Very probably. He's also taking part in Comic Relief Does The Apprentice where Sir Alan could get the opportunity to do something to JR that half the country wants to do: "You're fired!"

Oh yes you're right. Wasn't that something with Zoe Lucker?

Yep, Bombshell:

http://www.shedproductions.com/programmes/prog-bs.html

It's already been shown in New Zealand I believe. Did ITV actually contribute any money to this?

I've just seen my first trailer for Law & Order UK. I was planning to watch this. I'm not so sure now. It looks distinctly run-of-the-mill. It might start with a large audience due to its slot, but I see it sheddding quite a few viewers across a 13 week run.

Some people who have seen the first episode already are saying that it's very good, and that Bradley Walsh was "amazing" in it. I'm surprised about the second bit, especially after how he was in Corrie.

I'll give it a go for the first episode and see how I feel thereafter. It's maybe the most important new series for ITV this year, so they'll be hoping it can at least launch well to set up the remainder of the series nicely. But I fear that ITV's good luck in the Monday night slot might run out.

Definetly. ITV usually invest more in "one off dramas" these days, instead of taking the big risk and commissioning a long running series. I hope it pays off for ITV as it needs a reliable drama series that can come back year after year now, after losing many dramas that did this in the past ten years (At Home With The Braithwaites, Peak Practice etc).

Ratings wise, I can see it pulling 6-7 million viewers on its debut. Unfortunately, I can see that figure falling as the series goes on but I would expect it to settle between 5.5 -6 million, which I think would be enough for a recommission.

They must have done. Why won't they show it? It can't be that bad can it?

I suppose it's kind of ratings related...

Duncan Gray, former ITV Controller of Entertainment, talks about the potential for top terrestrial talent (Ant & Dec, Simon Cowell and Graham Norton) to be jumping ship to the likes of Virgin and Sky or at the very least, leaving their exclusive deals (which is a more likely option for Cowell who would want to keep XF going to a mass audience).


Such a move could change the landscape of UK TV forever. Obviously Claudia Rosencrantz has a past in entertainment and big names (as well as A&D, she was so close to Cowell that she was rumoured to be in line for a top job at Syco) but her channels are miles away from that level just now.

And might the Richard and Judy experiment put some of them off? Could Ant & Dec bear the idea of broadcasting to 8,000 viewers?! What would the top shows on TV be getting if they moved? I could have my numbers wrong, but there are hardly enough Sky homes in the country to provide the 15 million viewers that the XF final had. So how low would they be going?

Or perhaps it suffered because it was dull?

I watched last night and recorded Hustle. I wish I hadn't bothered. :yawn:

Didn't Living do a one-off special called Cilla Live which flopped? Only Noel Edmonds has been able to have a presense on pay tv with HQ and Are You Smarter on Sky1 but he also presents Deal or No Deal which means that he still has FTA exposure.

I think they will be less golden handcuff deals in the future and would allow personalities like Ant and Dec or Cowell to have more freedom in the projects they pitch or sign up for.

Basic Pay Channels which are on both Sky and VM are available to approx 50% of UK homes.

However in addition to the 50% reduction in potential viewers, I think they suffer even more from the phenomenon whereby the same programme will get a bigger audience on BBC1 than on ITV1 and a bigger audience on ITV1 than on Five - ie the same programme on Sky 1 would get less than 50% of the audience it would get on Five.

But it is certainly the case that there is scope for a huge further shake up in British TV. Up to now, Sky has only seriously challenged in the areas of Sport and Movies.

It would be fascinating if Sky (or anyone else but Sky are the ones with the resources) put aside say an additional £100m to £200m for Sky 1 and attempted to sign up several big stars - eg Ant & Dec, Simon Cowell, Jonathan Ross, Graham Norton, Chris Tarrant, Piers Morgan etc.

