NBC - Dead Last

Back in the late seventies, when Fred Silverman ran NBC, that network was going through excruciatingly tough times; it was airing a number of bad sitcoms, formulaic dramas, hilariously bad variety shows, and campy TV movies like KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park, desperately throwing anything up against the wall to see it would stick. And apart from "Diff'rent Strokes" and the miniseries "Sho-gun," nothing did. NBC's initials could have been said to stand for "Not Broadcasting Competently," and everything Silverman did to reverse NBC's course before the network finally canned him in 1981 only worsened the situation; the network stayed mired in last place among the three major networks.

Well, guess what - history is repeating himself. After twenty years of consistently being at the top or in the runner-up spot, NBC - overseen by the clueless Jeffrey Zucker - is once again last among the major networks. And this time there are four of 'em.

At the risk of sounding haughty, I could see this coming. NBC had been running on fumes for the past five years, relying increasingly on aging sitcoms such as "Friends" and "Frasier" while being unable to develop successful new sitcoms. Remember when the American version of the BBC's "Coupling" was expected to be the successor to "Friends?" Both were gone when the 2003-04 season ended, the newer show having lasted only two months. In fact, when Kelsey Grammer, who first appeared on "Cheers" at the same time NBC got out of last place, called it quits, he could congratulate himself for perfect timing, having ridden NBC's hot streak from its beginning to its end. The 2004-05 season ended up as a repeat of the bad old days of the Silverman era - bad sitcoms, formulaic dramas, and, in place of hilariously bad variety shows, egregiously stupid reality shows. Zucker had elected to emphasize reality programming, which he decided was the wave of the future, insisting that the sitcom was all but a spent genre and that reality shows provided comedy in their own right. This was Zucker's way of admitting that he couldn't bother trying to develop new sitcoms anymore; he evidently figured that NBC could keep up the good ratings with quickly produced reality shows that would generate quick advertising revenue, and so he went for reality fare like the boxing show "The Contender." Which, by the way, is out for the count - permanently.

Zucker hasn't opted for campy TV movies - although the miniseries "Revelations" is camp enough - but you'll know he's getting desperate if we see Limp Bizkit Meets Dr. Sinister.

NBC's recent sitcoms have mostly been minor hits (did anyone really want a "Friends" spinoff starring Matt Le Blanc?) or ill-advised disasters. After striking out so much there, you'd think they'd have been able to create some decent dramas in the style of "The West Wing," but the peacock network instead offered up "LAX," gone because the title described the ratings; "Hawaii," which is now paradise lost; and "Medical Investigation," which came up empty in seeking out viewers. They ditched "Ed" for this?

We could be going back to the days when local NBC affiliates opt for local programming during prime time, as Philadelphia station KYW-TV, now a CBS affiliate but an NBC affiliate until 1995, did during back in the Silverman years. Of course, it could be worse. The peacock network still has the Olympics through 2008 at least, but what if, say, late in the December before the Beijing Games, China should, say, decide to invade Taiwan? As I recall, the Soviets invaded a country called Afghanistan late in the December before the 1980 Moscow Olympics, which NBC paid a fortune to air in the U.S., and attentive readers of this blog will remember how that turned out.

NBC needs to rebuild its schedule completely from the ground up and emphasize quality programming with new ideas and fresh spins on old ones - which is exactly how they established their long period of dominance starting in the mid-eighties in the first place. What's more, they don't have a Gary Coleman sitcom or a miniseries based on a James Clavell novel to tide them over, as they did during their last great dry spell. If the suits at Rockefeller Center and in beautiful downtown Burbank know what they're doing, they won't repeat any of NBC's historic mistakes.

But if we end up seeing a new sitcom built around Sean Hayes, your best bet is to sell that NBC/Universal stock.

(On the other hand, they did unexpectedly renew "The Office . . ..")