Gawker: defamer, nina tassler

CBS Not Reinventing The Sitcom And Cop Show Wheel Here, Folks

Seth — Wed, 14 May 2008 13:00:00 EDT

Following a detour in last season's CBS programming strategy which saw the network throw a few wackier ideas against the fridge to see what stuck (Drac Steele, Vampire P.I. and The Singing Venetian, Hugh Jackman's addition to the musical-casino genre, were what stuck), it seems they have returned to the dependability of laugh-tracks and procedurals for the fall 2008-09 season. At their upfronts announcement this morning at their New York offices, Les Moonves and trusty commandantes Nina Tassler and Kelly Kahl made official their last-minute, 22-episode order of The New Adventures of Old Christine, the unlikely story of what happens when Elaine loses her balls and spends the majority of her leisure time bickering with her ex-husband and his new girlfriend. Following them on Wednesdays is a new sitcom, Project Gary, starring Jay Mohr, while another new, single-camera comedy, Worst Week, joins the Monday night lineup, alongside all the wisecracking nerd-geniuses and Britney guest spots you've come to expect.

Procedural goodness after the jump!

As for dramas, Tassler explained, "We do very well with our procedurals, but we've added more character to them." Translation: Expect an oblique reference to an affair between two CSI cast members over the break that will be all but forgotten about by episode three. With Drac Steele, Vampire P.I. (OK, fine, it's called Moonlight) thrown a fistful of holy water in the face by Moonves moments before the future galactic despot plunged a CBS-branded letter-opener through its heart, The Ex List—aka CGI: Clingy Girlfriend Investigators—swoops in to take its place. Also on the schedule, Jerry Bruckheimer's Eleventh Hour, "about a science professor who helps solve crimes," and The Mentalist, starring Simon Baker as "deceptive celebrity psychic" who "puts his observational skills to better use working for law enforcement." That's totally mental! All your CSI friends (minus Gary Dourdan) will be back, and, somewhat miraculously, you won't be seeing Without A Trace on the side of any milk cartons, for it has survived another season.

The full CBS Fall 2008/09 Lineup:

Monday
8-8:30 p.m. The Big Bang Theory
8:30-9 p.m. How I Met Your Mother
9:-9:30 p.m. Two and a Half Men
9:30-10 p.m. Worst Week (new)
10-11 p.m. CSI: Miami

Tuesday
8-9:00 p.m. NCIS
9-10 p.m. The Mentalist (new)
10-11 p.m. Without a Trace

Wednesday
8-8:30 p.m. The New Adventures of Old Christine
8:30-9 p.m. Project Gary (new)
9-10 p.m. Criminal Minds
10-11 p.m. CSI: NY

Thursday
8-9 p.m. Survivor
9-10 p.m. CSI
10-11 p.m. Eleventh Hour (new)

Friday
8-9 p.m. Ghost Whisperer
9-10 p.m. The Ex-List (new)
10-11 p.m. Numbers

Saturday
8-9 p.m. Crimetime Saturday
9-10 p.m. Crimetime Saturday
10-11 p.m. 48 Hours: Mystery

Sunday
7-8 p.m. 60 Minutes
8-9 p.m. The Amazing Race
9-10 p.m. Cold Case
10-11 p.m. The Unit

CBS returns to crime, comedy roots [THR]

'Creative Differences' Are the New 'Personal Issues'

Mark — Wed, 18 Jul 2007 19:33:05 EDT

Hoping to finally close the Case of the Vanishing Criminal Minds Star, reporters at today's CBS Television Critics Association panel confronted president Nina Tassler about the exact nature of the "creative differences" that might induce an actor to flee a successful series without explanation. Clarified Tassler:

"When he approached us and said, 'I want to be released,' and we talked about it internally, we realized that this was the moment in time where we knew we had to address it, and we did and were able to accommodate him," she told a gathering of TV critics in Beverly Hills.

In a statement issued on his behalf by the show's producers, Patinkin said his departure was "due to creative differences." The producers added that salary and contract issues were not at issue.
Pressed for further details during the network's semiannual presentation to TV critics, Tassler insisted unspecified "personal issues" were behind Patinkin's move. Asked to reconcile her explanation with his, she said, "I think creative differences is a euphemism for personal issues."

