can swap notes over their ratings problems. If politics isn’t your thing, Letterman has booked Kate Hudson, Indy 500 Winner Dario Franchitti and musical guest Sarah McLachlan.

While Leno still leads Letterman, his Q2 ratings fell to their lowest levels among total viewers, adults 18-49, and adults 25-54 since 1993, according to Nielsen data parsed by Deadline.com.

Waiting for the fate of Jack Bauer, answers to “Lost”

Sure, TV networks may already be looking ahead to  the fall — they’re all gathered in New York this week unveiling next season’s line up to advertisers – but viewers are still anchored firmly in the present, waiting with bated breath to see how their favorite TV shows will leave them hanging through the summer — or, in some cases, permanently.

CW’s freshman breakout hit “The Vampire Diaries” was one of the first shows to wrap for the season last week with a heart-stopping finale that the New York Post’s PopWrap said set the bar “for which all other 2010 season finales will be judged.”

This week, season finales ramped up with more than a dozen dramas saying au revoir until the fall. Among those include “Desperate Housewives”, “Brothers and Sisters”, “House”,  “Grey’s Anatomy” and “The Mentalist”.

But what a lot of fans are likely waiting for is the line up next week, when long-running hit shows “24″ and “Lost” both bid a final farewell with 2 hour finales.

After eight seasons of fighting terrorism and losing nearly everyone close to him, what’s left for Jack Bauer? Has he finally reached the breaking point?

And what about “Lost” fans? Will they get a Sopranos-like ambiguous ending? Or, will they learn what the island’s mysterious light source represents and which one of the Oceanic Six will be chosen as its protector?

Many of TV’s top rated dramas are also wrapping up for the season next week: “NCIS”, “NCIS: Los Angeles”, “Criminal Minds”, and “The Good Wife”.

‘Law & Order’ faces early death sentence

If “Law & Order” were a killer, it would have received the lethal injection years ago.

A report circulated Thursday that the NBC crime procedural famed for its “ripped-from-the-headlines” plots might finally be canceled at the end of its current 20th season, just one year short of replacing “Gunsmoke” as the longest-running drama in American primetime history.

Fans were shocked. Even though the show can no longer get arrested in the ratings, the perceived wisdom was that no NBC executive would want to go down in history as the perp who denied “Law & Order” a chance to rewrite the record books. The show could still cop a plea, possibly relegated to cable like its spin-off “Criminal Intent.” Or, once again, its producers could bump off some expensive cast members in a bid to trim costs if NBC demands a lower license fee to air it.

Coincidentally or not, S. Epatha Merkerson (pictured below) said last month she would quit at the end of this season after 17 years. Her cancer-stricken character, Lt. Van Buren, is the show’s mainstay amid an accelerating revolving door of cops and litigators. Quick, name any of the other actors or characters from this season – apart from 16-year veteran Sam Waterston’s sidelined D.A. character Jack McCoy, of course.

The sad fact is that the one-time Emmy winner for best drama (all the way back in 1997) never recovered from the departure of the late Jerry Orbach (a.k.a. wise-cracking Det. Lennie Briscoe) at the end of Season 14 in 2004. That was the last year the show made the season’s top 20 (No. 14, 16 million viewers). As this season nears its end, it ranks at No. 60 with just 7.3 million viewers.

At least the other spin-off, “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” is doing OK — even if year-on-year ratings are off by a similar amount (about 10 percent) as the mothership “Law & Order”. Nearing the end of its 11th season, “SVU” ranks at No. 40 with 9.3 million viewers. The show’s cast, headed by Mariska Hargitay and Christopher Meloni, has remained remarkably stable. But maybe some cross-pollination is in order? SVU’s Ice-T (pictured at left) as a thuggish new lieutenant on L&O, for starters?

Conan debacle inspires comic digs galore

It has become a battle of who can win the most sharp-tongued digs.

Conan O’Brien’s statement released two days ago that he will not be bullied by NBC back into a later timeslot has sparked a competition over which late night host can squeeze in as many quick fire NBC slaps in their opening monologue as possible.

 On Wednesday night O’Brien was more combative in his comedic tone than the previous night, in a message directed to “the kids out there watching: You can do anything you want in life. Unless Jay Leno wants to do it too.”

He also took a direct dig at executives talking about the strong audience “American Idol” receives at rival network Fox – where it is speculated O’Brien may eventually move to: “When they heard that, NBC executives said “That’s not true, there’s no such thing as an audience of 30 million people.”

 But David Letterman predictably has been able to be even more aggressive calling NBC executives “pinheads” and “nitwits” and “twits” after his own tumultuous relationship with the network in the early1990s following more than a decade with the network. Last night his nightly top ten was based on messages left on NBC chief executive Jeff Zucker’s voicemail and he also took potshots at Leno himself.