Sky 1 need to improve their crappy output if they want more viewers IMO! From what I've seen, their primetime output is the Simpsons & Futurama, then show such programmes as Lost, 24, etc (which get far less viewers than they did before they purloined them from mainstream TV!).
I think Freeview are better anyway - less choice, but more interesting channels.

I think Sky1 has improved significantly both programme quality wise and ratings wise in recent months.

I don't know why ITV don't just use pilots. I suppose 'Above Suspicion' and 'Whitechapel' are pilots, but they will only be commissioned for short series.

Remember Bike Squad? That was a pilot. Shown at the end of 2007 on a Friday night, it achieved 4.5 million viewers, winning its slot. The comedy drama was not re-commissioned, which I think is unbelievable.

Some of ITV's best dramas have come from pilots: 'Woodentop' shaped 'The Bill' for example.

It's something that has always happened in the US. For example, 'The Wonder Years' was one of the USA's most popular drama series, and in 1988, it was scheduled after the Superbowl, a golden slot, and it got brilliant series.

Then, it returned a year later and continued to do brilliantly. Now that's a show that really does well with character development.

If ITV could make a 'moral' drama that could perhaps premiere in-between 'The X Factor' or 'Britain's Got Talent' finals, I think it could be a blessing...

Of course, Britain is not the US. But pilots have been successful in the UK, and it could save the 1 million loss that comes after a 'drama premiere'.

Look at 'The Fixer', it brought in 6.5m for its first episode, then losing a million viewers after the next episode. Perhaps if they had only aired one, and then re-commission it for later on, viewing figures would have been stable.

The thing about some of them is that they make their own shows as well which would make it easier for Sky as they wouldn't need to generate formats around them, they would probably come with them.

I'd actually not be surprised if Cowell signs nothing and works project by project for a year. I agree with Duncan Gray that he would be reluctant to move something like X Factor to a smaller audience, but he might want other opportunities for his company as oppose to him as a personality. Also, at the end of 2010, everything goes up in the air. He'll be done with American Idol and his companies record rights to the show will expire. Simon Fuller's interest in X Factor drops and his contract with Sony Music Entertainment (which includes TV production) also expires.

But all this idea of "ITV can't afford..." seems a bit weird to me. Take Cowell as an example. £7m a year for nearly 60 hours of TV that appeals to a key demographic and gets 10 million viewers for the first showing plus generates highly rated shows for ITV2 and phone revenues. And yet how much are they paying for the FA Cup?

Surely if they can return what they are paid, then ITV can afford them? (And I'm guessing Ant & Dec are returning alot more than £10m a year).

The clue in my post is not being able to receive Five on analogue. Some places in the town where I live can, they can also receive Freeview, I can't.

Yes, but ITV makes a substantial amount of loss making programmes - eg Regional News, other Regional programmes, other PSB etc.

So they need to make substantial profits on prime-time programmes just to get back to overall break-even. They then need profits on top of that for the company as a whole to be profitable.

Add in the fact they have signed very expensive football contracts with the FA and UEFA which are likely to now be loss making and the position is even worse.

So making a profit on popular programming is not enough. They need to maximise that profit - hence the need to cut costs wherever possible.

See these Media Guardian articles which have been posted in a thread on the Broadcasting forum:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009...dreds-job-cuts

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009...under-pressure

^^
But surely the losses involved if A&D were to go to another channel would be greater than what they might need to fork out to keep them? When shows like X Factor can get £7m a year sponsorship from Carphone Warehouse (and that was before the 26% 16-34 ratings increase this year) they must be making a significant profit already. The figures for the football and the figures for the "star" salaries just don't seem to match up, they're on totally different planets.

I'd have thought that for ITV, it makes sense right now to hold on to those that they know will guarantee them ratings/revenue and commission less new shows. Especially if the alternative is to create a potential long term rival in Sky1 and have more Saturdays like they have been having recently in their Simon Cowell/A&D free schedules. And I doubt the past few Saturdays have been turning much profit at all to cover the loss making shows.

