Cancel a Show vs. Slash the Budget

[Mr Light]

As we all know, TV shows get canceled when their ratings don't perform well enough. And the more expensive a show, the more likely it is to be canceled, hence the poor track record sci-fi/fantasy shows have due to their hefty budgets.

But what I always wonder is, rather than cancel a show "on the bubble", with a small but proven audience, why not just slash its production budget? Wouldn't this make it again profitable to continue producing?

Obviously this would gut the quality of the show, but as we've seen time and time again, this isn't always the first priority of tv executives

 

[Aragorn]

Slashing budget usually means slashing the cast. I imagine Law & Order: SVU costs a lot more than the original Law & Order because of how many people from the first season are still there, versus the original show that hasn't been paying Chris Noth for 18 years. And 24 is a constant revolving door around Kiefer Sutherland considering how many people they keep killing off.

 

[Vendikarr]

As we all know, TV shows get canceled when their ratings don't perform well enough. And the more expensive a show, the more likely it is to be canceled, hence the poor track record sci-fi/fantasy shows have due to their hefty budgets.

But what I always wonder is, rather than cancel a show "on the bubble", with a small but proven audience, why not just slash its production budget? Wouldn't this make it again profitable to continue producing?

Obviously this would gut the quality of the show, but as we've seen time and time again, this isn't always the first priority of tv executives

This is the situation Moonlight found itself in last May. It was a bubble show with CBS, and they went back to Warner Brothers, and asked them to kick in a bit more, essentially saying CBS wanted to cut it's per episode payment to keep the show. Warner Brothers turned around and told CBS that the network would need to increase its fee for the second season. With the two parties being at an impasse, the show was canceled.

When you have two entities trying to maximize their profits, it's almost impossible to get this kind of agreement to work out. From what I have heard, Dresden Files died due to the same type of impasse.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

TV is a hit-driven business, where most shows are expected to fail and the few that are big hits provide the funding for the next crop of probably-failures.

So the impetus in TV is not to nurse along a show that will never be a big hit. Makes more sense to axe it and turn that timeslot over to a new show which may be the one you need to save your ass when most of your new fall season is crashing & burning all around you.

 

[DanCPA]

slashing a budget is usually not going to happen unless there is something huge to benefit the producing company (ala Paramount with Enterprise which was willing to take less per ep because they needed the "100" episode number to sell it in syndication and they also make big bucks on dvd sales) but usually they don't budge

 

[Jax]

A lot of canned shows still make profits but networks are very greedy so many bubble shows just don't need canning.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

A lot of canned shows still make profits but networks are very greedy so many bubble shows just don't need canning.

The point I made above is that they "have" to be greedy. That's the business they are in.

 

[Jax]

A lot of canned shows still make profits but networks are very greedy so many bubble shows just don't need canning.

The point I made above is that they "have" to be greedy. That's the business they are in.

Yes but bubble shows deserve a chance at the least but as we saw with a show like New Amsterdam got got decent ratings it was canned. Angel in season 5 was no way deserving being canned easily and WB failed in replacement shows after.

Majorty of shows fail but networks exec's are idiots, they pick a poor time/day slot or crapy lead in partner. I think if shows get canned for poor performance then so should these people who jobs are to run networks.

 

[Mr Light]

Given the horrible failure rate of new shows, you'd think they'd be more interested in a proven middler than a 90% probable failure that nobody shows up for. And wouldn't it be cheaper for a returning show rather than creating a new one from scratch?

 

[archeryguy1701]

I think making that call depends a lot on the show. Some shows can take a budget cut and keep rolling along just fine. For example, Jericho had a lot of money per episode cut in season 2, and it was far superior to season 1. However, there would be other shows who are already running on the bare minimum that they do well on, budget-wise.

 

[Mr Light]

Didn't they slash ST: TOS's budget in its third year, accounting for its crappiness? In addition to Roddenberry being off the show at that point (as I recall)?

 

[The Borgified Corpse]

Angel in season 5 was no way deserving being canned easily and WB failed in replacement shows after.