The jibes delighted the audiences and left others wondering how far can their zingers go? How long will NBC give the hosts ample fodder for laughs at their expense? Can Leno and NBC turn it around?

from DealZone:

Comcast the Barbarian?

Conan O'Brien could well be headed to Fox after making it clear to NBC that he will not go graciously into the later night. But a channel-changing question that is making the rounds has more to do with what the drama unfolding between O'Brien and former Tonight Show host Jay Leno says about NBC and its agreed joint venture with Comcast. If nothing else, the lack of replacement programming for the slot Leno is vacating, and the purported profitability NBC still enjoyed by having a cheaper, single-star variety show in a traditionally pricey prime-time slot, raise an obvious question -- why the rush?

John Hudson at the AtlanticWire does a nice job of collecting some thoughts on pressure that was probably building from Comcast, from angry affiliates who wanted Leno and his show's crummy ratings out of that vital pre-news slot, to improving PR.

"Though NBC Universal Chairman Jeff Gaspin said the Comcast deal has nothing to do with the decision, pundits say Gaspin has 'every incentive to show improvement' before his new bosses at Comcast takeover," Hudson says.

NBC said local affiliates had seen a 30 percent drop in audiences for their 11 p.m. news shows because of the weak lead-in from Leno. That would certainly have been alarming to Comcast, which knows a lot more about getting content into people's homes than it does about who is funnier, Conan or Leno.

Another reason Comcast may be the ultimate culprit here is change itself. Taking big, noisy, tough decisions before the deal with NBC gets its regulatory blessing means not having to take them when a new bunch of executives is taking charge of the remote control.

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:

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:

“Weatherman” Al Roker, Speidi wage war of words

Speidi “Get me Out of Here!” jungle drama drags on

(Writing and reporting by Laura Isensee)

The first contestant got voted off reality television show “I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!” on Thursday night, and (shock) it wasn’t Spencer and Heidi Pratt. All week long, speculation in celebrity media reports has been about whether they would be allowed to return to the TV contest show after seeming to walk off in a huff on Monday’s show and head back to Hollywood.

For those who don’t know, on “I’m a Celebrity,” B-list stars compete in challenges like eating bugs to see who can survive a battle of willpower in a Coast Rican jungle.

On Thursday’s episode, audiences were supposed to find out if, after Monday’s antics, Heidi and Spencer — dubbed “Speidi” in the media — would be allowed to return. Instead, it appears the on-again, off-again saga of the husband-and-wife team has yet another chapter.

NBC is dragging out whether the couple is really — like, for sure — back on the survival show. Viewers have to tune in to a special two-hour episode on Monday to see if the newlyweds, formerly of “The Hills” on MTV, make it back to camp after a trial stay in a creepy house called the “Lost Chamber”. (And if that is not enough Speidi, fans who love them — or love to hate them — can check out a mini-marathon of “I’m a Celebrity” on MTV over the weekend.)

The tease is no surprise, really. Aside from competitors arguing about Speidi and flashbacks of their plea to return, Thursday’s highlights included how former supermodel Janice Dickinson grossed out other campers and became a jungle thief by nabbing a pillow and shower kit. Exciting? We’re not so sure. But 5.2 million people tuned in to watch Thursday’s episode, according to initial overnight ratings. That’s not as much as the premier, which drew 6.4 million viewers, but on par with Tuesday’s 5.5 million viewers and up from Wednesday night’s 4.8 million.

Angela V. Shelton, part of the comedy duo called “Frangela,” got voted off on Thursday night, the first contestant to officially leave. Shelton told reporters on a conference call on Friday that she thinks Speidi should not be allowed back on.

Speidi celebrity walkaway, real or a stunt?

(Writing and reporting by Laura Isensee)

There’s no such thing as bad publicity, as they say in showbiz (see Sacha Baron Cohen and his MTV stunt with Eminem), and this back-and-forth is creating buzz for the NBC show, where Hollywood D-listers like “American Idol” contestant Sanjaya Malakar and born again Christian Stephen Baldwin battle for survival — and a return to fame — in a Costa Rican jungle.

Spencer and Heidi Pratt, dubbed Speidi, exited the jungle on the summer adventure’s first episode, which drew 6.4 million viewers. Yet on the second day, celebrity Web site TMZ reported they asked to come back and the couple reappeared on Tuesday night.

Adding to the confusion — and the buzz – have been reports that a Speidi double faked the couple’s return to Los Angeles airport and that Spencer and Heidi are telling people they never really planned to quit, bragging it was to mess with the competition.