TV Land Acquires Raymond, Boston Legal for 2010, Borrows Home Improvement, Nanny; Nick at Nite Renews Glenn Martin

TV Land has landed the exclusive primetime broadcast rights for the Emmy® Award-winning comedy, Everybody Loves Raymond, from CBS Television Distribution beginning June 2010. The series ran in primetime for eight seasons, totaling 212 episodes and will premiere in TV Land PRIME, the network's primetime programming block designed to appeal to the attitudes, life stage and interests of people in their 40s. Additionally, the network announced three other new series to hit the airwaves in 2010: Boston Legal, Home Improvement and The Nanny.
Everybody Loves Raymond will be shared with cable network TBS, which airs the series in daytime and will still do so next June. Boston Legal will premiere on TV Land in the first quarter of 2010, while Home Improvement is being borrowed from sister network Nick at Nite and will be either on both networks or will move to TV Land by first quarter 2010. My guess is that it will totally move to TV Land. Home Improvement also airs in the daytime on TBS, so TV Land will only have evening rights. The Nanny will also be borrowed from sister network Nick at Nite and will be either on both networks or will move to TV Land, but this won't happen until third quarter 2010...next fall. Boston Legal is currently not on cable besides the weekend play on WGN America, though ION Television does have broadcast weekday rights.
These four series represent a continued commitment to build TV Land PRIME, the network's primetime programming destination dedicated to 40-somethings - a vibrant group with unmatched purchasing power and living in the most dynamic stage of their lives with relationships at work, with family and with friends all thriving. All of the programming in TV Land PRIME is hand-picked to appeal to the attitudes, life stage and interests of this important demo.

Nickelodeon/Nick at Nite has ordered a second season of 20 episodes of stop-motion animated series Glenn Martin, DDS, the first television series from Michael Eisner's Tornante Animation. The animated comedy series chronicles the offbeat adventures of the Martin family as they crisscross America in their tricked-out RV, encountering an array of bizarre situations and colorful locals. Ranked as the number-one program on Nick at Nite last quarter, the show features an all-star voice cast that includes Kevin Nealon as Glenn Martin, Catherine O'Hara as Jackie Martin and Judy Greer as Wendy Park.
Glenn Martin, DDS ranks as Nick at Nite's number-one program among total viewers average with 2.1 million total viewers each week, in third quarter 2009. In its first week, Glenn Martin, DDS reached a total of 11.3 million viewers and averaged 2.6 million (P2+) total viewers per telecast (Monday-Thursday, Aug. 17-20, 8 p.m.-8:30 p.m. [all times ET/PT]), according to Nielsen. The series also ranked as ad-supported cable's number-one co-viewed entertainment series in prime time for the premiere week with 40% of Adults 18-49 watching with at least one kid per household. Forty percent of Adults 18-49 watched with at least one kid 2-11 per household.
Season one has featured celebrity appearances, including Wendie Malick and Betty White, and will soon feature Bret Michaels, Chrissie Hynde, Gene Simmons, Sean Hayes, Jim Parsons, Estelle Harris and Don Johnson, among others.
Recently, Nick at Nite added hit series Everybody Hates Chris and Malcolm in the Middle, strengthening its slate of popular hit family comedies including the Emmy Award-winning series George Lopez, Home Improvement, The Nanny and Roseanne.

Don't forget ABC Comedy Wednesday starting tonight at 8/7 central! Today's blog is sponsored by Cougar Town, airing 9:30/8:30 central on ABC Comedy Wednesday. Because 40 is the new 20!

