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Friday, August 6, 2004
‘Gotti’ is A&E’s highest-rated show ever
How sad is this? A&E, the cable network once synonymous with excellence, hit an all-time ratings high Monday with the debut of “Growing Up Gotti,” a domestic reality show starring the daughter of the late mob kingpin John Gotti.
Television is a ratings game, we know that. And there’s nothing wrong with balance. A lineup that’s all ballet, classical music and British theater would get boring after a while. And a lineup that’s all cheesy reality would be, well, worse than boring.
So in theory there’s nothing wrong with having blond-maned, Botox-infused Victoria Gatti shouting at her loutish teenage sons on A&E. But in reality (pardon the pun), it’s tragic that this is the most-watched series in the network’s 20-year history, drawing 3.2 million viewers.
It was also the top-rated series Monday night on basic cable.
“All of us at A&E are thrilled by the premiere ratings,” Abbe Raven, A&E’s executive vice-president and general manager, crowed in a press release. “Victoria and her sons proved to be compelling real-life characters that make for great television. We are delighted that our quality real-life series strategy has paid off.”
In case you missed it, “Growing Up Gotti” lurks inside Victoria’s enormous (and enormously tacky) Long Island mansion. A&E describes her as “a multidimensional working mom.” Sons Frank, Carmine, and John are called “the Hottie Gottis.” You get the picture.
A&E still has the loftier fare, including the riveting “MI-5,” about a British counter-terrorism unit operating in a new age of international espionage, and “The Last King,” a miniseries about the turbulent life of King Charles II.
But the push for bigger ratings has driven A&E to more mainstream programming. “Biography,” the long-running profile series, has become the network’s staple. And true-crime series such as “American Justice” and “Cold Case Files” have brought in a new batch of viewers.
Last season A&E added “Airline,” a reality show that chronicles travelers interacting with Southwest Airline’s ever-cheery personnel, and “Family Plots,” a reality show about a family that owns and operates a mortuary.
A&E proudly points out that it has the most prime-time Emmy nominations (24) of any basic cable network this year. Congratulations. But hey, A&E, try not to turn into a combination of E! and Fox, OK?
And speaking of ratings …
CNN’s coverage of the Democratic National Convention last Thursday night drew 2.8 million households, beating Fox News like a drum.
But before CNN begins bragging about trouncing the No. 1 rated cable news network, let’s think about why this happened.
Recent surveys by several media organizations have found that cable news networks tend to be politically divided: Fox’s audience overwhelmingly describes itself as conservative, while CNN’s audience describes itself as moderate to liberal.
Given that information, it stands to reason that Fox’s audience wouldn’t have much interest in the Democratic convention anyway.
So it’s not that CNN drew viewers away from Fox but that Fox viewers simply weren’t watching when John Kerry accepted the nomination.
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