Too Much TV: Your TV Talking Points For Monday, April 18th, 2022

What's wrong with "American Song Contest?"

Here's everything you need to know about the world of television for Monday, April 18th, 2022. 

WHAT WENT WRONG WITH 'AMERICAN SONG CONTEST?'
Given the popularity of the long-running Eurovision competition, it was inevitable that someone would try the format in the United States. Eurovision pits one musical act from each participating country in the U.S. and the U.K., so creating some version of the show that substituted countries for states almost writes itself. And in fact, various people have been trying to launch an American version for twenty years. Ben Silverman attempted to put together a project both while he was running Reveille in the late aughts and later when he was at NBC.

But it wasn't until last year that someone managed to get a project off the ground. NBC signed a licensing deal with The European Broadcasting Union and Silverman (who is now running Propagate Content) took on the production responsibilities. Thus, the American Song Contest was born and the show launched five weeks ago.

And the ratings have not been good. 

The premiere episode garnered a reasonable opening number, but the ratings have seen a steady decline each week:

03/21/2022: 2.90 million viewers/0.5 rating
03/28/2022: 1.88/0.3
04/04/2022: 1.65/0.3
04/11/2022: 1.44/0.3

There is another episode airing live tonight and I am skeptical that the ratings are going to improve. Once the numbers start dropping for a live show, it's almost impossible to turn them around.

So what went wrong? It's tempting to blame it on the flurry of performances crammed into each episode (typically eleven or twelve), but similar musical competitions such as The Voice and American Idol have the same performance schedule and it doesn't seem to have an impact. 

I suspect the problems lie with three decisions and all of the mistakes fall on the shoulders of the show's producers.

The first misstep was to include some veteran acts along with lesser-known musicians. Performers such as Michael Bolton, Macy Gray, Jewel and Sisqo are competing against non-celebrity acts and while that fits the Eurovision format, it's very different than the what viewers see on shows such as American Idol and The Voice. The comparison to The Voice is especially relevant, since that is the show that has been traditionally airing in this timeslot. Having well-known acts in the mix feels like cheating somehow, even though Jewel and Macy Gray failed to make the cut into the semi-finals (Sisqo performs tonight).

Secondly, there is a panel of "experts" that vote on the performers directly into the semi-finals and while in theory having a panel that represents each state and U.S. territory makes sense, the size and anonymous nature of the panel mean that its results might as well have been spit out by a giant computer. Unlike the well-known judges on The Voice or American Idol, these judges don't provide any personality and continuity to the show's structure and they might as well not be there at all.

But the biggest mistake centers around hosts Kelly Clarkson and Snoop Dogg. With a long-running stint as a judge on The Voice as well as her successful daytime talker, a show like American Song Contest should be a breeze for Clarkson. And yet she and Snoop Dogg meander around the set, laughing and distracting each other. Half the time they seem to be surprised by whatever task they've been asked to do. Clarkson does regular brief "interview" segments throughout the show and those are rambling and unfocused. It often feels as if someone is trying to direct her from somewhere just off camera.

And while the Snoop Dogg persona might be amusing in a beer commercial, it gets old really fast in this type of show. There was a sketch from the early years of Saturday Night Live that spoofed President Reagan's distracted, somewhat oblivious public persona. The sketch showed Reagan acting all distracted when the cameras were on and as soon as they turned off, he would start barking these sophisticated, complex orders that were so advanced most people had trouble keeping up.

I often feel that way watching Snoop Dogg. As if his "I'm just here smoking weed and being friendly" public persona is mostly an act and that off-camera, he is an entirely different person. It certainly feels that way on American Song Contest, where his comments and weird scripted bits feel inauthentic and painful to watch.

There are parts of American Song Contest I enjoy quite a bit. There have been some truly amazing performers to far and I've had the chance to interview a number of them just after the show thank to the magic of Zoom. I want the show to succeed for them and there is a version of the series that could be a hit. Sadly, that's not the version we're getting, which is a tragedy for everyone involved.

MY ADVICE FOR DAVID ZASLAV
Everyone in the television industry thinks they know what new Warner Bros Discovery head David Zaslav should do now. 

Earlier today, I posted some advice of my own. Although I suspect no one else has focused on the problem of content discovery:

You have a difficult task. Your best short-term option is to fully maximize the value of the content in your pipeline. And to be blunt, the Discovery Communications track record for effectively promoting new programming is...well, we're coming out of the Easter weekend, so I'll be charitable and say your track record is a mixed one.

Think I'm being too harsh? The long-running Discovery series Deadliest Catch is premiering its new season tomorrow and you'd be hard-pressed to find any press or promotion of the premiere aside from a few posted trailers and some listing highlights. Yes, the show has been around for close to two decades and you're not going to get the level of attention a new hot series is going to garner. But there's almost nothing about the series bubbling around the pop culture zeitgeist. 

And this is a pretty common occurrence with shows on the various Discovery networks, especially when it comes to old Scripps networks. These networks have a built-in audience that will turn on the linear channel and watch whatever show happens to be on. So the promotion for individual shows tends to be casual at best. But as the experience with Discovery+ should have shown you, streaming audiences are not nearly as predictable or easily amused. You have to be more aggressive with marketing and that includes everything that encompasses traditional promotional efforts: reviews, interviews, and constant reminders that the show is available. 

Read the entire piece here.

TWEET OF THE DAY

ODDS AND SODS
* Linda Martindale had a recap of Sunday's episode of Riverdale.

WHAT'S NEW FOR MONDAY
Here's a quick rundown of all the new stuff premiering today on TV and streaming:

Better Call Saul Season Six Premiere (AMC)
Celebrity IOU Season Premiere (HGTV)

Click Here to see the list of all of the upcoming premiere dates for the next few months.

SEE YOU TUESDAY! 

If you have any feedback, send it along to Rick@AllYourScreens.com and follow me on Twitter @aysrick.