PASADENA, Calif. -- Blood was in the water and the sharks were circling yesterday morning as ABC executives met the press. Where once the age of CBS viewers or the quality of UPN shows was the primary butt of jokes at the TV critics press tour, ABC's spectacular plummet in the ratings this past season made the alphabet network a designated punching bag.
After burning out "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" and failing to develop new hits behind it, ABC went from first to worst in short order. With ABC/Disney chieftains Alex Wallau and Robert Iger looking on from the front row, ABC Entertainment Television Group chairman Lloyd Braun acknowledged the unfortunate state of the network.
"Believe me," he said, "nobody has been looking forward to a new television season more than we have."
Braun said this year's goal is to "show you tangible signs of a turnaround." He acknowledged that a complete turnaround is unlikely, but the network aims for a "palpable shift in momentum."
Braun emphasized working with producers to make new series the best they can possibly be from the start, saying there is "no margin for mediocrity."
At the same time, ABC Entertainment president Susan Lyne said critics who have bemoaned the lack of originality in all networks' fall schedules are out of touch with the mainstream.
"Groundbreaking and provocative is not necessarily what the network audience is looking for when they come home after a long day," she said. "What we have been focusing on at this network is, how do we give people what they really want -- shows that are entertaining and genuinely funny. We'll leave groundbreaking to somebody else."
Lyne said programs that are overly complex and overly demanding are not what viewers want to see on ABC.
"While I'm thrilled shows like that are on the air, they may not be what most of our audience is dying to watch at 8 or 9 or 10 at night," Lyne said. "[Critics'] interest may be slightly different from the majority of the viewing audience."
Based on ABC's pilots (and Braun's comments notwithstanding), it looks as though mediocrity is the order of the day for ABC. However, the notion of a "Happy Hour" of shows at 8 p.m. weeknights should not be taken as the return of the "family hour" of the 1970s.
"We avoided calling it the 'family hour' because I think that term has developed a negative association with safe programming, bland programming, programming that can't hurt or upset anyone," Lyne said. "We're trying to offer an entertaining block of television targeted at our core 18-to-49 audience that's fine to watch with a 10-year-old or 12-year-old. We're not trying to imply it's for the family to gather 'round ye old television set, but there is an opportunity with any one of these shows to appeal to multi-generational age groups."
When asked if he would guarantee that ABC's ratings will improve, Braun, ever the businessman, dodged. When a reporter rephrased the question and asked if ABC had hit bottom, Braun again began to run away until the more media-savvy Lyne jumped in.
"Let's just say, 'Yes,' " she said.
ABC didn't say "yes" to a second season of "Philly," a show that improved creatively from its inception and seemed poised for ratings growth if it had been renewed for a second season.
"What we found problematic was that people were not inclined to give it a second chance," Lyne said. "One of the reasons we have to focus so strongly on making sure the shows we put on the air this fall are shows the way we want them to be, is because the television audience, besides being fickle, is very unlikely to go back to shows they have written off as being too dark or complicated or not entertaining enough."
Other ABC news:
After "The Bachelor 2" concludes its run, "The Bachelorette" will come on in January with Trista Rehn, 29, from the original "Bachelor" in the title role. A reporter suggested that double standards about men, women and sex may color viewers' impressions of Rehn. "We've convinced ourselves there isn't [a double standard], and I do think watching this unfold will be interesting," Lyne said. "We are looking carefully at the format to see whether there are different things we might do. ... At the end of the day, we may not change a thing, but we are at least assessing some of the aspects of that program. If we never turned it around and had a female able to choose from 25 men, we'd have a much bigger backlash."
"Monday Night Football" producer Fred Gaudelli said the decision to replace Dennis Miller in the broadcast booth came about only after John Madden became available. "We were planning to go full steam ahead with Dennis," he said. There were no plans to retain Miller after the addition of Madden because "with John Madden and Al Michaels, you have everything you need to have the finest broadcast."
"The Practice" creator David E. Kelley will contribute more scripts to the legal drama this season, which will add a lawyer to the firm. Jessica Capshaw will play a know-it-all who recently graduated from law school.
"The Drew Carey Show" and "Whose Line Is It Anyway?" will begin their seasons early on Sept. 9 before the start of "Monday Night Football." However, it's the Steelers at New England that night, and Pittsburgh's WTAE already has plans for a local special in that time slot. ABC's comedies may air on Channel 4 at a time that's yet to be determined.
A one-hour retrospective of "NYPD Blue" will air 9 p.m. Sept. 24 before the show's 10th season premiere at 10 p.m.
