Thursday November 30, 2023

Today’s Finale
ABC: The Golden Bachelor at 8p

IN THE NEWS

Disney’s linear networks are not for sale, said CEO Bob Iger at the New York Times DealBook Summit on Wednesday. While Iger had floated the idea in July, that was “a means of my saying to Wall Street or the investment community that our heads were not in the sand about the challenges those businesses were having,” he explained. “I did not want to get accused of being kind of an old media executive. Our company had already shown the ability to basically adapt to new circumstances. So, 1) I wanted to convey that and 2) see what the reaction would be.” And while media coverage of his comments last summer suggested the networks were on the block, “I did not say they were for sale,” said Iger.

Warner Bros. Discovery chief David Zaslav was also at the summit, and it sure sounded like there are no hard feelings between the CEO and fired CNN head Chris Licht (who was in the audience during Zaslav’s session). “There are a lot of good days and a lot of tough days. Chris has had a lot of great days,” noted Zaslav. “He created ‘Morning Joe.’ He created ‘CBS This Morning.’ We had a lot of fun and a lot of battles together. Chris is going to have a lot of great chapters and hopefully some of those with us at Warner Bros. He’s very talented.”

MGM+ has ordered a 10-episode season four of “Godfather of Harlem,” starring Forest Whitaker. The series, produced by ABC Signature, is MGM+’s #1 acquisition driver for subscribers.

Score! Michigan’s victory over Ohio State was the most-watched regular season college football game on any network since 2011. The Fox Sports broadcast drew 19.065 viewers, up 11% over the same match-up in 2022. And Fox’s “Big Noon Kickoff” averaged 2.34 million viewers, Saturday’s most-watched college pre-game show.

Season five of CBS’ “Bob Hearts Abishola” will be its last. “We are so proud to call ‘Bob Hearts Abishola’ a CBS comedy as it helped establish a new generation of programming at the Network,” said Amy Reisenbach, president of CBS Entertainment. “This series expertly showcased a family love story and workplace comedy about the immigrant experience with heartfelt humor and emotion while also authentically portraying Nigerian culture.” The upcoming 13-episode season will run from February 12 to May 13.

Advertisements within NBCUniversal’s Thanksgiving weekend programming reached nearly 80 million total linear viewers in English and in Spanish, with NBC network topping all broadcast and streaming competitors, reports NBCU. NBC’s Thanksgiving primetime NFL matchup between the San Francisco 49ers and Seattle Seahawks outperformed all broadcast and streaming NFL games of the weekend by double digits across all key advertising performance metrics, including Ad Memorability, Message Memorability, Brand Memorability and Ad Likeability, while the “97th Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade” delivered +100% stronger ad message memorability and +50% brand memorability and likeability for brands than standard advertisements across competitive broadcasters.

Jamie Lyn Spears (“Zoey 101”) has left ITV’s “I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here.” A spokesperson for the UK reality series said Spears left for medical reasons, and had been “a fantastic campmate who has triumphed at trials and bonded well with her fell celebrities.” As for Spears, on her penultimate episode she told her castmates, “I hate it, I hate it, I hate it here. This is where people go to have the worst days of their lives.”

The Hollywood strikes had “no material impact” on AMC Networks revenue, CFO Patrick McConnell told investors during an earnings call this week. “We understood and sort of expected there would be some type of work disruption that would arise. We were in the process of reducing our volume of produce content already. So we had a lot of stuff that was going to be on the shelf,” said O’Connell. “I wouldn’t go so far as to call it a nothing burger, but it’s as close to that as it can be financially,” he added. “So we’re set up well going into 2024.”

ONE WEEK AWAY

Cynopsis’ final event of 2023 is almost here. The Reaching Audience in 2024 Virtual Conference takes place Thursday, December 7, from 1-3pm EST, with industry experts offering insights on the solutions that can set you up for success.

REGISTER FOR FREE HERE

Bunim/Murray Productions and Candace Bushnell are teaming to develop a reality dating series. Bushnell, author of the book which inspired HBO’s “Sex and the City,” is also the author of 2019’s “Is There Still Sex in the City?”. And that’s the name of the new show, following four friends in their fifties who relocate from the city to a country chateau, where they will date a variety of men. “We feel that Candace’s brand has grown with her audience and her expertise in the dating space is an incredible entry point for an immersive dating experiment,” said Julie Pizzi, President, Bunim/Murray.

NEW & RETURNING SERIES

“Shogun,” an adaptation of James Clavell’s novel, debuts Tuesday, February 27 on Hulu. The premiere of the 10-episode limited series will include the first two episodes, followed by a new episode each week. In addition to its day-and-date global streaming launch, the FX linear channel will telecast new episodes once each week.

COMING UP

“Saturday Night Live” alum Kate McKinnon returns to the NBC sketch show for her first time as host on December 16, with musical guest Billie Eilish. That’s one week after Adam Driver makes his fourth appearance as host, accompanied by second-timer Olivia Rodrigo.

“TMZ’s Merry Elfin’ Christmas Special” airs Tuesday, December 5 at 9p on Fox. Celebrity guests including Shaq, Tiffany Haddish, Bill Maher, Kyle Richards, Mark Cuban and Gavin DeGraw.

