Sitcoms are tricky shows to invest in. They need a little time and a few episodes to grow into the shows they’re meant to be — for 30 Rock to find its manic energy or Community to really let itself be weird. On rare occasions, a comedy’s auspices are clear and realized enough that the tone and thrust of its run makes itself clear from the get go: Modern Family — the overtly affluent, opaquely progressive, and broadly slapstick ensemble that debuted in 2009 — is ABC’s proudest, most lucrative example.
The network sitcoms that survived the initial ratings bloodbath and its subsequent wave of early cancellations, specifically [...]
This has been a transitional season for NBC's comedy department, with the network seemingly abandoning developing hip young shows like Parks and Rec, 30 Rock, and Community to focus on more traditional, broadly-appealing sitcoms like Go On and The New Normal (with much better results, ratings-wise). NBC Entertainment Jennifer Salke spoke to TV Guide today about the changes to the network's comedy strategy:
"We just want a different brand. We don't want a narrow brand in the sense of some of those shows that we inherited here, which we're huge fans of, [but] have a very narrow audience… It would be easy if we hated those shows, but we actually [...]
In an interesting twist of fate for the broadcast networks this past week, NBC finished in first place in the 18-49 demo for “Premiere Week” for the first time since 2003 (back when Friends, Will & Grace, and ER were still things and people cared about The Apprentice). NBC’s ratings rose 12 percent compared to last year’s Premiere Week, whereas the other three big networks (ABC, CBS, Fox) all suffered sharp plunges of at least 20 percent. NBC’s surprising victory is mainly thanks to singing competition The Voice, which is a smash hit on both Mondays and Tuesday nights, and not thanks to the network’s comedies, which [...]
NBC very wisely used their massive Olympic ratings to lead into a preview showing of the (pretty sad) Go On pilot last night, convincing 16.1 million people to not change the channel after the sports were over. These are bananas huge numbers for an NBC sitcom — Parks and Rec averaged 4.4 million viewers per episode last season, for example. Of course, Parks and Rec never had beach volleyball as a lead-in, did it? In any case, it'll be interesting to see how many people come back when the show officially premieres on September 11. Even half of these numbers would be a huge win for NBC.
Some actors make their bones in their eyes. Some actors are masters of voice control. Some can just use body language to convey a lifetime of experiences. (If you've watched Whitney, Whitney exclusively acts by waving her arms around.) John Cho, however, it's all in the eyebrows. Playing it cool? Eyebrows. Pompous? Eyebrows. Concerned? You know it's the eyebrows. In the pilot for Go On, he did a great job playing the boss of the grieving Matthew Perry by displaying all of these eyebrows. (And more!? Not really, it was just those eyebrows.) Well, get used to dem brows, America, because Cho has made a deal to [...]
