Were you BORED STIFF TOO?  Did you feel like you were a bystander watching an inside Hollywood joke?  Did you also turn off your TV set and find something better to do because the elite culture war was crude and insulting?

There is a story behind  the awards, the hosting, the production numbers, and the whole dry, humorless affair.   You could blame the show’s producers, or host Jane Lynch of “Glee”, but the truth is:

TV is dying.   The nominated shows are not half as good as watching YouTube for half an hour on your computer.  Why?

No one is buying time or making or watching commercials.  As a result, advertisers

are not willing to pay the freight like they used to at ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX.  Audiences are watching network TV shows produced by cheaper writers and producers, with cheaper and cheaper ideas, low-ball content, less talented but more provocative talent, and the result?   There is almost nothing worth watching and even less worthy of an award.

Sunday night, viewers were treated to glorious tributes and thank you speeches for shows like Glee, A Modern Family, and The Big Bang Theory.  (Which might be your personal favorites!)  But the Neilsen Ratings reveal the painful truth:  None of these big “winners” peeks into the Nielsen Top 20 during ratings sweeps except occasionally The Big Bang Theory.    AMC’s “Mad Men” is another rare exception.  The advertising series built around the 1960’s era is well-written and beautifully-acted.  “Mad Men”  took  several Emmy’s Sunday night, but even that fine show doesn’t crack the Nielsen Top 20.

Network television is  a wasteland today , especially when compared to its heyday in the 70’s and 80’s when M.A.S.H. or Cheers or “Seinfeld” would draw 20 million or 30 million viewers regularly.  Sometimes more.  The number one show in the Nielsen’s last week?  NFL Football!  In season, the runner-up to a good pro-football game is American Idol.   Even American Idol only attracts about nine million viewers on a competitive night. The Apprentice or Dancing With The Stars draw even a smaller audience.   In other words, no one is watching TV like they used to.  Americans are on Facebook, watching Netflix, YouTube, or reading on their IPADs.

(Incidentally, what are CNN Anderson Cooper’s nightly numbers?  Perhaps 500,000 viewers on a good night.  AMAZING.)

The more actors, producers, directors and writers keep crowding their personal agendas into the Emmy’s and their episodes, the shorter the red carpet will become.  This year’s Emmy broadcast was the poorest ever, and the high point?  Well the high point was also the low point.

Someone  felt it would be good television to bring Charlie Sheen on stage to present the Emmy for Best Actor in a Comedy Series.

That just about said it all.

Here are the Nielsen Ratings for the first week of September 2011.  Judge for yourself.

 

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Filed under: Economy, Featured, Inside The KC, Politics, Sonja Eddings Brown by Sonja Eddings Brown, Sep 18, 2011