Right now, it's hard to see the real situation amid the press positioning. A few months ago when Grade said he wanted to cut star pay, Cowell promptly appeared in the tabloids discussing retirement and how he was tired of appearing on TV. With the latest stories about ITV, A&D have now "accidentally" let slip that they aren't happy either.

EDIT: I'm not particularly disagreeing with you here, just trying to get my head around the relationship between ratings and resulting revenue.

I agree with you entirely.

I'm sure ITV are making very large profits out of A&D and Cowell. If they were to lose them, I think it's highly unlikely that any alternative programming could make anything like the same amount of profits.

But I guess that doesn't mean ITV shouldn't try and cut the amount they pay to A&D and Cowell if ITV are confident they can get away with it. But if they misjudge the situation and lose them it would be a disaster for ITV.

I'm not in any positon to calculate the detailed numbers but I wouldn't be in the slightest bit surprised if the vast majority of ITV's annual profits come from just 6 shows, ie:

Coronation Street
Emmerdale
Dancing on Ice
Britains Got Talent
X Factor
I'm a Celebrity

There are several things to bare in mind though...

1. These shows are only hugely successful if ITV are getting them at a reasonable price. If they are paying millions upon millions for them is it value for money? They might be able to buy 20 new shows with it.

2. ITV has to assess what impact these stars have on the shows. Would viewers stop watching Britain's Got Talent if Ant and Dec were not the hosts? If ITV think they are good at hosting it, but not integral, then they wont feel too bad about asking them to work for less money.

Some very stupid scheduling from the BSI if you ask me for tonight:

8:25pm - Casualty
9:15pm - The Old Guys
9:45pm - Live at the Apollo (R)
10:30pm - BBC News
10:50pm - A Question of Sport
11:20pm - FILM: High Crimes

Why is a random repeat episode of Live at the Apollo being dumped in the schedules, which in turn bumps back a new episode of A Question of Sport to 10:50pm? Is there something I'm missing? IMO, it should be:

8:25pm - Casualty
9:15pm - The Old Guys
9:45pm - A Question of Sport
10:15pm - BBC News
10:35pm - Live at the Apollo (R)
11:20pm - FILM: High Crimes

Why does repeat get priority over new exactly? The only reason I can think of as to why AQoS gets low ratings on Friday is because it clashes with ITV's soaps.... however on 9:45pm Saturday on ITV is good opposition to "Dancing on Ice: The Story of Bolero with Torvill and Dean". Similar situation next Saturday as this is the schedule:

9:00pm - The Old Guys
9:30pm - The Vicar of Dibley
10:00pm - BBC News
10:20pm - Match of The Day
11:30pm - A Question of Sport

Again, similar situation WHY do we need TVoD in the schedules?
If I was the scheduler, it should be:

9:00pm - The Old Guys
9:30pm - BBC News
9:45pm - A Question of Sport
10:15pm - Match of The Day

IMO, it is madness to put on AQoS (a NEW episode) on @ 11:30pm. ITV don't have much on next Saturday at 9pm, just FILM: The Bourne Identity. The BSI strikes again...

As I (don't) understand it, there's some accounting wrinkle that means they don't have to put the cost of a series "on the books" until they show it? Don't ask me to explain how it works, cos it sounds daft to me. GeorgeS seemed to understand it - ask him!

K

Good pilots cost as much a real episode. Bad pilots are useless for assessing whether to invest in a drama. Pilots only really work in the UK for studio based game shows or light entertainment.

You only recognise the cost of the production when you air it.

Without getting too technical, until you show it you can defer the cost for accounting purposes. Obviously you still have to pay the performers, etc but you dont need to expense it for external reporting purposes.

However I think some of thee "on the shelf shows" represent where ITV was trying to position itself 2-3 years ago and broadcasting them now might jar with recent attempts to go slightly upmarket, which might be why Bombshell, etc never see the light of day.

Thanks GeorgeS, I think we had this conversation before but I can't remember the details. How long can they "defer" the costs? Was it just one year?

K