This summer, I have vowed to make a good-faith effort to watch So You Think You Can Dance and see if I can get into the show. Because I am a man of very modest ambitions. This commitment, however, doesn’t extend to the audition rounds. Did any Tuned Inlanders watch last night? If not, what’s on your summer viewing calendar? (I’ll …
The CW Rolls Out More Glampires
By rights, The CW should be one of the hugest success stories on TV. This is, after all, the heyday of the Twilight books and movie(s), whose moody, romantic vampires have bewitched the young women in precisely The CW’s demographic.
The CW–in its previous incarnations of The WB and UPN–was doing spooky-romantic before …
More Talk With Jim Cuno
In today’s final installment of that conversation with James Cuno, director of the Art Institute of Chicago, we talk about what it might take to make the Institute free to the public — which Cuno says is an idea they have begun — stress begun — to entertain at his museum.
LACAYO: Museum admissions used to be roughly in line with …
CBS Upfront: Selling Boring in Too-Interesting Times
We’re boring. That was the front-and-center message of CBS’ upfront pitch to advertisers, not just covertly but overtly: CBS Corporation chief Les Moonves actually used the term. “We’re not sexy,” he added to the advertisers assembled at Carnegie Hall Wednesday afternoon. But you could argue that’s a strong sales pitch in these …
The Morning After: Not-Idol Edition
I’m told there were other things on TV besides American Idol last night; considering that Tuesday’s final performance show was the lowest-rated ever, there’s a good chance you even watched some of them. For those of you who didn’t, and would never, blow two hours and seven minutes waiting for the results of a pop-music contest, how did …
Idol Watch: The Pro and the Underpuppy
Spoilers for last night’s American Idol finale after the jump:
Turner Crashes Network Upfronts Week
The channels of Turner Networks (disclosure: a division of Time Warner, which owns TIME) have been making the case loudly that advertisers should consider large cable networks (like them) equal to broadcast networks (like NBC) that have been getting smaller and smaller. TNT’s The Closer, for instance, might be only a modest hit on a …
A Talk With Jim Cuno
When I was in Chicago last week for the opening of Renzo Piano’s new addition to the Art Institute I sat down with the Institute’s Director James Cuno to talk about a number of things, but in particular the controversy that broke out in April when Chicago Alderman Ed Burke, chairman of the city council finance committee, challenged …
Programming Note: Idol Liveblog Tonight!
Tonight I will be liveblogging the American Idol finale with a special guest: Blake Lewis, runner-up of Idol’s season 6. He will be live at the finale in L.A. I will be on my couch in Brooklyn. I do not believe he will be beatboxing. If I get enough drinks in me, I just might.
The liveblog starts tonight. [Update: Blake starts …
CBS's Schedule Announcement
Every year, CBS introduces its schedule to reporters at a bacon-laden breakfast at their headquarters. Usually, you can count on the network’s chief, Les Moonves, to take entertaining potshots at the competition, especially NBC’s Jeff Zucker. This year, however, he disappointingly chose not to snark at NBC’s move to put Jay Leno on the …
The Morning After: Gotta Sing! Gotta Dance!
Fox has been promoting it and critics have been writing about it for what seems like years now, but last night the most important show in the history of broadcasting, Glee, finally debuted. You know I loved the pilot. What did you think?
I’ll be busy with upfronts business for the better part of the day, so feel free to use this …
Judging American Idol: The Final 2
“I am the voice in the crowd that needs to be heard.” “I am a dreamer.” “I am a superstar in the making.” And I… am finally writing my last American Idol review of the season!
I kid Idol, but although this was overall not the most memorable batch of contestants, we ended up with an actual suspenseful finale, between two contestants …
ABC's Upfront: Our Viewers Are Less Broke!
Say this for the Great Recession: it is prompting some creative new pitches at the upfronts. In a typical year, a network like ABC, which is not at the top of the ratings, would argue that it was still a good buy for advertisers because it had a god demographic. So ABC argued this year, but with a twist: buy ads on our network, they …