Too Much TV: Your TV Talking Points For Thursday, September 5th, 2024

This is why media executives love appearing at industry conferences

Here's everything you need to know about the world of television for Thursday, September 5th, 2024:

THIS IS WHY MEDIA EXECUTIVES LOVE APPEARING AT INDUSTRY CONFERENCES
More than once I have suggested that executives at Warner Bros. Discovery would have a lot more success telling their story if they spent less time making appearances at relatively safe industry conferences and more time being questioned by knowledgeable industry reporters.

But that is advice that also applies to media executives across the board. Because while these conferences do require the executives to answer some questions, the executives can be almost guaranteed to be shown such a level of deference that answer they do give is nothing deeper than a vague platitude.

The latest example of this issue comes from the pages of Deadline, which has a piece today entitled NBCUniversal Content Chief Donna Langley On Blending Original Films And Sequels Into Slate Full Of “Familiar Surprise.” And based on the headline, you might think this is an interview by someone from Deadline.

As it turns out, the piece consists of comments cobbled together from Langley's appearance at "a conference in New York hosted by the Bank of America." And that explains why it's filled with these paragraph-length comments which are so lightweight, they almost drift up and away from the screen when you read them:

Asked whether it’s important to continue backing original film projects, she replied, “Well, this is a great paradox because the short answer is yes. I think what we’re seeing with the audience is that the pandemic taught them to stay home and watch streaming and we have to habituate them back into going to the movies.”

Moviegoers, she added, used to show up at multiplexes and then decide what to see. “Maybe you’d heard of one or two that you wanted to see. That’s no longer the case. It’s really destination viewing,” she said. “‘We’re gonna think ahead of time – Oppenheimer is opening, Barbie is opening, we’re going to that movie.'” She continued, “We do look at originality but then you, if you go, if it’s too original and it doesn’t seem familiar, then it’s harder to market and it’s harder to get people to sample it.”

NBCU, she said, strives for a blend of originals and franchises that she described as “familiar surprise.”

I like to think of myself as being someone who has some level of insight. And I'll be honest. I have no idea what she means. She thinks originals are important. But it's harder to market originals and convince people to see them. So the answer is "familiar surprise." Which makes about as much sense as executives who say "We're going to make fewer projects, but they will be better ones."

But the takeaway from this piece isn't the vagueness of the answers. It's that sitting down with a journalist who can ask relevant follow-up questions in a way that provides context is a useful thing for both executives and those people trying to understand the industry. I wish that media executives weren't so risk-adverse about putting themselves in situations where they'll be asked tough but fair questions.

And while I'm not going to get into this issue too deeply here, this risk-adverse approach to interviewing definitely extends to a lot of actors and showrunners. There are plenty of celebrities who will agree to be interviewed if it's primarily a way for them to not talk about themselves or anything but the project. I agree, the project being promoted is a primary focus. But I have recently had publicists offer up interviews, then provide such a long list of forbidden topics that it rendered the entire process pointless. 

Maybe it's my talk show background, but I am most interested in an interview when I can have a conversation. Either trust me or don't. But look at my other interviews. Trust that I know the material, that I know the boundaries. The end result will be a much better experience for the actor and a much better way to reach the audience. And it’s not unusual for me to opt to speak with a lower-profile cast member because I know we’ll have a better experience.

I once interviewed someone who was hosting an upcoming reality series. He was a dancer and had experienced a very public split several years earlier from someone who was currently in the public spotlight. I was asked not to bring up the relationship, which was fine with me. I didn't really care about that personal side of his story. But at one point he talked about how at its best, dancing can transform you, can take you away from the world and its problems. So I asked him if he had found that to be the case in his personal life. Did he find that sometimes when he's been confronted with difficult situations, he's escaped into dance? He proceeded to give this incredibly nuanced and heartfelt explanation of how that had happened with him. And even though he didn't mention his ex, it was clear that was the situation he was discussing. I didn't pry. But because it was a conversation, I was able to bring out a side of him that was really sweet and compelling.

The publicist later called me to pass along that this person enjoyed the interview immensely and that he appreciated me not prying. Even though I ultimately got a lot more from him than I would have if I would asked him about that failed relationship directly.

So that's why I'm spending so much time talking about interviews. They can be incredibly useful to both media executives and celebrities. Find a reporter or two whose judgement you trust and give them the latitude to do what they do best. You won't be sorry.

ODDS AND SODS
* Fox just announced the contestants for the upcoming season of Crime Scene Kitchen. And I am not sure what it means that out of the 12 people, eight of them are listed as being from Texas.

* Warner Bros. Discovery will report its Q3 2024 earnings number on Thursday, November 7th.

* The Max Original film Caddo Lake, from producer M. Night Shyamalan and writer-directors Celine Held and Logan George, debuts on Thursday, October 10th. Here is the brief logline: "When an eight-year-old girl mysteriously vanishes, a series of past deaths and disappearances start to link together, forever altering a broken family’s history."

* A group of male celebrities will volunteer to bare all to raise awareness for prostate, testicular and colorectal cancer testing and research in the two-hour special The Real Full Monty, which premieres Monday, December 9th on Fox. Anthony Anderson hosts, and he lead Anderson celebrities Taye Diggs, Chris Jones, Tyler Posey, Bruno Tonioli and James Van Der Beek as they train and rehearse for the most revealing performance of their careers, culminating with a big strip-tease dance, choreographed by Emmy Award-winner Mandy Moore (Choreographer for So You Think you Can Dance, La La Land, and Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour), where they will bare all in front of a live audience.

* Paramount+ has ordered the true crime miniseries JonBenet Ramsay, which will star Melissa McCarthy and Clive Owen as JonBenét’s parents Patsy and John Bennett Ramsey. This is one of those ideas which for me falls in the category of "Okay, I guess. But it's unlikely there's going to be anything in this that viewers familiar with the case haven't seen before."

* The James Gunn animated series Creature Commandos has been picked up for a second season by Max ahead of its premiere on December 5th. Given the production lead time on animated shows, that likely means that Max executives like what they see in the season one episodes and want more in the pipeline for next year.

* The 90-minute special Wynonna Earp: Vengeance premieres Friday, September 13th on Tubi. The movie picks up roughly 18 months after the events of the Season 4 finale.

* Netflix has renewed the animated series Unicorn Academy for a second season. 

WHAT'S NEW TONIGHT AND TOMORROW

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 5TH:
* Apollo 13: Survival (Netflix)
* Caught In The Web: The Murders Behind Zona Divas (Netflix)
* Coming From America Series Premiere (Max)
* Fight Night: The Million Dollar Heist (Peacock)
* The Past Comes Knocking (LMN)
* The Perfect Couple Series Premiere (Netflix)
* Trigger Point (Britbox)

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 6TH:
* Disco, Ibiza, Locomía (Netflix)
* Elisabeth Rioux: Unfiltered Series Premiere (Prime Video)
* Family Empire: Houston Season Finale (OWN)
* Power Book II: Ghost Season Four, Part Two Premiere (Starz)
* Rebel Ridge (Netflix)
* Selling Sunset Season Eight Premiere (Netflix)
* The Demon Disorder (Shudder)
* The Money Game (Prime Video)
* The Secret Lives Of Mormon Wives Series Premiere (Hulu) 
* Whose Line Is It Anyway? Season Thirteen Premiere (The CW)

SEE YOU ON FRIDAY!