30 Rock Reruns Coming to Comedy Central, WGN America in Fall 2011; NY's WWOR Makes Historic Change

30 Rock is heading to off-network syndication in fall 2011 and has already sealed a cable deal. Both Comedy Central and WGN America have acquired the off-network cable rights to the critically acclaimed but ratings challenged comedy. They both will share the cable rights to the sitcom airing weekdays starting fall 2011 and have paid a combined $800,000 an episode, approximately speaking. That is similar in price to FX's buy of Two and a Half Men, but that was only FX buying it and not a shared deal. FX starts Two and a Half Men in fall 2010.
30 Rock will be coming to cable the same time it starts local broadcast syndication as well. That usually doesn't happen, as usually it takes 3 years or more for a show to hit cable after it hits local broadcast syndication, as is the case with Two and a Half Men. So far 30 Rock has not had any local station clearances for fall 2011, but that is still a while away. If the series gets canceled after next season, that might not even happen anyway.
Comedy Central currently airs only two actual sitcoms--Scrubs and Just Shoot Me. 30 Rock would make a nice pair with Scrubs, but Scrubs' deal would be over by fall 2011, unless they renew it. As for WGN America, they are trying to be an all-around network, as they have also acquired Entourage for fall 2010 and South Park for this fall, both as we previously announced. This type of programming is geared for their late night line-up. Classic TV will still be a big part of WGN America's line-up as well, so don't fret!
30 Rock is entering its fourth season on NBC this fall, airing Thursdays at 9:30pm ET/PT. We will certainly have more on the syndication deal as we get more information.

WWOR (My9) in New York is making some drastic and historic changes starting next week. Historic because they are moving the long time 10pm newscast to 11pm and removing the weekend newscast totally! We first reported this on our message boards on Monday, but we wanted to do a story on this as well. WWOR will air The Wendy Williams Show now weeknights at 10pm following MyNetwork TV programming, replacing the hour-long 10pm newscast with Brenda Blackman and Harry Martin. The Wendy Williams Show is a encore from earlier in the day from sister station WNYW (Fox5), which will air it at 10am. So the WWOR news moves to 11pm, and will now only be 30-minutes but will be continued to be anchored by Blackman and Martin. Law & Order: Criminal Intent shifts from 11pm to 11:30pm weeknights as a result of this change. On weekends, the news hour is completely gone--so on Saturdays we now get The King of Queens at 10pm and on Sundays the second run of House at 10pm.
There are tons of other changes during the day on weekdays starting July 13 as well, most notably are sitcoms now from 1pm-2:30pm with One on One, Scrubs, and That '70s Show. WWOR is preparing for the fall as they are cutting the double-runs of canceled shows to just one airing like Family Court with Judge Penny and Trivial Pursuit. WWOR will also have a big hole to fill in the fall when Tyra Banks Show moves from syndication to The CW Daytime.
Sister station WNYW is also making changes. This week they added a test-run of Beyond Twisted, which is an eight-week trial run on Fox owned stations (WNYW New York, KTTV Los Angeles, KDFW Dallas, WJVK Detroit, KSAZ Phoenix and KMSP Minneapolis) at 12am. Then starting next week, Good Day NY expands into the 9am hour as well, bumping the canceled Morning Show with Mike & Juliet to 12 noon for now. As we mentioned, The Wendy Williams Show will air weekdays at 10am on WNYW. And the second run of Everybody Loves Raymond moves from WWOR to WNYW, airing weeknights at 12:30am. WWOR will air the first run but will move it to weekdays at 6:30pm. Finally, starting July 20, another test run show will air on WNYW. Weekdays at 11am Deadlock or Wedlock (a sort of a Divorce Court spin-off) will get a six-week trial run on Fox owned stations in New York, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Tampa, Phoenix, Orlando and Memphis.
View the full changes for WWOR and WNYW in a list form. We will have more on WWOR and WNYW later this month (along with cable networks and other NYC market stations) in our annual fall schedules barrage blog posts! So stay tuned!

