CYNTHIA TURNER’S
Cyn opsis

01/12/05

Good morning. It’s Wednesday, January 12, 2005, and this is your first early morning briefing. 

The part 2 premiere of Fox’s 24 drew a 5.0/12 A18-49 on Monday night in final ratings from Nielsen Media Research. M18-49 chimed in stronger with a 5.5/14 for the 2-hour premiere evening.  Fox won both hours in those key demos over a tie between NBC’s Fear Factor and ABC‘s premiere of EMHE: How’d They Do That?, both pulling a 4.2/11.  For its first four hours, 24 has averaged  a 5.5/13 A18-49 over two nights, up 38% vs. the first four hours of last season (4.0/10).  ABC’s 2-hour premiere of The Bachelorette pulled a decent 4.3/10 A18-49, with higher marks in the women demo: 6.0/13 W18-49, 6.5/15 W18-34. NBC’s Medium second week averaged a very healthy 6.3/15, winning the time period well ahead of The Bachelorette as well as a repeat of CSI Miami (4.7/11), and building on its Las Vegas lead-in by four share points.

HBO premiered the second season of Carnivale on Sunday night at 9pm and drew 1.8 million viewers on the network’s primary pay channel (tally numbers for HBO no longer include the digital offspring of the network), significantly down from the series 2003 debut which pulled in a very strong 5.3 million viewers – and had a S#x and the City lead-in.  At 9pm was the debut of Unscripted dropped more than half of its lead-in, delivering 814,000 viewers.

One time airing of The Will on CBS was apparently all that was needed.  This weekend, a repeat of Cold Case will air in its place at 8pm.

Casting / Development / Production

• TNT has picked up 13 episodes of a new crime drama called Rush starring Gary Cole, per Hollywood Reporter.  The LA storyline revolves around an elite undercover crime unit targeting the city’s most wanted criminals.
• ABC has ordered up three new pilots: Laws of Chance (Roundtable Entertainment) is about a clever Houston based female assistant district attorney going up against good-ol’ boy defense attorneys. Pros and Cons (Touchstone TV) from JJ Abrams about a group of five con artists who work for the FBI; and Invasion (Warner Bros. TV and Shaun Cassidy) finds strange things happening in a small Florida town in the days following a massive hurricane.  Little green men have not been ruled out.
• Currently in development at Comedy Central is an improv comedy from Matt Ballard, Chris Crockett and David Wain called Teach’s Lounge.

CABLEready and St.Paul based independent producer Bosch Media will develop a new reality series called House of Babies which centers on the lives and drama of the students in a midwifery educational facility. Viewers will follow the stories of the parents who have chosen midwifery as a birthing option, and the midwives and students.  Bosch Media will produce 13 half-hour episodes of the series. 

Last Sunday VH1 enjoyed an evening of premieres beginning with the fourth season of The Surreal Life at 9pm, earning a 1.6 A18-49 rating and 2.25 million viewers 2+. At 10p Strange Love with Flavor Flav and Brigitte Nielsen drew a 1.3 A18-49 rating and 1.8 million viewers.   Monday night at 11pm, VH1 debuted a third new series, Celebrity Fit Club with celebs competing on teams to lose weight, and drew an average of 1.1 A18-49 demo with 1.5 million viewers.

King World has sold the weekend broadcast syndication rights CSI: NY to 75% f the country, to start in Fall 2008. Top 30 market clearances include: WCBS/NY; KCBS/LA; WBBM/Chicago; KYW/Philadelphia; WBZ/Boston; KPIX/San Francisco; KTVT/Dallas; WUSA/Washington; WUPA/Atlanta; KHOU/Houston; KSTW/Seattle; WTOG/Tampa; WCCO/Minneapolis; KTVK/Phoenix; WEWS/Cleveland; WFOR/Miami; KCNC/Denver; KCRA/Sacramento; WKCF/Orlando.   CSI: NY kicks off in Fall 2008; CSI: Miami begins earlier, in Fall 2006.

Television Critics Association (TCA) Updates:  The TCA is going on now and broadcast and cable networks are making their annual presentations to the press of new series and specials for the upcoming here. 

