New NBC Entertainment President Scott Sassa didn't wait long to shake things up for the faltering Peacock. He's shuffling sitcoms, affecting the network's schedule on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays.
Mondays have pretty much collapsed for NBC this season, which is no surprise given the extreme weakness of three of its four sitcoms on that night. "Suddenly Susan," "Caroline in the City" and "Conrad Bloom" are all mediocre when they're at their best -- and they're rarely at their best.To remedy this situation, effective Dec. 14, NBC is going to move "Mad About You" to Mondays at 8 p.m. Of other Monday sitcoms, "Susan" stays put at 7 p.m.; "Caroline" moves up a half hour to 7:30 p.m.; and "Conrad" moves back an hour to 8:30 p.m.
(News flash: This isn't going to work.)
This is an indication that NBC has largely given up, not only on the night but also on "Mad About You," the once-fine sitcom that has fallen to the level of, well, "Suddenly Susan." Sassa referred to this as the "final" season for "Mad," and at this point, it's highly improbable that even if the overpaid-at-$1 million-per-episode Paul Reiser and Helen Hunt want to return for another year, they'll have a place on the network.
The network is also taking a shot at reviving its failing Tuesday lineup, using both of its Wednesday-night sitcoms -- "3rd Rock from the Sun" and "NewsRadio" -- to do it. Effective Dec. 15, "Rock" takes over the Tuesday-at-7 p.m. timeslot and "NewsRadio" will follow at 7:30 p.m. "Just Shoot Me" stays put at 8 p.m., and "Will & Grace" moves over from Mondays to assume the Tuesday-at-8:30 p.m. timeslot.
"Will & Grace" is not only the best new sitcom of the season, but NBC has a vested interest in keeping the show alive -- the network owns it and stands to make hundreds of millions of dollars from syndication rights if it can turn the sitcom into a hit.
On the other hand, another sitcom NBC owns -- "Working" -- is being sent on hiatus. The network would only say that the Fred Savage show would return in January on a night and time to be announced.
Beginning Dec. 16, Wednesday nights will see the return of "Encore, Encore," the lame Nathan Lane sitcom that was the biggest disappointment of the fall season, at 8:30 p.m. (It does, after all, come to us from the producers of "Frasier," winner of the past five Emmys as TV's outstanding comedy.) "Encore, Encore" has been on hiatus since October, when NBC yanked the show off its Tuesday-night schedule due to weak ratings.
For the foreseeable future, NBC will air reruns of "3rd Rock from the Sun" on Wednesdays at 8 p.m.
It says something about NBC that the network has not had a regular series to fill the hour on Sundays at 6 p.m. since the season began (instead airing various lame specials); that it has been airing reruns of "Law & Order" and "Homicide" on Fridays at 8 p.m., since yanking "Trinity"; and that it plans to air reruns of "3rd Rock."
We're talking about a major broadcast network that can't fill out its prime-time schedule with original programming.
Sassa assumed the reins of the NBC programming department a month ago, just in time to see the network's prime-time fortunes slide. In the recently completed November sweeps, NBC fell to second behind CBS in both households and total viewers and barely held off Fox to win among the advertiser-friendly demographic of 18-49 year olds.
Rumors are running so hot, even within the network, that NBC circulated an internal memo denying it was about to make changes in its once-formidable Thursday-night lineup. (Which, of course, is almost tantamount to admitting that such moves are under consideration.)
The rumor was that "Friends," which is NBC's highest-rated Thursday comedy, could move back an hour to 8 p.m., to sort of anchor the night. "Frasier," the current occupant of that time slot, would return to Tuesdays at 8 p.m. And "Just Shoot Me" would move to Thursdays at 7 p.m.
All of which would make a great deal of sense. (And not just because yours truly wrote last spring that this would be the smart thing for NBC to do.)
As predicted, "Friends" has shown a great deal of strength on Thursday nights. For the season-to-date, "Friends" is ranked second overall in the ratings, a half-a-rating-point ahead of "Frasier," which is third. This is particularly significant given that there are fewer people watching television at the earlier hour.
And, also as predicted, moving "Frasier" away from Tuesday nights has done major damage to NBC's schedule on that night. "Just Shoot Me" is a good show, but it hasn't the strength to beat back ABC's "Spin City."
What all of this signals is a network in some disarray. Sassa has his work cut out for him.
QUOTABLE: "Late Night" host Conan O'Brien: "John Glenn went back into space today, and just before he left, he said it's really exciting achieving weightlessness. Which, coincidentally, is the same thing Calista Flockhart says."