TBS Fall 2008 Line-Up; RTN's New Slogan

A little over a month ago we told you Married...with Children is coming to TBS this September airing weekdays from 6-7am and sometimes between 4-6am as well. TBS only has rights to air the show between 2-7am, so they cannot give it a better slot, unfortunately. However, we also stated Spike TV has gotten the rights from 7am-2am starting September as well. We gave you two updates on that, one for the original story and the other with the schedules times. We will have more on Spike TV's part tomorrow in our Spike TV Fall schedule. But sticking with TBS, they are not really making any changes this fall. For Labor Day weekend they will have two marathons...on Sunday, August 31 from 8am-1pm they will showcase the hit sitcom The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air for a marathon leading into their Sunday MLB Baseball Game of the Week. Then on Labor Day itself, (Monday, Sept. 1), TBS will showcase the number one sitcom of all-time for basic cable Tyler Perry's House of Payne with a marathon from 10am-8pm, leading into the Family Guy Monday block. They will air the premiere episode of TNT's original drama Raising the Bar on Tuesday, Sept. 2 at 11pm following two episodes of The Office. We will have more on TNT's fall line-up in the coming days. Then Tuesdays at 11pm, Frank TV is back with a second season as the late night comedy is back starting Sept. 9! Teen drama Dawson's Creek had been airing on some early morning slots on some days, and its last airing will be late Monday, Sept. 8 at 4:30am ET, as it is no longer scheduled in any other slot through the end of October, so I am not 100% sure, but it seems it might have expired.
Effective Monday, Sept. 15 Married...with Children joins the TBS morning line-up airing weekdays at 6:00am & 6:30am ET. The MLB Playoffs start on TBS on Wednesday, Oct. 1 airing in the afternoon and primetime, so the morning/early afternoon lineup will be a bit altered each day...so when the playoffs are on, you'll have to check your listings to see when the TBS sitcoms are airing. But starting Monday, Sept. 29, TBS will swap Seinfeld and Everybody Loves Raymond's slot. So, Seinfeld will move from 5-6pm to 7-8pm, while Raymond goes from 6:30-8pm to 5-6:30pm, which means Friends is now 6:30pm starting Sept. 29. Also, the primetime blocks are altered a tad as well. Starting Monday, Oct. 20 everything will be back to normal as the MLB Playoffs are over and Fox will do the MLB World Series.
Check out the full TBS Fall 2008 line-up in a list form, and you can also discuss what you think.

Today RTN (Retro Television Network) announced its new slogan "Classic Television Hits All Day, Live Talk all Night." According to RTN spokesman Neal Ardman, RTN will begin to phase out paid programming over the next few months. The goal, said Ardman, is to provide the viewer with compelling programming 24 hours a day. RTN will begin inserting live news, general entertainment, and sports talk shows in the late night and overnight hours beginning in September. Not to worry, Classic TV will still air in the mornings, afternoons, evening and primetime!
Robin Leach has been tapped to produce and host one such, as yet unnamed, show to be produced LIVE in Las Vegas. Another show, Unreliable Sources, a news/talk show with viewer calls, already airs in over 30 markets and is produced at the RTN studios.
RTN is currently sold in 72 markets and last week went on the air in Washington, D.C. on WJLA-DT. RTN is the only network that is customized for each market.

TV One Brings Amen to Evenings Starting in April Now; Nick at Nite Sees 1st Quarter Ratings Do Big; TNT Loves Romano

Beginning on Monday April 7, TV One has made a change to their line-up. The Sherman Hemsley sitcom Amen will air one hour of back-to-back episodes in the weekday 5pm & 5:30pm timeslot. For Your Love and Eve, previously airing in these time periods will no longer air. This change was set to happen on Monday, May 5, as we said late last week, but TV One has decided to do it a month earlier!
As also stated late last week on the TV One May highlights, TV One will be airing 24-hour sitcom marathons during the month of May beginning on Friday nights. The first of these special marathons will actually begin now on Friday, May 2 at 8pm with a special Martin marathon continuing on the theme of TV One's election year slate of 'Martin for President' marathons that originated over President's Day weekend. This time, the "Martin 'HaterNation' Marathon" takes on the sniping that usually happens in election campaigns with a full 24 hours of Martin Payne & his host of wacky alter egos battling Pam, Sheneneh and all the other Martin-haters who would try to take Martin down.

