Moraes on TV

Oprah: "Yellow brick road of blessings" is ending

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 12:02:17 -0500

(12:55: this entry has been updated with Discovery Communications statement.) "After much prayer and months of careful thought, I've decided the next season, season 25, will be the last season of the "Oprah Winfrey Show'," daytime TV host Oprah Winfrey said Friday morning in a sometimes teary-eyed announcement confirming what her production company had announced to TV stations the previous evening. "Why walk away and make the next season the last?" she asked rhetorically on the show, which aired Friday morning in Chicago, where her Harpo Productions is based. "Here is the real reason -- I love this show. This show has been my life. And I love it enough to know when it's time to say 'goodbye.' Twenty-five years feels right in my bones and it feels right in my spirit. It's the perfect number, the exact right time. So I hope you will take this 18-month ride with

Palin gooses Oprah's numbers

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 20:55:05 -0500

Sarah Palin performed like the Osmond family for Oprah Winfrey. According to Nielsen's early stats, Palin's pre-taped interview with Oprah, which aired Monday on the daytime diva's syndicated talker, clocked the show's best household rating and share since a Nov. 9, 2007 broadcast. That day, Oprah's guest was the entire Osmond family. Nielsen has not yet said how many actual people saw the Palin chat on Oprah's show. Likewise, we do not yet have final stats for those portions of Palin's interview with Barbara Walters that have aired on ABC's "Good Morning America," "World News," or "Nightline." Sigh.

NBC moves Emmys to August; puny ratings to follow

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 20:36:44 -0500

NBC announced Wednesday it is moving the Primetime Emmy Awards to Sunday, Aug. 29. The annual trophy show traditionally airs the Sunday before the start of the TV season, in mid-September. But NBC has a contract to air NFL football on Sunday nights and those games rev up before the start of the TV season. Hence the Aug. 29 Emmy date. In its announcement, NBC noted that the last time it aired the Emmys, in 2006 (NBC, ABC, CBS and Fox take turns airing the trophy show), the trophy show also had to air in late August and yet it clocked its biggest audience of the past four years. It's true, that 2006 Emmycast averaged about 16 million viewers and the next year the show's audience plunged to 13 million after which it only attracted an average of 12.3 million viewers, followed by 13.5 million this past September. On

Palin is ready for her close-up: We watch so you don't have to

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 14:18:17 -0500

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin continues campaigning for her new book, "Going Rogue: An American Life," but today is the start of an epic five, six, or seven-part series -- depending on how you slice it - with Barbara Walters of ABC News. This morning: parts 1 and 2, on the morning infotainment show, "Good Morning America." Though morning infotainment shows traditionally open up with hard news, "GMA" tosses tradition to the wind and dives right into the pre-taped Palin chat, after a brief mention of a new ABC News/Washington Post poll showing President Obama's job approval rating at 56 percent, and 52 percent of the public saying they trust Obama more than Republicans in congress to handle "the economy." Because Oprah had Palin on her show Monday to woo back conservative viewers who'd been annoyed when Oprah endorsed and campaigned for President Obama, she feared to tread into

Palin goes 'Rogue' on Oprah: We watch so you don't have to

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 15:38:59 -0500

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and daughters Willow (left) and Piper pose with talk show host Oprah Winfrey during a taping of "The Oprah Winfrey Show." (Image: REUTERS/George Burns/Harpo, Inc.) Sarah Palin kicks off the TV leg of her campaign to sell copies of "Going Rogue: An American Life" this afternoon on Oprah's syndicated talk show -- which, in one of those happy coincidences, is happening at the exact same time Oprah is deeply mired in a campaign to revive that same show's ratings. We're live-blogging at 4 o'clock. 4:00: Oprah Gets Rolling: "You've been waiting and I've been waiting," Oprah says. Palin comes out and Oprah "woo-hoo's" her. They hug. Palin finger waves. 4:02: It took Oprah under 2 minutes to make it all about her: "You know there were reports last year that I had snubbed you during the election by not having you on my show.

