Monday

Don't toss sod on
NBC's 'Ed' just yet

New Friday time slot may be salvation, not death

By Toni Fitzgerald

    It could well seem that NBC is plotting a quiet death for "Ed," the quirky third-year dramedy that has been struggling over recent weeks against Fox's smash "American Idol."
Why else would a network move a show to Friday, a notoriously slow TV night, as NBC decided to do earlier this month?
Fans have already set up “Save Ed” web sites, and media speculation centers on when, not if, the show will be canceled.
   But all this worrying and prognosticating may be premature. On any other network, a move to Friday nights is reason for worry.
   On NBC, it’s not such a bad thing. Indeed, this may be the show's big chance to find and hold an audience, after struggling since its debut in a time slot that in retrospect was probably too young-skewing.
   “NBC has done very well on that night,” says Roy Rothstein, vice president and director of national broadcast research at Zenith Media. “I think that it could be a good move for ‘Ed.’ NBC has a following on that night.
   “If you said it was going to Friday on ABC or CBS, I’d say, well, lots of luck. But on NBC, it might be a good move.”
   One of NBC’s top-rated adults 18-49 shows on any night, “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” airs Friday at 10 p.m. The new show “Mister Sterling,” which ended its run two weeks ago, didn’t get great ratings but did attract a very upscale, educated audience.
   Into this mix plops “Ed,” chronicling a newly divorced lawyer who moves back to his hometown of Stuckeyville and buys a bowling alley, all the while still pining for his high school crush. When the show debuted on Sundays in 2000, Media Life critic Andrew Wallenstein called it a “promising drama.”
   It’s long shown more promise than actual delivery for NBC on Wednesdays. Though the show has not done badly, its best-ever 18-49 rating is a middling 4.5 earned by its premiere (and matched this season by the episode in which Carol, Ed’s erstwhile love, nearly got married to another man).
   “Ed’s” biggest competition from 8:30 to 9 on Fox, “Idol,” routinely draws double that rating. “Ed” also has struggled to match the ratings of ABC’s sitcom time slot competitors “My Wife and Kids” and “George Lopez,” which have better season averages among 18-49s.
   The introduction of CBS’s “Star Search” at midseason made the competition even tighter.
   That’s why a less competitive night could give the show a boost.
   Though the show's rating dropped to a 3.2 18-49 average in its Friday debut last week, it won its time slot. And that was against CBS's NCAA basketball.
   “I think it’s been a little up and down at times this season, and I think that NBC was probably hoping for more out of ‘Ed’ for that [Wednesday] time period,” Rothstein says. “But it’s important to advertisers, like Lexus. It delivers an upscale audience.”
   That’s why “Ed,” considered a 50-50 shot at renewal, was worth another try. There are only two episodes left for this season. The show has been preempted so many times that not even one rerun has been shown all year.
And NBC has been running lots of promos for the show’s Friday relaunch. It was a pet project of network executives when it debuted, coming as it does from David Letterman’s Worldwide Pants production company.
   Bringing it back for one more year could give producers their first real chance to turn this into an adult show. When it debuted on Sundays three years ago, it aired at 7 p.m. Now it will air at 9, which Rothstein thinks is a very good sign.
   “You can address more serious topics at 9 o’clock. Maybe that’s why they’re experimenting,” he says.
   “At 8 o’clock you’re pretty limited in what you can do. You can’t be on the edge at 8 o’clock. So maybe they will consider toughening the storyline and making it more adult than it already is.”
   There’s plenty of room on NBC’s Fridays for next season. “Providence” was canceled last fall. Its replacement, “Sterling,” has not yet been renewed. “Dateline,” the show “Ed” is bumping, can serve as a place-filler any night.
   And “America’s Most Talented Kid,” which debuted Friday at 8, actually has the toughest time slot of the night, against ABC’s “America’s Funniest Home Videos.”
   Getting out of a brutal Wednesday time slot may be a good thing for “Ed.” But whether that will satisfy NBC won’t be decided until May.
   In the meantime, the next two episodes look like doozies for "Ed" fans -- turns out it was really Carol in that knight's costume shown in the commercials after all.

-Toni Fitzgerald is a staff writer for Media Life.

Send to a Friend| Printer-Friendly Version
Cover Page | Contact Us