A few points about this:

* Although its ratings in Season 5 were up from Season 4, it was still not a top performer for the WB. All of the shows that did get renewed that year had better ratings with the sole exception of One Tree Hill.

* Most likely, 20th Century Fox would have had to increase the licence fee for Season 6, especially since David Boreanaz was making grumblings about not wanting to be on the show anymore, which would have at least required them to pay him more. (I suspect this is what finally killed Stargate SG-1 as well.)

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Yes but bubble shows deserve a chance

Most of them don't deserve a chance. Everyone focuses on the shows they like that get cancelled and ignore the hordes of terrible shows trotted out every year that need to be swept aside so the dimwitted networks can try, try, try again to come up with anything decent. I have no idea why this is so incredibly hard for them. Every year they come up with crap that sounds just like all the other crap and then they wonder why nobody bothers to watch.

And then there's the what-were-they-smoking shows...

Cavemen. I rest my case FOR ALL ETERNITY!

I think if shows get canned for poor performance then so should these people who jobs are to run networks.

Don't worry, they do. That's one reason why they are so quick on the trigger: if something looks like it's not going to make it, they will axe it quickly because they don't want it to take their career down with it. And when the new suits come in after a housecleaning, everything from the old guard gets swept aside, even shows that are doing halfway decently, because the new execs are not going to get credit for nurturing the old crew's pet shows. They are going to get credit (and keep their jobs) because they nurtured hit shows of their own, and to do that, they need lots of free timeslots to play with.

Everything in the business is geared towards lots of "creative destruction." The logic of Hollywood demands it.

And wouldn't it be cheaper for a returning show rather than creating a new one from scratch?

A TV exec looks at the new shows as containing that ONE hit that will save his/her career. The returning show isn't going to be a hit, unless it's a hit now, and maybe it was somebody else's baby to begin with, given the turnover rate in the executive suites. If it's a hit now, it won't be axed; if not a hit, it's in the way of the exec's career: goodbye. Any exec who wants to keep their career on an upward trajectory (and the alternative is failure) must wield a heavy axe - greed and terror rule the day.

 

[Jax]

Cavemen. I rest my case FOR ALL ETERNITY!

Someone please tell me that whoever allowed that on TV was fired. Makes me laugh that the guy who allowed LOST on tv was fired before it began.

 

[Captain Shaw]

I never herd of this show?
When did it air and how long did it last.
And please tell me it was not really about leopard print wearing cavemen.
Never mind manged to find the 1ep and i turned it off.
That was really bad and for one moment i thought one of the cavemen was David Boreanaz it sounded like him.

 

[stj]

This approach is obviously working quite well for the networks. That's why viewership and ad revenues are up so much. The job insecurity is forcing executives to new levels of creativity and bold originality.

Most of the budget slashing takes place in the show's production offices. Scripts with limited location shooting, or cheap location shooting (hello conifer forests of British Columbia,) limited casts and/or cheap actors (hello, Vancouver Central Casting,) limited FX, and ruthless negotiations with stars (this rarely comes out in public---but remember Jorja Fox and George Eads negotiating with CSI producers?) are all tried and true methods of slashing the budget.

Once the show is aired, cheapening it is extremely difficult. Playing hardball with actors at contract renewal is customary but cutting pay is breaking the contract. Cutting production values is self defeating as far as building an audience goes. This is especially true in SF, where producers believe (correctly, too, depressing a thought as it is) that the audience will accept just about anything, no matter how ridiculous, if the show looks good. The essential abilities of TV show writers are writing in the proper number of commercial breaks at the right time, plotting the cheapest casts, sets and FX the budget allows, and dreaming up the money shots (usually explosions or sensational confrontations.) Real originality in scripting is usually not available as an option for slashing costs. In fact, it might raise costs.

In short, either the production company eats the costs from a network demanding cuts in fees because they have reasonable hopes of receiving it back in other venues, or the show is canceled. Genuinely slashing budgets is only a specialty of companies like the ones that made Earth: The Final Conflict or Andromeda.