CBS mixes corpses, comics in fall lineup
Posted on Wed, May. 14, 2008
BY GLENN GARVIN
CBS, for the past decade a network built around CSI and its gory crime-drama clones, unveiled on Wednesday a fall schedule intended to make its viewers laugh as well as gag.
The network added two sitcoms, renewed a couple of others that seemed near cancellation just a few days ago and expanded comedy programming from one night to two.
''One of the things we wanted to get across is how important comedy is for us,'' said CBS programming chief Nina Tassler. ``Comedy has been significant for the network for many years. We had a fantastic comedy year.''
To make room for the comedies, the network canceled three notable dramas, including Cane, its groundbreaking nighttime soap about Cuban exiles in South Florida. Also biting the video dust were the vampire-detective cult favorite Moonlight and Shark, which won James Woods rave reviews for his portrayal of an ethics-schmethics district attorney.
Tassler's announcements came at a press conference in New York where the broadcast networks are staging their upfronts, annual meetings where advertisers get to see clips from the new fall shows.
WHAT'S COMING
CBS renewed sitcoms How I Met Your Mother and The New Adventures of Old Christine, which had been dangling in the wind for the past several weeks. The new comedies are Project Gary, with Jay Mohr (Ghost Whisperer) and Paula Marshall (Out of Practice) as dueling ex-spouses, and Worst Week, a remake of a British series with frequent CBS guest star Kyle Bornheimer as a top-notch magazine editor but domestic bungler.
Combined with two previously renewed sitcoms, Two And A Half Men and Big Bang Theory, they'll allow CBS to open both Monday and Wednesday nights with slates of comedies. ''We really wanted to focus on comedy, and we had the goods to do it this year,'' said Tassler. ``We've been looking to expand, to build out to another night. We have two of the highest-testing new comedies we've had in years.''
Not that the network is turning away from its crime-show corpsefests. The latest of the CSI clones is The Mentalist, starring Simon Baker (The Guardian) as a phony psychic turned cop whose hot-dogging ego bugs his colleagues. CBS is also adding Eleventh Hour, which shares the name of a 1962 NBC series about psychiatrists and the content of Fox's 1990s hit The X-Files. It stars Rufus Sewell (The Illusionist) as a government agent who investigates cases of weird and threatening science.
Another new CBS series, The Ex List, is a comedy-drama hybrid, with Elizabeth Reaser (Grey's Anatomy) frantically redating former boyfriends after a psychic tells her one of them is her future husband -- and she must marry him within the year or wind up alone.
FALLING SHORT
Two other CBS shows in the ratings twilight zone, military drama The Unit and romantic-discord sitcom Rules Of Engagement, were renewed but won't return until midseason. The network also formally canceled sitcom Welcome To The Captain, musical drama Viva Laughlin! and cutthroat-kiddie reality series Kid Nation, none of which have aired in months. The cancellation of another cult favorite, post-apocalyptic drama Jericho, was announced several weeks ago.
Jericho had already been canceled once, but a furious campaign by fans -- who shipped tons of peanuts to CBS executives -- had revived it for a second season. Fans of Moonlight tried a similar stunt, donating thousands of pints of blood to the Red Cross in an attempt to get the network's attention, but it didn't work. ''We had to make some tough calls,'' Tassler said.
None of the cancellations was really surprising, though the demise of Cane -- the first network drama with an all-Hispanic cast -- is certainly noteworthy. Its average audience of around 11 million viewers would have been enough to keep many shows on the air, but Cane's large and expensive cast -- which included Jimmy Smits, Rita Moreno and Hector Elizondo -- required more eyeballs to make the economics work.
''They wanted a lot more viewers,'' said Cynthia Cidre, Cane's creator and head writer, from her home in Los Angeles. ``They spent a lot of money, not only on the cast but on promotion. But the viewers just didn't show up.''
Cidre said Cane -- the tale of a wealthy and powerful Cuban sugar dynasty -- probably took viewers by surprise. ''It was an odd show in that it portrayed an ethnic minority without [them] being humble, aspiring, singing, dancing or telling jokes,'' said Cidre, herself a Cuban exile raised in Miami. ``These people were really rich . . . and I think there's something disorienting about that for a lot of people.''
This story was supplemented with material from Miami Herald wire services.
Join the discussion
The Miami Herald is pleased to provide this opportunity to share information, experiences and observations about what's in the news. Some of the comments may be reprinted elsewhere in the site or in the newspaper. We encourage lively, open debate on the issues of the day, and ask that you refrain from personal comments and remarks that are off point. In order to post comments, you must be a registered user of MiamiHerald.com. Your username will show along with the comments you post. Not a registered user? It's Free!
Register here. Thank you for taking the time to offer your thoughts.