Food Network:

• Iron Chef America debuts January 16 at 9pm – just like the original Iron Chef with a US bent.
• Food Network Challenge premieres on January 9 at 10p, featuring cook-offs from small towns to world championship events.
• Take It Off is on the schedule for March 2005 with host Juan Carlos Cruz assisting regular folks in healthfully adjusting diets and lifestyles to obtain weight goals in time for upcoming events
• The Dave Lieberman Show (working title) kicks off in April 2005 shows viewers how to live the high cuisine life on a just-folks budget
• The Next Food Network Star will debut in June and this reality show is searching for the next Food Network showstopper, with host Marc Summers. Winner gets a six episode series premiering next September.

Court TV:

• Takedown: Casino premieres its pilot episode on June 7, and then the series premieres in 4th qtr 2005. Takedown: Casino attempts to scam casinos, beating the cards, beating the odds,and beating the anti-scam technology.
• Parco: PI is set to debut in 3rd qtr 2005 and is described as Arrested Development meets Growing Up Gotti, a hybrid reality-docu-drama series focusing on the Parco family of private detectives
• High Stakes with Ben Mezrich kicks off in 4th qtr, and follows best-selling author Mezrich as he infiltrates the world of the young and very very rich, on their own playgrounds, exploring their world of wealth, beauty, action and some times danger.
• The Chase begins on August 23 is a race – ‘fugitives’ on one side attempting to get to the pot of gold before being picked up by expert and professional trackers using high end technology and their wits.
• Impossible Heists premieres on March 15 and pits two teams of professional attempting to execute a heist while eluding elaborate security measures, within a specified period of time. Each setup is a recreation of a famous or infamous and some times unsolved heist.

Oxygen:

• Mr. Romance kicks off on the first of five episodes (and a 2-hour finale) on March 14 at 10p, a reality show looking for the next Harlequin romance book cover model; created by Gene Simmons of KISS. Winner gets a cover deal and $50k in cash. Judges include Fabio and Gene Simmons.
• Confessions of a Sociopathic Social Climber is an original Oxygen movie based on the novel by Adele Lang, and starring Jennifer Love Hewitt, airs March 12.
• Nadine in Dateland is another Oxygen original movie starring Janeane Garofalo, and set to air in the spring.

BET: Celebrating its 25th anniversary this year –

• College Hill will kick off its second season on January 27 with 13 weeks of new eps at Langston University in Oklahoma
• Rip the Runway debuts on March 24, featuring the mix of hip hop and high fashion
• The Cousin Jeff Chronicles premieres in March and is a four part series with RAP CITY’s Cousin Jeff Johnson addressing issues of importance to the Latino and Black communities
• Book of Love – The Definitive Reason Why Men are Dogs is an original film scheduled to debut on February 14
• New tagline for the anniversary year is “It’s My Thing”, and a slight adjustment to the network logo

Top Ten Basic Cable Ad Supported Network Rankings among Total Viewers for the week of January 3-9, 2005:
Primetime       (000)   Total Pgm Day   (000)
TNT              2728     NICK              2223
USA              2357     NAN*              1666
NAN              1985     TNT               1429
LIFETIME         1818    CARTOON  1320
TBS              1809     LIFETIME         1205
CARTOON 1791     USA              1157
FOXNEWS 1605     TBS              1121
SPIKE            1547     FOXNEWS 898
ABC FAMILY      1408     ABC FAMILY      806
ESPN             1341     ESPN              741
Source Turner Research from Nielsen Media Research Data.
All ratings based on Total U.S. Television Universe of 108,400,000 homes
* = Network broadcasts less than 51% of minutes in a 24 hour day. Primetime listing only includes those networks broadcasting more than 51% of the primetime hours (M-Su 8p-11p)

Top Ten Basic Cable Ad Supported Network Rankings among A18-49 for the week of January 3-9, 2005:
Primetime       (000)   Total Pgm Day   (000)
TNT              1388     TNT               777
USA              1151     NAN*              724
TBS              1107     TBS               679
SPIKE            801      USA               598
LIFETIME         761     LIFETIME         549
DISCOVERY        680     NICK              532
ABC FAMILY      600      ESPN              406
MTV              553      SPIKE             371
SCI-FI           534      MTV               361
NAN              531      DISCOVERY        358
Source Turner Research from Nielsen Media Research Data.
All ratings based on Total U.S. Television Universe of 108,400,000 homes.
* = Network broadcasts less than 51% of minutes in a 24 hour day. Primetime listing only includes those networks broadcasting more than 51% of the primetime hours (M-Su 8p-11p)

