Black Widow
07-21-2008, 05:43 PM
Farming It Out, Branding the Livestock
The CW does, however, account for its Sunday nights, which consists of four shows produced by Media Rights Capital. It's a curious mix: In Harm's Way, a documentary show about dangerous jobs; Surviving Suburbia, a sitcom starring Bob Saget; Valentine, about a family of Greek gods who try to foster love around them; and Easy Money, a drama starring Laurie Metcalf about a family that runs a high interest loan business.
The big question is why The CW felt the need to hand over its Sunday programming block to this other company.
"The Sunday night formatting was a great opportunity for us to not have WWE [Smackdown] on Friday night, where it was really all men," says Ostroff. "There was no duplication in our audience at all for any of our other shows. When we look at the shows we're putting on Sunday night, we have real opportunity for flow. For viewers, it will be seamless ... in fact, much more seamless than WWE has been for the network."
As a strong performer, WWE, or rather its absence, may affect the network's overall ratings.
"It was a really tough decision and a bold decision to decide to take WWE off. It was not easy," acknowledge Ostroff. "The strategy of being able to brand this network was what we were thinking about."
Okay, gotcha. Forget men, bring on the women.
But with such branding, it's still unclear who has final say over the MRC shows, in which the CW insists they have creative control. Apparently the deal with MRC is so labyrinthine, Ostroff evades the critics' attempts to have her explain the deal three times. On the final round, she merely responds, "Let's leave it at it's a very complicated deal and we'll leave it at that. It is. Next question."
The CW does, however, account for its Sunday nights, which consists of four shows produced by Media Rights Capital. It's a curious mix: In Harm's Way, a documentary show about dangerous jobs; Surviving Suburbia, a sitcom starring Bob Saget; Valentine, about a family of Greek gods who try to foster love around them; and Easy Money, a drama starring Laurie Metcalf about a family that runs a high interest loan business.
The big question is why The CW felt the need to hand over its Sunday programming block to this other company.
"The Sunday night formatting was a great opportunity for us to not have WWE [Smackdown] on Friday night, where it was really all men," says Ostroff. "There was no duplication in our audience at all for any of our other shows. When we look at the shows we're putting on Sunday night, we have real opportunity for flow. For viewers, it will be seamless ... in fact, much more seamless than WWE has been for the network."
As a strong performer, WWE, or rather its absence, may affect the network's overall ratings.
"It was a really tough decision and a bold decision to decide to take WWE off. It was not easy," acknowledge Ostroff. "The strategy of being able to brand this network was what we were thinking about."
Okay, gotcha. Forget men, bring on the women.
But with such branding, it's still unclear who has final say over the MRC shows, in which the CW insists they have creative control. Apparently the deal with MRC is so labyrinthine, Ostroff evades the critics' attempts to have her explain the deal three times. On the final round, she merely responds, "Let's leave it at it's a very complicated deal and we'll leave it at that. It is. Next question."