Nick at Nite, fueled by the performance of George Lopez and Home Improvement, scored double digit increases during the 1Q08 (Jan-Mar) among total viewers (P2+) and Adults 18-49 in both primetime and total day. In primetime, Nick at Nite was up +32% over first quarter 2007 (1Q07), and was +37% higher among Adults 18-49. George Lopez has been the network's highest rated program in 2008, with ratings growing consistently since it joined the schedule, while Home Improvement ratings have also increased each month. The recent George Lopez marathon did huge as the ratings were the best week ever for Nick at Nite.

TNT has ordered a one-hour pilot of Men of a Certain Age, a new character-based drama from Everybody Loves Raymond Emmy winners Ray Romano and Mike Royce. Romano will star in the project that takes a wry look at what it means to be a guy approaching mid-life while also exploring the unique bonds of male friendship. Romano wrote the pilot script with Royce and will executive-produce with Royce (who will serve as show runner), Rory Rosegarten and Cary Hoffman. The show is about the highs and lows of being a guy in the modern era. It's about three best friends, each hoping to fulfill his dreams before the clock starts running out.
This is the latest project to emerge as part of TNT's aggressive plan to change most of the network's weekday, primetime schedule to originals by 2010. The network currently has 15 projects in various stages of development, including both scripted dramas and unscripted programs.

NBC's Today Reunites Classic TV Casts: Happy Days, Growing Pains, Newhart and More; Raymond Moves to Fox Stations in March

There have been some TV reunions already this month (Cosby Show kids on Oprah and Family Ties on Today). But now we will get much more! NBC's Today will bring America's favorite classic television show casts together again starting Saturday, February 23 and continuing through Friday, February 29. "Together Again" reunions will air each day sometime during the 8:00 a.m. hour of Today.
On Saturday, February 23, Weekend Today's Amy Robach will interview the cast of Growing Pains. Kirk Cameron, Joanna Kerns, Alan Thicke, Jeremy Miller, and Tracey Gold will talk about their experience as the Seaver family in the classic 1980's sitcom.
On Sunday, February 24, Peter Alexander interviews the cast of Newhart. Bob Newhart, Julia Duffy, Peter Scolari, William Sanderson, Tony Papenfuss, and John Voldstad are reunited for the first time on television as a full cast.
Happy Days are here again on Monday, February 25 when Henry Winkler, Ron Howard, Marion Ross, Tom Bosley, Erin Moran, Don Most, and Anson Williams are reunited live in the studio.
On Tuesday, February 26, the cast of the classic sitcom One Day at a Time with Bonnie Franklin, Valerie Bertinelli, Mackenzie Phillips, and Pat Harrington together again live in the studio. Valerie Bertinelli returns later in the show (9am hour) to discuss the book "Losing It: And Gaining My Life Back One Pound at a Time." Gary Coleman is also interviewed in the hour.
Candice Bergen, Faith Ford, Charles Kimbrough, and Joe Regalbuto will be live in studio 1A on Wednesday, February 27 to talk about their time on Murphy Brown.
On Thursday, February 28, Michele Lee, Joan Van Ark, and Donna Mills stop by to talk about one of the longest-running primetime dramas in network history, Knots Landing.
Friday's reunion will be announced soon...Taxi was originally planned this week, so it could be that. We will let you know.
Get those VCR's and DVR's ready at 8am for the next 7 days starting Saturday! To discuss these reunions, click HERE!