Intermedia Advertising Group’s Top Ten Most Effective New Ads for new campaigns airing the weeks of December 20, 2004 – January 2, 2005. The list is ranked by viewer’s ability to recall the new ads and their associated products and brands. The Recall Score is the percentage of TV viewers who within 24 hours are able to remember the brand of the ad they saw during normal TV viewing. The scores are then indexed against the mean score for all ads during the time period to create the Recall Index; 100 is Average. For example, with a Recall Index of 237, the top-ranked Subway spot was more than twice as memorable as the average new ad during the period. Source Intermedia Advertising Group Inc.’s 2004 Ad Performance Data Series ( www.iagr.net )
– 237 SUBWAY: Turkey Sub–Jared compares Big Mac to turkey sub, has half the calories
– 234 KFC: Spicy BBQ Wings–firemen stop eating from too much flavor (:30)
– 212 KFC: Spicy BBQ Wings–close-up of wings, Honey BBQ Wings (:15)
– 205 GLAD: Force Flex–truck drives away over a cliff, trash spills everywhere, Force Flex catches it all
– 201 NETZERO: Computer monitors, Dennis Miller says all computers take you to the same Internet (:15)
– 198 NETZERO:  Computer monitors, Dennis Miller says all computers take you to the same Internet (:30)
– 193 TARGET: Boy sitting on couch eats soup, soup falls on floor, woman rock climbing gets dirty
– 176 TACO BELL: Big Bell Value Menu–man screams as friend tries to hit golf ball, man at costume party is full
– 166 TARGET: Man pulls table cloth & breaks table, woman in convertible has hair come loose
– 166 WENDY’S: retch Boots–Buy two get one free–brunette uses aerosol can to spray on tall black boots (:15)

For the first time Home Box Office (HBO) has entered into an agreement with the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) to play three of the pay TV network’s original public interest movies on PBS one month after their respective debuts on HBO. 

• Dirty War is a fictional tale of a terrorist attack in London, set to debut on HBO on January 24 and on PBS on February 23. PBS will include a biological warfare panel discussion as part of the film’s surrounding programming. 
• The Raoul Peck-written and directed Sometimes in April tells the tales of the 1994 genocidal violence in Rwanda starring Idris Elba and Debra Winger.  It will premiere on HBO in March followed by PBS in April. 
• In Yesterday, a young mother in African deals with AIDS. 

The only movie requiring serious re-editing for PBS is Dirty War with a scene showing those exposed to the biological agent are forced to shed their clothes (editing more to avoid possible FCC issues rather than its “racy” content according to HBO chairman Chris Albrecht).  This agreement between the two networks will make these films available to a wider array of television audiences.  PBS is creating panel discussions centering on each individual film’s core theme.  In yesteryears, HBO has screened some of its original films in theaters before airing them on TV (usually as a run for the Academy Awards) but has never aired them on free TV before.

Fox Sports World, the soccer channel, will officially change its name to Fox Soccer Channel, at the stroke of midnight, Monday, February 7.    Sister network, Fox Sports will offer a sneak peek at the channel during the Super Bowl Pre-Game Show, Sunday, February 6, 2p.  Additionally, Fox Soccer Channel will sport a new graphic look, sound (music) and on-air messaging, as well as an off channel consumer marketing campaign to support the transition.

Derek Koenig has been named SVP/Marketing, US Division of Discovery Communications Inc., reporting to Ken Dice, EVP/Marketing, Discovery Networks US. Derek will provide strategic and creative brand leadership in management of consumer marketing campaigns with primary responsibility for TLC.  Koenig will identify and leverage strategic partnerships and brand extension opportunities for the network. 

