Big 4 Creative Famine

The decline of quality fictional (drama and comedy) broadcast on the four major US commercial TV networks continues.

Two recent developments cement this trend. First, NBC’s recent announcement that next fall they will cede five hours of their weekly lineup to a new primetime weekday strip of Jay Leno’s talk series. Second, the Golden Globe nominations for television, in which the Hollywood Foreign Press reserved over 70% of their nomination slots (in the 11 major TV categories) for programming that does not air on the major networks. In one of the categories -- Best Performance by an Actress in a Mini-Series or Made for TV Movie—the major networks were shut out altogether. Meanwhile, the Big 4 scored only 1 nomination in 6 of the other categories and 2 nominations in 3 of the categories. Only in the Best Performance by an Actress in a Comedy or Musical category did the major webs managed to score a majority of the nominations.

Here’s a complete run down of the split in nomination slots between the majors versus the cablers + PBS (1st number indicates major net programming/second number indicates non-net programming

Best Television Series – Drama: 1/4
Best Television Series – Comedy or Musical: 2/3
Best Mini-Series or Made-For Television (MTV) Movie : 1/4
Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series – Drama: 2/3
Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series – Drama: 1/4
Best Performance by an Actress in a Comedy or Musical: 3/2
Best Performance by an Actor in a Comedy or Musical: 2/3
Best Performance by an Actress in a Mini-Series or MTV Movie: 0/5
Best Performance by an Actor in a Mini-Series or MTV Movie: 1/4
Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Mini-Series or MTV Move: 1/4
Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Mini-Series or MTV Movie: 1/4

Overall totals 15/40
Percentages: 27.3%/72.7%