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for Donahue
He's oozing flop sweat, sure. But don't dig just yet.
By Heidi Vogt
Donahue hasn’t failed yet.
The rumors are now old stuff indeed: Phil Donahue out of work at the end of the year.
MSNBC may even have picked the out-of-retirement chatter's replacement: Jesse Ventura, whose term as Minnesota governor ends in January, or so goes the talk.
"Saturday Night Live" even got into the act a few days ago with a skit lampooning Donahue’s lack of viewers.
Donahue certainly is running around his new audience like he’s got a lot to prove to Connie Chung and Bill O’Reilly. But all the attention on Donahue may be ignoring the real problem: a 24-hour news channel that just isn’t doing that well.
“The problem with MSNBC isn’t the Donahue show,” says Andrew Tyndall, publisher of the Tyndall Report, which tracks TV news. “He’s not saved the network, but you can’t say that he’s the cause of all their problems, either.”
According to Tyndall the network that set out to be captivatingly brash at its launch is floundering in an identity crisis that changing one 8 p.m. show won’t help.
“For [MSNBC] to cancel it would mean that they’re sticking with their regular approach: try something and if it doesn’t work, try something else,” says Tyndall.
MSNBC’s already booted two big names out of primetime: Ashleigh Banfield and Alan Keyes. Banfield was re-assigned to the weekend “MSNBC Investigates” and Keyes was told to take his low ratings elsewhere. Tyndall says the refreshing change might be for MSNBC to stick with a show for more than a few months.
MSNBC says this time it will stand by its man.
“We’ve always felt that it would take time for [Donahue] to catch up with CNN and Fox News. We’re definitely happy with how it’s growing,” says MSNBC spokesperson Cheryl Daly.
While Donahue’s ratings are down 5 percent so far this quarter at 404,0000 viewers, there have been some bright spots: two shows this past week snagged more than 430,000 viewers.
A spokesperson for CNN says Donahue’s competitor, “Connie Chung Tonight,” has found an audience much more easily because Chung’s show is more focused on interviews, less on her own personality. Chung has averaged 812,000 viewers so far this quarter. Fox News Channel’s “O’Reilly Factor” averages about 1,833,000 viewers.
“They’ve been in a tough position at MSNBC because on one hand they’ve been accused of not letting shows develop an audience but on the other hand if it doesn’t work in a little while, what is going to make it work in a long while?” says Tyndall.
MSNBC’s answer: a few more changes. The network is currently tinkering with the format of the show, trying to find the right formula for Donahue whether it’s a live audience, more celebrity interviews, or single-subject shows.
But if MSNBC spends too much time tinkering, the network may find itself without any audience.
“If you also count CNBC as a 24-hour news channel, it could be that you don’t need four of them,” says Tyndall.
November 19, 2002© 2002 Media Life
-Heidi Vogt is a staff writer for Media Life.
