The Price is Recession

Just about everyone is cutting back in these economic times. Heck, look at all the articles I had to cut back in writing here, to save newsprint.

You wouldn't think about it in normal economic times, because the overload of consumerism seems so normal -- but I imagine game shows must be getting hit harder than we expect. The current killer of media -- news, programming, papers, internet -- is a lack of advertising revenue. With no one buying, companies are forced to slash their ad budgets to save cash. So it comes as no surprise that game shows -- for example, The Price is Right -- are not immune. After all, The Price is Right is nothing more than an hour-long commercial. I've always wondered how the FCC lets that slide. I just figured Bob Barker must have fathered everyone on the FCC board, but I'm not sure about Drew.

Recently, The Price is Right has taken a major nosedive. Again, not just because of Drew Carey. Take, for instance, the prizes in the showcase. Now, when I was a kid, those showcases were out of control. You'd get a shitty first price, to warm up you up -- essentially a fluffer, so to speak, to get you ready for your big scene. You know, like a toaster or a washing machine or a piece of carpet. Then you'd get a medium prize, like a new dining room or a golf cart or a big ass TV. Finally, you'd get the monster prize. The prize that you could never afford if you worked your whole lousy life as a bartender/student/old person or whoever else competes on TPIR. The monster prize used to be a motor home, or a trip around the world, or a night with Barker's Beauties. Sigh, if only.

Now, look at today's Showcases:

Showcase #1: An arcade game, a trip to Cannes, France, and $1500 "gambling money."
Showcase #2: A coffeemaker, some shitty Seattle's Best coffee, and a Chevy Cobalt.

Hmmm so you're telling me I have to choose between Pacman and forcibly wasting my prize money in a shitty tourist town -- or a caffeine high in a shitty American car that will likely kill me in my ride home? Umm, I bid $10 trillion, Drew. Thanks.

I don't blame The Price is Right. They're doing the best they can. They hired Drew Carey to save a few million a year. The fired all the hot Beauties, because apparently, unattractive girls cost less. And they started handing out crappy prizes, because the big-ticket advertisers weren't willing to give away a Cessna anymore. I get it.

Maybe pretty soon they're just do away with The Price is Right, and save money by merging it with other CBS programming.

CSI: Showcase Showdown, Two and a Half Dollars, or How I Met Your Outbidder.

CBS Gets an F-

It goes without saying (but I will anyway): Yesterday's bridge collapse in Minneapolis is a huge story, and will be for weeks. "What went wrong?" will be the question that will probably never be answered, yet perpetually asked.

So yesterday, after the 6:00 local shows wrapped their wall-to-wall coverage of the collapse, it was the Networks' turn to take over. Now, the bridge collapsed around 4:00 PT. World News, Evening News, and Nightly all air from 6:30-7:00 for the east coast, or 3:30-4 for those slow in math (and I know you're out there). Here's a bit of inside baseball, "making the band" info about how the networks do their evening news shows. Generally, the show is live in all aspects for the east coast, like most things on TV. But the west coast feed (3 hours later) is usually different than the live version. After the live broadcast, Charlie, Katie, or Brian go back, re-shoot/update/edit/fix things from the live show. So by the time we see it here in L.A., the "West Coast Edition" (as Nightly calls it) is about as live as The Tonight Show.

There's two obvious reasons to reshooting the show:

1. Making the anchors look better by eliminating flubs and screw ups; and more importantly,
   
2. Being NEW (because the NEWS is supposed to be NEW) in case something happens between 4:00 and 6:30 Pacific Time.
   

Get to point right? Yesterday, while ABC and NBC went live with their respective anchors to cover the bridge collapse, CBS did not. For whatever reason, CBS and Katie Couric went with their canned East Coast feed, and had nothing on the bridge until about 6:45, with a live VOSOT.

There may be an excuse, and I really hope there is. Otherwise, the Evening News producers need to be fired, or flogged. Either will do.

Bad job, Katie.