Billionaire investor Charlie Munger sat down with CNBC’s Becky Quick on November 14 for a special interview to commemorate his soon-to-come 100th birthday. Munger passed away on November 28 at the age of 99. “Charlie Munger: A Life of Wit and Wisdom,” including the interview, celebrates Munger’s life and career today at 8p on the business news net.

STREAMING

Not all subscriber churn is bad, according to a report from Magid that includes findings culled from its SubScape, an analytics-driven tool that provides media companies with insights on what drives or inhibits consumer engagement in streaming services. Findings include:
· Income and Churn don’t always go hand in hand. Having less disposable household income isn’t always predictive of churn propensity.
· Traditionally, average subscriber tenure and churn rates was an indicator of business health. But research suggests the more accurate metric is the number of total subscribed months (whether or not they’re contiguous), which recognizes that some subscribers who leave quickly also come back quickly.
· Big tentpole series, expensive to produce and promote, don’t necessarily bolster subscriber engagement.

“The media industry is at an inflection point as savvy consumers are presented with an unending list of viewing options,” said Brent Magid, CEO, and Kate Morgan, chief product officer and head of the Global Media, Entertainment and Games in a statement. “The battle for the acquisition and retention of churn-centric subscribers isn’t slowing down which is why leveraging SubScape’s granular, solution-based insights have been mission critical for our clients as they reimagine their streaming playbook for long term growth.”

FOX Weather has expanded its distribution to include DISH Network and Sling Freestream subscribers.

RETAIL MEDIA

Zitcha and Broadsign have teamed up to integrate the Broadsign OOH advertising platform with Zitcha’s retail media platform. With the combined technologies, a retail brand and its advertising partners can now develop more holistic on and off-site retail marketing strategies and better leverage the retailer’s first-party data. “The potential of in-store retail media is huge and yet still relatively underutilised by retailers and brand advertisers. We think the ability to run in-store screens and report on transactions, similar to other marketing channels, is going to be a game changer for brands looking at how they spend their OOH budgets,” said Troy Townsend, CEO, Zitcha. “By harnessing Zitcha’s unified retail media platform and our native Broadsign integration, retailers around the world wanting a comprehensive retail media solution can simplify and supercharge their in-store screens to drive additional incremental revenues and sales for advertising partners.”

TECH

Amazon introduced Amazon Q, a generative AI-powered assistant for businesses. Users can have tailored conversations, solve problems, generate content, take actions, and more. Amazon Q is aware of which systems users can access, so they can ask detailed questions and get tailored results that include only information they are authorized to see.

SPORTS ROUNDUP

Chivas v. Pumas airs live from Akron Stadium tonight, November 30 at 10p on Telemundo, Universo and Peacock. Telemundo Deportes pregame and postgame show “Futbol Estelar Chivas Extra” airs at 9p and 12a, respectively, on Universo and Peacock.

GOING GLOBAL

Pre-school animation series “The Musical World of Mister Zoink,” created and produced by animation studio A Productions for Sesame, has been bought by Sky and launched in the UK on Sky Kids and Now TV.

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Basic Cable Top 10 for the week of November 20
P2+ AA (000)
Primetime
ESPN 3360
Hallmark Channel 1628
Fox News 1327
MSNBC 797
HGTV 720
Hallmark Movies & Mysteries 661
TNT 623
TBS 607
INSP 604
Food Network 585
Total Day
ESPN 1054
Fox News 997
Hallmark Channel 817
MSNBC 587
CNN 431
Hallmark Movies & Mysteries 422
HGTV 415
Food Network 347
TBS 345
INSP 325
Source: Nielsen

Since the beginning of the Israel-Hamas War on October 7, FOX News Channel has attracted 1.9 million viewers in primetime and 222,000 in the A25-54 demo. In total day, from October 7 to date, FNC has garnered 1.3 million viewers and 162,000 in the demo.

EXECUTIVE MOVES

Kate Nexon has been promoted to President, Domestic TV & Digital Distribution at Lionsgate. Nexon will oversee North American sales, strategy and planning for the company’s first-run film and television pipelines and library.

Jeannie Kedas is joining ABC News as SVP, Publicity and Communications. Kedas was previously at First Look Media, where she served as Chief Communications Officer and EVP.

CBS Media Ventures has hired Stacy Rader to serve as SVP, First-Run Development and Brand Extensions. Rader had been Executive Producer and Head of Branded Partnerships for Sony Pictures Television’s The Good Dish.

IN MEMORIAM

Tony-winning actress Frances Sternhagen died November 27. She was 93. While heralded on Broadway, Sternhagen was perhaps best known to TV audiences as Cliff’s mother on “Cheers.”

Answer to Our Last Trivia Question
Which sport did Charlotte participate in at school in Chicago in “Ozark” (2017-2022)? Swimming. Kudos to: Marni C. Gold/Hawthorne, NJ; Rob Casalaina-ITN/NYC; Susan Nessanbaum-Goldberg-M and S Entertainment/LA; Tom Moore-Kalt Productions/LA; Adam Leston-Wiegel Broadcasting/Milwaukee; David Westberg-SAG-AFTRA Credit Union/Burbank

Today’s Trivia Question
What was the name of Fred and Ethel’s dog on “I Love Lucy” (1951-57)? (Email [email protected] with your answer and be sure to include your name, company, city and time zone. Unofficial rules: a limit of four answers per time zone.)

Cynopsis Team