CBS: Restocking the Comedy Coffers

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Coverage: Upfronts 2013

RELATED:

ABC:

Reducing Repeats With Limited Series

CBS:

Restocking the Comedy Coffers

Fox:

24 Ways to Retool With Comedy, Spectacle

NBC:

Betting on Olympics, Voice to Launch New Hits

The

CW: Making Noise With Dramas

USA:

Launching Original Half-Hour Comedies

Turner:

Beefing Up Content Collection

ESPN:

We Welcome the Competition

Univision:

Expanding Its Hispanic Footprint

Telemundo:

Batting 1,000 on Original Content

MundoFox:

Bringing The X Factor, Bridge to Hispanic Viewers

Discovery

en Espanol: Introducing a New Programming Genre, Vroom

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here to view the fall primetime schedule grid.

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here to view pilot clips and trailers from the networks new shows.

STRATEGY: Launch the next generation of comedy

hits by premiering four new half-hours this fall, including expanding Thursdays

to a two-hour comedy block.

Next season, How I Met Your Mother will make its final bows, Two and

a Half Men will premiere its 11th season and The Big Bang Theory

will enter its seventh, so its no surprise that finding new comedy was a

priority for CBS this development season.

Last week, the network unveiled a fall schedule that includes four new sitcoms

and an expansion to a four-comedy block on Thursdays to build off the strength

of Big Bang Theory and Two and a Half Men. New sitcom The

Millers, starring Will Arnett as a recently divorced man with meddling

parents, will get the prime slot after Big Bang, followed by The

Crazy Ones starring Robin Williams and Sarah Michelle Gellar as

father/daughter partners at an ad agency.

Though CBS usually uses a veteran show to launch a newbie, it felt Williams

star power was enough to support Crazy Ones in the key time period. The

network hopes moving Men to 9:30 p.m. to lead into Elementary will

help grow that sophomore drama the same way it did Person of Interest

this season.

Theres maybe one or two actors in Hollywood who could help you launch a 9 oclock

show, and one of those is Robin Williams, Kelly Kahl, executive VP of CBS

primetime, said at a press conference last week.

The two other rookie comedies will join CBS Monday lineup, with HIMYM setting

up the single-camera We Are Men, about a group of newly single guys living in a

rental complex, and 2 Broke Girls leading into the new Chuck Lorre

sitcom, Mom, starring Anna Faris as a newly sober single mother.

In addition to launching comedies, picking up projects from its own studio was very

important, according to CBS Entertainment president Nina Tassler. Currently

the networks most successful half-hours -- Big Bang, Two and a Half

Men and 2 Broke Girls -- are from Warner Bros. Television, meaning

CBS does not profit from their lucrative syndication deals. Of the networks

four new fall comedies, two -- We Are Men and The Millers -- are

from CBS Television Studios.

With the focus on comedy, CBS will only launch one new drama this fall: Hostages,

starring Toni Collette as a surgeon whose family is taken hostage by a rogue

FBI agent (Dylan McDermott) the night before she is scheduled to operate on the

president. The show will air on Monday at 10 p.m. In a shift for CBS, the

suspense thriller is set for a shortened 15-episode run. Another new drama, Intelligence,

starring Josh Holloway, is set to replace Hostages in midseason with 13

episodes.

While Tassler stressed we are in the 22-episode business, the network agreed

to Hostages producers wishes for 15 episodes because of its highly

serialized storytelling and the opportunity to get more originals on Monday

nights. It is better for the show if we do 15, Tassler said, adding, The goal this year was to have more originals,

fewer repeats.

With Thursday growing to four comedies, Person of Interest moves to

Tuesday at 10 p.m. following NCIS and NCIS: LA, putting

televisions three most-watched dramas on the same night. Returning drama Hawaii

Five-0 shifts to Fridays between Undercover Boss and Blue Bloods,

where CBS execs hope its Monday audience will follow it.

Wednesdays remain completely intact with Survivor, Criminal Minds

and CSI, as do Sundays with 60 Minutes, The Amazing Race, The

Good Wife and The Mentalist, representing the stability CBS touts to

advertisers. We dont want to change every night. We dont want to change

nights that are working, Kahl said.

That stability helped CBS to its first ratings victory among adults 18-49 since

the 1991-92 season (though it has been No. 1 in total viewers for 10 of the

last 11 seasons), and its a crown the network doesnt plan on ceding any time

soon.

We didnt just look at what looks good this September. We tried to be

forward-looking, trying to see whats going to be good for the fall next

season, Kahl said.

Filling out CBS bench are three series that remain on tap for midseason --returning

comedy Mike & Molly (which still has a full 22-episode order), new

romantic comedy Friends With Better Lives and new southern legal drama Reckless.

E-mail comments to amorabito@nbmedia.com

and follow her on Twitter: @andreamorabito

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