Oprah welcomes Palin to woo back viewers

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 13:05:28 -0500

Oprah Winfrey, on a campaign to climb back from last season's ratings slump (and, some say, to make sure her syndicated talk show goes out on top) is going to try to kiss and make up with conservative viewers Monday afternoon, when Sarah Palin is her guest on her syndicated talk show. You may have noticed that the appearance by the former Alaska governor and Republican vice presidential candidate is happening smack dab in the middle of the November ratings derby. It's also the day before Palin's new book, "Going Rogue: An American Life," is scheduled to hit bookstores. It's Palin's first interview about the book but, far more important to Oprah, it's the first time the daytime diva and Palin will have met. Oprah's camp has been teasing the heck out of the interview since late last week, when her Harpo production company released clips from the sitdown -

Balloon Boy's parents plead guilty

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:51:43 -0500

Richard and Mayumi Heene may see all their wishes come true, at Christmas-time. The Fort Collins, Colo. couple who faked seven-year-old son's death-defying flight in a homemade weather balloon, are set to be sentenced for the hoax next month - two days before Christmas. Given how completely the cable news networks, not to mention the millions of viewers, got duped last month by the Heene's camera-ready story that the silver, helium-filled balloon floating over the Colorado landscape contained their adorable little son, Falcon, who had stowed away inside and was likely a goner -- and the annual news drought that takes hold two days before Christmas -- it is extremely likely the Heene's Dec. 23 sentencing will be telecast around the world by the same cable news networks. The Heenes pleaded guilty Friday to staging the Balloon Boy hoax, about three weeks after Mayumi Heene told investigators she and her

Carrie Prejean makes Larry King 20 percent more interesting

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 14:13:46 -0500

Larry King finally asked a question somebody did not want to answer. Embattled former beauty pageant contestant Carrie Prejean tossed off her microphone, accused CNN show host King of "being inappropriate," and threatened to walk off "Larry King Live" Wednesday night after he asked her why she'd settled her lawsuit against the Miss California Pageant. King immediately became 20 percent more interesting. It all started when Prejean, who was dethroned as Miss California in June after lingerie-modeling photos of her emerged, stopped by King's show to promote new light-reading tome, "Still Standing, the Untold Story of My Fight Against Gossip, Hate and Political Attacks." They were getting along like pledge sisters. King wondered "Who is your hero?" and Carrie confessed, "Sarah Palin is my hero." King noted "You characterize yourself as being Palinized. What do you mean?" and Carrie explained "there is this double standard that conservative women are fair

Halderman's rep says client just trying to sell movie treatment

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 19:11:46 -0500

Just when you thought this story couldn't get any better, the suspended CBS News producer accused of trying to blackmail David Letterman to the tune of $2 million says it was all a silly misunderstanding and what Letterman took for a shakedown was really just another Hollywood movie deal. "There was no extortion....there was a screenplay for sale," Robert Joe Halderman's lawyer Gerald Shargel told a judge in a Manhattan courtroom Tuesday in filing a motion to dismiss the case, according to news reports. To which Letterman's attorney Daniel Horwitz reportedly replied that any attempt to "dress this up as anything other than classic blackmail is sophistry" noting the whole "movie treatment" concept was difficult to reconcile with Halderman having approached Letterman's driver at 6 a.m. with the so-called screenplay treatment and demanded a response to his business proposition lickety split. It's true, Hollywood deals usually are not brokered at

"Oprah" to cable in 2011 -- here we go again!

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 18:18:31 -0500

Nearly one year to the day after Discovery Communications' top dog said Oprah Winfrey would stop syndicating her talk show in September of 2011 and move it to Discovery's new Oprah Winfrey Network, a blog report saying Oprah will stop syndicating her talk show in September of 2011 and move it to OWN gave The Reporters Who Cover Television the vapors. "She has not made a decision yet," Winfrey's Harpo Productions said Thursday in a stern e-mail to hyperventilating reporters. "As she has previously stated, she'll be making an announcement before the end of the year." That statement is virtually identical to the scolding Harpo issued within hours of Discovery Communications CEO David Zaslav's crack about Oprah moving her talkshow to OWN -- a comment he made at his company's first earnings call as a public company back in early November of '08. Back then Harpo said, patronizingly, that "while