The hit sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond is one of the top sitcoms in off-network syndication. In many markets it airs on a Tribune station. That will change starting March 17, though. The show will be on the move in many markets from Tribune stations to Fox-owned stations. For example, in New York City the show airs currently at 6:30pm and 12am every weeknight on WPIX (CW11), a Tribune station. It will be moving to WWOR (My9), a Fox-owned station, in New York. If you all recall, something similar happened to Seinfeld some years back when it moved from Tribune to Fox-owned stations (in NY that was WPIX to WNYW). The Fox-owned deal for Raymond runs from March 2008 to September 2013.
So how will this Raymond move affect New York? Obviously this will affect WPIX and WWOR, since they are the ones removing and adding Raymond. But this will also effect WWOR's sister station, WNYW (Fox5), as some series will migrate from WWOR to WNYW, and vice versa. First off, WWOR will add Raymond every weeknight at 6:30pm and 12am (the same slots WPIX aired it). The show will also be available in HD! Raymond will also air Saturdays at 6:30pm. WPIX will replace Raymond at 6:30pm with Friends, so it will air back-to-back from 6-7pm now. Friends' late slot will now be gone though as Sex and the City, Will & Grace, Frasier, and George Lopez will move to an half-hour or hour earlier. Joining WPIX's late night line-up are classic sitcoms The Odd Couple and The Jeffersons in the 2am hour...both are now back after a short break! WNYW's changes include moving the 2nd run of TMZ on TV from noon to midnight and adding the second run of Bernie Mac, which was on WWOR. WWOR will air the first run of Bernie Mac now at 4:30pm instead of 6:30pm.
To see a FULL list of the changes on WWOR, WPIX and WNYW, I really urge you to click HERE!

Our big week continues tomorrow with more big news, including a follow-up on our BET schedule story and some TV One changes. You will not want to miss this!

WPIX Fall 2007 Schedule; Fox Revamps Fall Schedule

WPIX, the CW affiliate in the #1 market (New York City), has announced its Fall schedule to us. They will be adding quite a lot of new shows this fall, compared to other New York local affiliates. They will add repeats of new syndicated entries Two and a Half Men, Family Guy, George Lopez, and Reno 911 to the weekday line-up. Also coming are new first-run series Steve Wilkos Show and Jury Duty to the weekday line-up. Joining the Daytime CW lineup will be repeats of sitcom All of Us at 3pm. On weekends, they will add repeats of Chappelle's Show on Saturday nights at 12-1am and Degrassi: The Next Generation on Sunday mornings from 10:30am-1pm.
Some changes include Judge Mathis at 9am and 2pm, while staples Maury and Jerry will air 10 & 11am, leading into new talk show Steve Wilkos Show, which means Judge Lopez will move to 1-2pm. Sitcoms My Wife & Kids and According to Jim will be moving to 5-6pm, Friends at 6pm and Everybody Loves Raymond moving to 6:30pm. New sitcoms Two and a Half Men and Family Guy takes over 7-8pm. The same duo returns for more episodes from 11p-12am, but the half-hours are switched. Moving to midnight, we get the secondary episode of Everybody Loves Raymond, followed by Sex and the City at its new time at 12:30am. The secondary Friends is now at 1am, followed by Will & Grace, Frasier, and George Lopez will debut at 2:30am. Back to back South Park at 3am, the debuts of Reno 911 and Jury Duty in the 4am hour round out the night.
So what happened to the late night classic TV sitcoms? You know The Jeffersons, Good Times, Cheers. They will lose rights to Cheers after August, but the others are still under contract and will return when needed. The Honeymooners and Green Acres are also under contract still.
To view the full seven day schedule, click HERE.

Fox has made some changes to its fall line-up. The biggest move is Bones moving from Wednesdays at 9 to Tuesdays at 8 as of Sept. 25. Now airing Wednesdays at 9 (effect. Sept 19) is the new reality series Kitchen Nightmares, which was slated for Thursdays at 9, which will now be Don't Forget the Lyrics as of Sept. 6. Fox will also air another night of Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader episodes for four weeks on Fridays at 8, before new reality series The Search for the Next Great American Band premieres in early October on Fridays at 8. New drama New Amsterdam, which was slated for Tuesdays at 8 will now be held for mid-season.