To her credit, the discreet Tassler refused to entertain reporters' follow-up questions about what "personal issues" might be a euphemism for, preferring instead to wish the actor the best of luck with all of his future suddenly-quitting-hit-shows-under-mysterious-circumstances endeavors, and even generously offering to send Patinkin's headshot over to NBC colleague Ben Silverman for one of his headline-grabbing talent reclamation projects.

CBS: Patinkin Quit 'Minds' Due to 'Personal Issue' [Reuters]

Nina Tassler Issues Formal Letter Of Surrender To The 'Jericho' Nation

Seth — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 20:56:30 EDT

For Jericho fans anxiously awaiting confirmation of the rumors that their grassroots campaign to save the series had actually worked, today comes official word from on high: This morning, a tiny, white flag poked out of the gargantuan mound of peanuts that currently stands where CBS headquarters used to be. It was waved weakly (there was precious little oxygen for the executives trapped beneath to breath), and was followed by a rolled-up sheet of CBS letterhead, which eventually landed with a bounce at the feet of the small army of chanting Jericho activists hoisting placards at its base. This is what it read:

"Wow! Over the past few weeks you have put forth an impressive and probably unprecedented display of passion in support of a prime time television series," CBS Entertainment President Nina Tassler said in a letter to "Jericho" boosters. [...]

"You got our attention; your emails and collective voice have been heard," Tassler wrote, and seven episodes have been ordered for midseason 2007-08. "In success, there is the potential for more. But, for there to be more `Jericho,' we will need more viewers."
Fans must do their part to rally interest while the network does its job, she said. [...]

Another positive outcome of the fan campaign: CBS is donating the protest peanuts to charities, including one that sends care packages to troops overseas.

We're having difficulty remembering a network-audience dialogue as universally beneficial as this one: Jericho fans get additional episodes and the impression that CBS actually listens to them, CBS gets some good P.R. and a new revenue source by repackaging the first season DVD set with the bonus episodes as Jericho: The Ultimate Saved From Cancellation Collection, and our soldiers get many, many, many boxes of salted peanuts, just the snack you first want to reach for in 110° Iraq summer weather.

CBS reverses decision to ax 'Jericho' [Yahoo/AP]

CBS's Nina Tassler Reveals Why She Put Down 'Smith' Like A Sickly Dog

Mark — Mon, 23 Oct 2006 18:31:34 EDT

Today's NY Times uses the example of Smith, the quickly dispatched CBS drama whose birth/death cycle was an impressively efficient three weeks, to illustrate how the itchy trigger-fingers of jittery, hit-hungry TV executives seem to have doomed the on-air existence of TV's "modest successes," shows that fall somewhere between total Nielsen bed-shitters and instant, inexplicable, Deal or No Deal-type hits. But after hearing CBS head executioner Nina Tassler dissect the reasons she dispassionately strangled the show with a piece of piano wire, Smith sounds less like a "modest success" than a "show that people checked out once or twice, then decided they weren't interested in." Reports the Times:

"When you launch a new show, you certainly want it to retain a certain percentage of its lead-in," [Tassler" said. "You also want it to build in the second half hour, and we really weren't doing that with 'Smith.' "
In its first week, 11 million, or 93 percent, of the 11.8 million viewers of "The Unit" stuck around for the first episode of "Smith." In the second week, that percentage fell to 81 percent, then plummeted to 63 percent in the third week.

Not only was "Smith" keeping less of its lead-in audience, but a shrinking portion of the previous week's viewers returned each week to see the next installment of "Smith." And the number of viewers also fell consistently from the first half hour to the second. [...]

"We have a unique vantage point at the network," she said. "I've seen cuts and read scripts for the next four to five episodes, so I could see where we're headed creatively. And we weren't 100 percent happy with what we were looking at."
Specifically, she said, the show's scripts were becoming harder to follow. "You have to have clarity in the story-telling," she said. "Confusion kills. I think it was particularly challenged in that area."

Citing the series' rapidly declining Nielsens probably would have been justification enough for her decision, but feeling suddenly liberated by the candor that programming executives rarely share with the press, Tassler followed up her opinion on the needless, syndication-hampering complexity of Smith's scripts by remarking, "For 2.5 million per episode, you'd think they could have edible craft service when the head of the network visits, you know? I had the runs for weeks. Weeks!" and that "in high-def, Ray Liotta's face was a little much to take."

On TV as in Hollywood, Little Breathing Room for the Modest Success [NY Times]
Previously: 'Smith' Finally Takes The Fall Season's Cancellation Maidenhead [Defamer]