GOP gains; Fox News Channel wins

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 19:24:44 -0500

An off-year election night the GOP is touting as the launch of a "Republican renaissance" delivered a decisive primetime ratings win for Fox News Channel too. After three years of Democratic wins, Republicans captured the governorships in New Jersey and Virginia -- two states President Obama won last year. This prompted GOP chairman Michael S. Steele, the Post reported, to deliver the "Republican renaissance" line. Meanwhile, Fox News Channel, which one year ago had its head handed to it by CNN on election night, was dancing the Comeback Dance -- the network having scored nearly twice as many viewers as CNN, MSNBC and HLN -- combined. FNC averaged more than 4 million viewers in primetime Tuesday. That's 84 percent more people than the cable network has averaged in primetime so far this calendar year. The NewsCorp-owned network thumped NBC Universal's MSNBC, which attracted 974,000 people to its election coverage in

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Wed, 04 Nov 2009 19:24:44 -0500

MTV pulls DJ AM series from primetime

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 18:06:31 -0500

MTV has yanked its deceased-DJ intervention series "Gone Too Far" from its primetime schedule after it died in the ratings. The reality series has been moved to Thursdays at 11 p.m., starting this week. Only three of the eight episodes ordered ran in primetime, when the number of Homes Using Television is much higher than other dayparts. But its chance for survival in primetime pretty much evaporated when its much ballyhooed premiere only attracted half a million viewers. Things looked slightly less dismal the second week -- episode No. 2 attracted about 700,000 people. But last week's third third episode fell back down to under half a million. "Gone Too Far" features young drug addicts who are shown using and talking about their drug of choice. Celebrity DJ Adam Goldstein -- aka DJ AM -- headlined the show and is featured in each episode, dispensing tough love to the addicts

Aliens land; 14 million watch

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:31:11 -0500

More than 14 million people watched the unveiling of ABC's controversial "V" do-over, making it the second biggest new-series opening of the two-month-old 2009-10 TV season. CBS's "NCIS" spinoff, "NCIS: Los Angeles" is still the ratings champ, having attracted 19 million viewers to its premiere episode in September. But "V" squeaked by CBS's new "The Good Wife" to take second place among new-show premieres, according to national stats. The Julianna Margulies lawyer drama had opened earlier in the season to an audience of just under 14 million people. In its ratings report, ABC focused instead on the 6.8 million people between the ages of 18 and 49 who watched the first episode of its new sci-fi series at 8 p.m. Tuesday - a ratings performance the network characterized as "soaring" above the 5.6 million in that age bracket who instead chose to watch the sixth episode of the seventh

Kirstie Alley to perform weight-loss encore

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 23:45:42 -0500

Kirstie Alley returning to the small screen to lose more weight for our entertainment. In case you did not get the memo: Fat is the new singing competition; fat is the new dance derby. Seems like every TV network wants a reality series about people trying to lose weight. Some of the hefty stars are old hands at this. Like Alley, whose new A&E show will chronicle her efforts to not only shed the pounds, but launch her own weight-loss program. The series, which does not yet have a name, is not to be confused with Alley's 2005 Showtime series "Fat Actress" - a barely scripted series in which she played, well, herself. In this new series, Kirstie will also be seen raising two "normal Hollywood children" (oxymoron alert!) and eight ringtail lemurs, and looking for love. Kirstie will have stiff competition in the form of made-for-TV weight loss veteran

Steve Martin, Alec Baldwin to share Oscar hosting gig

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 22:54:42 -0500

NBC has won the latest round of trophy-show one-upmanship it had been waging against ABC, when the motion picture academy announced late Tuesday that Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin would co-host the 82nd Academy Awards. No, NBC is not broadcasting the Academy Awards -- ABC is, on March 7. NBC airs the Globes, on Jan 17. And yes, the Baldwin/Martin-hosted Oscars on ABC will probably, like other years, clock nearly twice as many viewers as the Golden Globes (though the Globes broadcast is no slouch with its 20million-ish viewers, often beating the Primetime Emmy Awards and usually rivaling the viewership of the Grammy Awards). But in addition to co-hosting the Oscars, Martin and Baldwin are co-starring in an upcoming movie called "It's Complicated" that's coming out Christmas Day, so the Oscar show will be one big, fat wet kiss to that new movie -- and that kiss will be seen