Forsaking the solitary color yellow in network promotions, ABC will expand its palette in on-air promos with green and yellow as signature colors for "Happy Hour" promos and darker blues and reds for the network's dramas.
ABC has ordered the comedy "Regular Joe" for midseason. Daniel Stern stars as a father who puts his empty-nest years on hold to raise his 18-year-old daughter's baby. Bill Macy ("Maude") and Estelle Harris ("Seinfeld") play Stern's parents.
ABC's "Wonderful World of Disney" original movies revisit two big-screen movies with "Home Alone 4" and a loose remake of the John Travolta flick "Phenomenon."
Visiting 'Buffy'
A trip to the Santa Monica set of UPN's "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" reveals several telling traits immediately: Buffy really likes Ben & Jerry's ice cream (a half-dozen empty containers fill her non-functioning freezer) and her hometown of Sunnydale must love the movie "Dude, Where's My Car?" because it's still showing almost two years after its release at the Sunnydale cinema. (Actually, the movie is a favorite of executive producer Marti Noxon.)
Though the series was down last season -- it got too dark, the humor disappeared, the plots weren't well paced -- it's not out. Executive producer Joss Whedon said the upcoming seventh season will return to the show's roots, figuratively and literally.
Sunnydale High, which was blown up when Buffy (Sarah Michelle Gellar) and her friends graduated, has been rebuilt. Once again, it's located over the "hellmouth," a portal that unleashes demons into the world.
"The city planners of Sunnydale are really stupid people," admitted co-executive producer David Fury.
Buffy's sister, Dawn (Michelle Trachtenberg), will enter high school, and Buffy will spend time there working for a school-based community outreach program. The characters will both relive aspects of high school and realize how they can't relive it.
Xander (Nicholas Brendon) and his construction crew are involved in building the new school, and he's become financially successful. He'll use that new-found wealth to attempt to woo back demon Anya (Emma Caulfield), whom he left at the altar last season.
Standing in the midst of the Sunnydale main street -- facades built in the parking lot behind the warehouse that houses the show's sets -- Whedon said this season will bring back the humor.
"We wanted to go to a dark place and explore the dark side of [Buffy's] power, her relationships and how hard it is to enter the adult grown-up world, and boy, did we succeed in showing it was hard," he said. "Not everybody was glad we did that. This year we're doing something different, partially in response to that, but mostly because we do something different every year."
Whedon said recent seasons have explored the freedom of college, the importance of family and the fear of entering the adult world. This year is about being drawn back to school and showing Buffy once again empowered and taking a leadership role.
"Last year she really lost herself, and I think the audience really felt that lack," he said.
Whedon said returning to the high school setting appeals to him because he only got to tell high school stories for 2 1/2 seasons before the characters graduated.
"That was the only time I felt bad, like I'd lost something," he said. "When they graduated, I was like, 'Wait, I went through more bad things! There's more pain I haven't talked about yet!' "
Vampire Spike (James Marsters), who had his soul restored in the season finale, also will be connected, but Whedon wouldn't explain how. He would say Spike's reinstated soul won't lead to a repeat of Angel-with-a-soul stories.
"Everything we've done has been done before. The trick is to do it differently and have it mean something new," Whedon said. "[Unlike the Angel situation], there's no [gypsy] curse. And also no mousse," referring to the look sported by David Boreanaz, who plays Angel.
Whedon is planning to bring back many past characters this season, including the vampire slayer Faith (Eliza Dushku), evil demon Glory (Clare Kramer), the nerd Warren (Adam Busch), vengeance demon Halfrick (Kali Rocha), Tara (Amber Benson), crazy vampire Drusilla (Juliet Landau) and ditzy vampire Harmony (Mercedes McNab).
Former librarian Giles (Anthony Stewart Head) will appear in at least 10 episodes.
The contract for series star Gellar expires after this season (Caulfield said she'll leave at that point, too), but Whedon didn't rule out continuing the series without Buffy.
"I'm game for almost anything," he said. "It's an incredibly strong ensemble, a very strong mythos. It's a huge universe we've created and an incredible cast of actors. There are definite opportunities for different kinds of shows."
Because of Whedon's work on The WB's "Angel" and his new Fox drama "Firefly," two "Buffy" spin-offs are now on the backburner: the Giles-starring BBC show "Ripper" and a "Buffy" cartoon series.
Rob Owen can be reached at 412-263-2582 or rowen@post-gazette.com. Post questions or comments about TV to www.post-gazette.com/tv under PG Online Talk.
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