In an age when you can find out who won or lost instantly on Twitter, does the full-blown, all-star election night coverage still matter? There was some hubbub recently, for example, when CBC decided not to preempt their Monday night hit Murdoch Mysteries in order to provide live, municipal election night coverage on its main
Here is something you never hear a showrunner of a new network TV series talk about: their fears about how audiences might take their new show. Leave it to a Canadian, then, to break the barrier. “My fear is that people are not going to give it a shot,” says Tim McAuliffe. “I personally wouldn’t.”
It’s interesting to compare — or re-boot around — Thursday night’s revival of Murphy Brown vs. last winter’s revival of Roseanne. In both instances I wasn’t expecting much. Two sitcoms coming back after 20 year absences. Did anybody ever ask for more from these shows? Roseanne, however, really surprised me. I didn’t expect to care
Fire up the Tiki Torches and pass the ketchup flavoured potato chips — Canadians can now apply to be on the U.S. version of Survivor. Just as Donald Trump seems ready to kick Canadians out, CBS announced Wednesday that Canadians will finally be able to join Americans on the long-running reality series. Host and executive
For years I told newcomers attending Television Critics Association press tour sessions in Los Angeles that they aren’t really on this beat until they’ve been in a scrum with Leslie Moonves. Well, things have changed. What’s left of the TV beat writers could pretty well all pull up to the TCA hotel in the same
The 2018 US network upfronts in New York last week were about as stale as a decades old dough-nut. Viewers are being asked to choke down more revivals in the wake of the tremendous success of ABC’s Roseanne. Reboots of Murphy Brown, Magnum (both CBS) and Charmed (The CW) all made the network’s fall schedules. Canada,
With Sheldon and Amy tying the knot, Thursday night’s 11th season finale of The Big Bang Theory is sure to be a ratings grabber. In the most recent available national total ratings tally from Numeris (the week of April 23-29), the CBS sitcom was the No. 1 show in English Canada with 3,221,000 CTV viewers.
Way back when I was a young Turk at TV Guide Canada I was asked to get Steven Bochco on the phone. I thought the request was pure madness. At that time and for many years afterwards, Bochco was TV’s top showrunner, the much-admired writer/producer behind such groundbreaking hits as Hill Street Blues and L.A.