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Stuart · 03-06-2006, 18:10

The problems are twofold: money and the obsession with viewing figures present in the TV industry. Comedy is relatively expensive to make (I don't know why, but apparently it is). Most good comedies take a series or two to really take off. TV companies simply don't renew most series unless they are an immediate hit. I can think of a few examples of this: Blackadder (which wasn't funny until series 2), Cheers (which was apparently nearly axed after series 1 because of low viewing figure, but went on to become one of the most successful comedy series in history) and Men Behaving Badly (which was on ITV, was axed because of low viewing figures then went on to massive success on the BBC).

The problem is that a TV company can very nearly produce an entire series of a reality show for the cost of one episode of a good comedy. They can also be fairly certain that the series will get enough viewers for the series to make a profit. They don't have this certainty with a comedy, or indeed any non-reality TV series.

They are frightened to stick with anything new.

03-06-2006, 18:10	#12
Stuart - Join Date: Jun 2003 Location: Somewhere Services: Virgin for TV and Internet, BT for phone Posts: 26,546	Re: Comedy The problems are twofold: money and the obsession with viewing figures present in the TV industry. Comedy is relatively expensive to make (I don't know why, but apparently it is). Most good comedies take a series or two to really take off. TV companies simply don't renew most series unless they are an immediate hit. I can think of a few examples of this: Blackadder (which wasn't funny until series 2), Cheers (which was apparently nearly axed after series 1 because of low viewing figure, but went on to become one of the most successful comedy series in history) and Men Behaving Badly (which was on ITV, was axed because of low viewing figures then went on to massive success on the BBC). The problem is that a TV company can very nearly produce an entire series of a reality show for the cost of one episode of a good comedy. They can also be fairly certain that the series will get enough viewers for the series to make a profit. They don't have this certainty with a comedy, or indeed any non-reality TV series. They are frightened to stick with anything new.