Ordinarily I’d save these for another day, one in which I don’t already have a topic in mind, but these popped up today and led to a few thoughts:
First, due to Hurricane Sandy, a number of stations have cancelled shows or will replace them with repeats, including CBS (what do you mean there’s no new HIMYM tonight?). Shows that tape live (including Jimmy Kimmel, who is taping in Brooklyn this week) have either be cancelled (Kimmel, The Daily Show, The Colbert Report) or are taping without audiences (Letterman, Jimmy Fallon).
Second, do you watch NBC’s Up All Night?
Yeah, I don’t either. But apparently they’re switching mid-season from a single-cam to multi-cam. Ratings haven’t been great for the show, which is more than likely on the bubble for renewal, but this change at least gives them a couple of benefits:
1. The show gets cheaper (multi-cam costs less than single-cam to produce, generally).
2. If NBC is serious about trying to open a new beachhead in the multi-camera comedy world (where CBS is king), then taking a shot at keeping an existing property on the air next year by converting it to a multi-cam (where the network currently has no hits, unless you count Whitney as a hit) – especially if it was probably going to be cancelled anyway – isn’t the worst idea in the world.
One ancillary benefit also comes from the fact that since this means the show will have to go on break for a few months to re-tool, that scheduling void (likely to hit sometime in January or so) could be when Community finally returns.