Last night David Letterman skewered his own network with his Top Ten Proposed Changes to CBS News.  You’ll want to check this out:  http://www.cbs.com/latenight/lateshow/top_ten/archive/ls_topten_archive2005/ls_topten_archive_20050111.shtml

As in previous years, this January Cynopsis will provide its NATPE Syndicated Program Guide listing of NEW SERIES only coming to market in preparation for this year’s conference in Las Vegas.  If you have information you’d like listed for a new strip or weekly series, please send it to me at
(with NATPE listing in the subject line), and provide the name of the series, #/eps, distributor name/phone/booth or suite number, terms (cash, cash+, barter split), and frequency.  Because of space, no OTOs, specials, movie packages, quarterly shows or returning series are included in the listing. For Children’s Programming, please send your new series information (please add if its live action/animation and target age group) to Gwen Billings for the Cynopsis Kids NATPE Syndicated Program Guide at
.   The deadline for submissions is January 14; the Syndicated Guides will be sent to all subscribers on Wednesday, January 19, the week before the convention.

Monday, January 10, 2005. FINAL Ratings for all Networks – program averages.  Source: Nielsen Media Research.
[p] = Premiere; [r] = Repeat

CBS     8.5/13   Still Standing [r] 6.5/10, Listen Up [r] 6.0/9, Raymond [r] 10.2/15, 2-1/2 Men [r] 9.1/13, CSI: Miami [r] 9.6/15

NBC     8.2/12   Fear Factor 6.4/10, Las Vegas 7.9/12, Medium 10.4/16

FOX     7.6/11   24 [season premiere – part 2]  7.6/11

ABC     6.6/10   EMHE: How’d They Do That? [p] 7.4/11, The Bachelorette [p] 6.3/9

UPN     2.1/3    One on One [r] 2.0/3, Half and Half [r] 2.1/3, Girlfriends [r] 2.3/3, Second Time Around 2.0/3

WB      2.0/3    10th Annual Critics Choice Awards (OTO)  2.0/3

A18-49  NBC 5.1/12, Fox 5.0/12, ABC 4.3/10, CBS 4.2/10, UPN 1.2/3, WB 1.0/3

The History Channel presents This Day in History:
1921 – Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis is appointed commissioner of baseball.

Answer to Yesterday’s Trivia Question: When the tag line says, “Nothing comes closer to home”, to whom or what does it refer?  STOUFFER’S FOODS.  Kudos to: Sally Ferrante-NBC Universal/NY; Sheryl Rosen-The Lawyers Group/Stamford; Christina Owen-Millenia 3 Comm/Atlanta; Peter Bakalian-Rankin Bass Prods/NY; Anne Pogue-Univ of Chicago/Chicago; Mark Edwards-KEZK/St. Louis; Catherine Hudspeth-KLRT/Little Rock; Steve Morabito-WJHG/Panama City; Rose Pacette-Pauline Center for Media Studies/Culver City; Jeanne Harrison-samfilm/San Francisco; Bruce Moccia-Pappadoc Prods/Palm Springs; Trisha Reece-Weller Grossman Prods/North Hollywood; and Mitch Altman/Toronto.

A MESSAGE FROM COURT TV

A letter to Court TV’s Miss X:

Today’s Trivia Question:  Step into your syndication way-back machine and tell me what series starred Bill Daily as a veterinarian, Dr. James Shepherd?  (no fair looking this stuff up!)  (click here with your answer and be sure to include your name, company, city and time zone with your answer.  Unofficial rules: Only the second four correct answers from each time zone will be mentioned; and once you’ve been mentioned in any of the Cynopsis editions, you can’t be mentioned again that calendar week.)

Later — Cyn
01.12.06

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WHAT’S ON TONIGHT:  JANUARY 12, 2005:

ABC              Lost, Alias, Wife Swap
CBS              60 Minutes, King of Queens, Center of the Universe, CSI: NY
FOX              That 70’s Show, Quintuplets, Nanny 911
NBC              SI: Swimsuit Model Search, The West Wing, Law & Order
PAX              Doc, Sue Thomas F.B.Eye, Early Edition
UPN              Road to Stardom with Missy Elliott, Kevin Hill
WB               Smallville [r], Big Man on Campus
TELE             La Mujer en el Espejo, Gitanas, Te Voy a Ensenar a Querer
UNIV             Rubi, Amor Real, Don Francisco Presenta