TV shows with international audience priority

Quote: Pacomartin

I don't think any TV show earns $10 million in it's first airing.

Goof on my part, should have added "viewers" after the 10MM. Was working on two other things at the same time.

Quote: AZDuffman

Goof on my part, should have added "viewers" after the 10MM. Was working on two other things at the same time.

There are only 11 scripted shows on broadcast right now averaging over 10 million viewers, and 9 of them are on one network.
17.70 NCIS : CBS
16.47 The Big Bang Theory (renewed) : CBS
15.53 NCIS: New Orleans (renewed) : CBS
12.97 Empire (renewed) : FOX
12.00 Madam Secretary (renewed) : CBS
11.36 Blue Bloods : CBS
11.05 Scorpion (renewed) : CBS
10.95 The Odd Couple : CBS
10.44 Criminal Minds : CBS
10.13 Mom (renewed) : CBS
10.04 The Blacklist (renewed) : NBC

The economics have changed radically in 20 years. Now we have stars getting paid $1 million per episode to deliver 16.5 million viewers. When "Friends" started out they were being paid $22.5K to deliver over 24 million viewers.

Their 7th and 8th series were supposed to be their swan song, where they cash out. Surprisingly the ratings started going back up and they got two more years at a million dollars per episode.

Friend's year	Millions	Salary
1	24.1	$22,500
2	23.5	varied
3	20.7	$75,000
4	20.2	$85,000
5	24.5	$100,000
6	21.6	$125,000
7	22.8	$750,000
8	24.5	$750,000
9	21.6	million
10	22.8	million

In the 8th season of Friends the network was looking for a healthy sitcom to follow in the half hour slot after Friends. "Inside Schwartz" was pulling in 15.5 million viewers, but was cancelled after 9 episodes( 5 followed Friends). They then put on "Leap of Faith" with the woman from the TV show House and it averaged 16.5 million viewers for 6 episodes. NBC axed that show and simply aired repeat episodes of Friends where the repeats averaged 18.5 million viewers.

There must be pressure to change the laws of TV around the world, so that a new show can debut in multiple countries.

What gets me about network TV is the
hit shows disappear for weeks at a time
during the season. Especially Modern
Family, Blacklist and Bluebloods.

There are several 3 week breaks for
all of them since the 1st of the year. Those
time slots are so valuable they shove
something else in it knowing people
will watch because they went there
hoping for the regular show.

Quote: Evenbob

What gets me about network TV is the
hit shows disappear for weeks at a time
during the season. Especially Modern
Family, Blacklist and Bluebloods.

There are several 3 week breaks for
all of them since the 1st of the year. Those
time slots are so valuable they shove
something else in it knowing people
will watch because they went there
hoping for the regular show.

It is about saving the shows to fill out the season. Most shows go 20-22 episodes a season. Even if you reran every episode that leaves 12 weeks where you would have to run it a 3rd time.

What I always hated was when they reran totally out of place things. I forget the show where Dan Akroyd was a priest. It was a week before Christmas and they reran the freaking Halloween episode! Before I turned it off I wondered if I was the only one annoyed at them doing that. That weekend the T.V. Editor in the local paper said the same thing, if they want to rerun during a dead week fine, but come on and pay attention to what you put on the air.

I wonder if it works the other way round? Do shows produced in other countries seek out a U.S. market? Downton Abbey, Power Rangers and Pokemon come to mind, but I wonder if other TV offerings from Europe, Latin America, or Asia are made with American revenue in mind?

Quote: Ayecarumba

... but I wonder if other TV offerings from Europe, Latin America, or Asia are made with American revenue in mind?

I don't know if the British shows are specifically thinking about American tastes. They are, of course, aware of the market in America, but I don't know if they alter their production decisions specifically to broaden the appeal.

There are so many Anglophiles in America, that Downton Abbey could be made as British as possible and it would have wide appeal in the USA. There are cynics in the UK who believe the only valid reason to keep the monarchy is US tourist revenue.

Dr Who's producer cast John Scot Barrowman, MBE (born 11 March 1967), is a Scottish-American actor, singer, dancer, presenter and writer who holds both British and American citizenship. Born in Glasgow, Scotland, he emigrated to the United States with his family in 1975. It is not clear if he was cast to appeal to the American audience. My guess would be NO.

Kristin Kreuk was starring in a TV series in a fictional suburb of Vancouver where she is from. She was cast in Smallville which was shot in Vancouver. There is no particular reason to think that her being half Chinese was particularly important to her career at CW, over and above that the network likes to cast young beautiful actors and actresses that come from a rainbow of ethnic groups. The network seems to prefer that the storylines are blind to the ethnicity of their actors (i.e. it is never brought up in the script).

But TV is a sometimes brutal business. I am just at a loss to see how TV shows are staying on the air with audiences that are so far below average. In 2012-13 Vegas made the top 11 scripted shows with almost 12 million viewers and it was still cancelled because the show was too expensive and didn't appeal to young viewers.

CBS NCIS 21344
CBS BIG BANG THEORY 18680
CBS NCIS: LA 17306
CBS PERSON OF INTEREST 16072
CBS TWO & A HALF MEN 13788
CBS BLUE BLOODS 13167
CBS ELEMENTARY 12652
ABC MODERN FAMILY 12306
ABC CASTLE 12256
CBS CRIMINAL MINDS 12153
CBS VEGAS 11935

Quote: Ayecarumba

I wonder if it works the other way round? Do shows produced in other countries seek out a U.S. market? Downton Abbey, Power Rangers and Pokemon come to mind, but I wonder if other TV offerings from Europe, Latin America, or Asia are made with American revenue in mind?

I do not think so. While there are some occasional successes of foreign shows on the air here those successes tend to be niche markets. What happens more often is that a usually British show is retooled for the USA. "Till Death Us Do Part" became "All in the Family." "The Office" was a fairly close clone. "Sanford and Son" came from "Steptoe and Son" and so on.

What Japan is to cars the USA is to TV entertainment. Even if the market is not officially "closed" the local product is so good worldwide that you are not going to get a big share on the home turf.

There's a lot of game shows in the US that started in the UK and Europe. I've -heard- that the UK is a pretty decent test market for game show formats in the bigger US market. Top Gear found it's market in the US too.

Of course, when it comes to serials, the US tends to have the biggest production in budget and numbers, and overall the best shows. There's a bunch of crap, but the good stuff is excellent. And also has more global appeal.

Quote: AZDuffman

I do not think so. While there are some occasional successes of foreign shows on the air here those successes tend to be niche markets..

Well, the USA has 5X the population of the UK, while China has over 4X the population of the USA. So a "niche" market can mean a lot.

But I think you have to distinguish between movies and television.

For television, comedies have been retooled for the American audience now for decades. There is a new attempt to retool dramas (pointless in my opinion) and sci-fi.

Even though the audience is much smaller, a combination of their TV watching tax, and standards for broadcasting and even televisions are much stricter in the UK than in the USA. As a result 85% of households in the UK have antenna delivered TV and they all watch the same 60 STD channels and 12 HD channels.
http://www.freeview.co.uk/

In the USA, the Advanced Television Systems Committee sets the standards for TV tuners, but everything else including the antenna is not standard. You can see from British news articles that the term "Free" is much debated.
The Freeview HD 'con': Even viewers with the latest TVs will need to pay £170 for high definition channels By SEAN POULTER FOR THE DAILY MAIL 20 January 2010

So a TV show in the USA is lucky to get 3% of the total population as viewers, but in the UK a hit TV show will often get 20% or 30%.

What kind of standards do you want for an antenna?

When I was antenna shopping, I only considered ones with clear range and pattern information.