TBS September 2007 Schedule, The Office on Tuesdays, 'Sex' All Week-Long; My Boys Scores on TBS

TBS has released its September 2007 schedule and it will feature some changes. The week of September 3 has some minor changes, which are just filler until the new line-up that starts on September 10. Let's start with the filler stuff. Sept. 4, 5, 6 and 7 NewsRadio returns for 4 days in the noon slot followed by The Cosby Show at 12:30pm. The other filler stuff is very minor, and you can take a look at that in our link at the end of this story.
Let's move on to the September 10 line-up. The Steve Harvey Show is moving from its afternoon slots to 6 & 6:30am, replacing The Cosby Show which will now move to the dreaded approx. 5:30am slot, where it will not air everyday. Saved by the Bell continues to air its two-hour block from 7-9am. The morning movie will move from 10am-12pm to 9am-11am now. Dawson's Creek which was at 9am will move to the dreaded approx. 4:30am slot, which like Cosby Show, will not be everyday. Home Improvement will get a two-hour block from 11am-1pm. Yes, Dear moves from late afternoon to early afternoon at 1-2pm. Just Shoot Me, which premieres August 6, will move from 1-2pm to 2-3pm. The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air moves to an hour later at 3-4pm. The King of Queens will take over the 4-5pm slot followed by an hour of Seinfeld at 5-6pm. Friends will air at 6pm followed by a triple shot of Everybody Loves Raymond from 6:30pm-8pm.
Primetime will also be changing. Friends will kick-off Mondays and Thursdays with back-to-back episodes from 8-9pm. On Mondays it will lead into Family Guy from 9-11pm and on Thursdays a movie from 9-11pm. Tuesdays will see a Family Guy block from 8-10pm and then starting September 18 The Office will air Tuesdays 10-11pm. Wednesdays will see a House of Payne marathon from 8-10pm followed by back-to-back Family Guy episodes 10-11pm. Finally, Fridays will have Everybody Loves Raymond kick-off the night leading into Dinner and a Movie.
Effective week of September 17, you can now catch Sex and the City five nights a week on TBS at 11 & 11:30PM! Seinfeld will get the late Tuesday slot of 11:59PM and 12:30AM, while movies will air the rest of the week. Other notes: Parent'hood is missing from the schedule because its contract has expired. Drew Carey Show has also expired, as we noted in the August changes.
No word yet if this is indeed the Fall schedule or not, as usually TBS launches its fall schedule in October. We shall find out and when we do, we will let you know. So for now click HERE to view a list of these changes!

Sticking with TBS, the season premiere of original sitcom My Boys scored well for TBS last night. Continuing to ride a wave of comedy success, TBS has triumphed once again on the original comedy series front. Last night's return of the critically acclaimed sitcom My Boys scored extremely well with young adults, garnering a median age of 29. The show also outdelivered the series' November 2006 series premiere among adults 18-34 and scored an extraordinary 43% growth in that demographic when compared to the show's 2006 13-episode average. Last night's episodes averaged more than 1.6 million viewers, nearly half of them among the key adults 18-34 demographic. My Boys airs Mondays at 10 p.m. (ET/PT), exclusively on TBS.
Other ratings highlights for the return of My Boys on TBS:
- Combined, last night’s back-to-back episodes averaged 801,000 adults 18-34, a 43% jump over last year's 559,000 premiere average for the first 13 episodes in that demographic. Last night's episodes also averaged 1,176,000 adults 18-49, up 12% vs. premiere telecasts of the show in 2006 (1,052,000).
- Demonstrating the successful strategy of stacking episodes to provide stronger flow, the 10:30 p.m. episode of My Boys last night showed growth over its lead-in 10 p.m. episode, with adults 18-34 up 4% and adults 18-49 up 6%.
- With My Boys joining the list, TBS now claims ad-supported cable's Top 8 sitcoms for the year to date among adults 18-49, with Tyler Perry's House of Payne ranking #1, The Bill Engvall Show ranking #2 and My Boys ranking #6. Rounding out the list are Friends (#3), Seinfeld (#4), Everybody Loves Raymond (#5), King of Queens (#7) and Sex and the City (#8).