Jon Hamm on Mad MenMichael Yarish
TOO FAST, TOO FORWARD?
Cable dramas like Mad Men, The Walking Dead and Fargo may earn the buzz but they aren't the best buy for advertisers.
According to a new research from the U.S. digital service TiVo, viewers are far more likely to skip through the commercials when watching recorded programming.
The TiVo research covered the time period of January to June of 2014 and focused on a sample of 350,000 TiVo boxes in the United States.
And according to the TiVo data, viewers are more inclined to race through the ads at breakneck pace while watching recorded episodes of TV's currently most-talked-about drama shows.
The TiVo list compiles the top 10 shows with the lowest commercial retention, with AMC's Mad Men topping the list with only 27 per cent, followed by the FX series Justified (30 per cent), AMC's Halt and Catch Fire (31 per cent), FX's Fargo (33 per cent) and the FX series The Americans and the USA Network legal drama Suits (both 33 per cent).
The list is rounded out by AMC's The Walking Dead (34 per cent), History's Vikings (35 per cent), SyFy's Warehouse 13 (35 per cent) and Bravo's cooking-competition series Top Chef (36 per cent).
It's worth pointing out that both advertisers and TV networks factor ad-skipping into their pricing of commercials. All ad buys are based on the audience levels for commercials – not the programs – that are viewed live and up to three days after their initial broadcast date.
And which shows have the highest commercial retention (meaning viewers actually watch the ads)? Welcome to the wild world of reality television.
Three unscripted series tie for first place: HGTV's House Hunters International, TBS's Bam's Bad Ass Game Show and HGTV's Caribbean Life, with an impressive 84 per cent of ads retained by viewers.
The high-commercial retention list also shows that HGTV's Love It or List It has 83 per cent of ads retained by viewers, followed by Discovery's Gold Rush with 82 per cent and the Nickelodeon family drama Haunted Hathaways with 81 per cent (Haunted Hathaways is the only scripted show on the list).
Also on the list: HGTV's Island Hunters (81 per cent), HGTV's Property Virgins (80 per cent), House Hunters Reno (80 per cent) and Beachfront Bargain (79 per cent).
Obviously, the shows with the highest ad retention are not the type of shows that earn Entertainment Weekly covers, but they're great ad buys if only for the fact that they cost far less.
According to the media firm SQAD, a 30-second primetime spot on The Walking Dead costs $97,000 (U.S.), while the same-length commercial on Love It or List It costs an average of $13,000.
The message here: Viewers want to find out what happens to Don Draper on Mad Men and the human survivors on The Walking Dead, but they're not very interested in the car and lifestyle ads during commercials.
But when viewers watch Property Virgins or Love It or List It, they're more willing to sit through commercials for wood stain or home furnishings.
Suddenly the expression "all that glitters is not gold" has new meaning.
SHARK SUCCESS
On either side of the border, the tacky cable movie Sharknado 2: The Second One took a big bite out of the available viewing audience this week. On the originating U.S. cable outlet SyFy, the sequel set a ratings record with 3.9-million viewers, which is more than double the audience for the first Sharknado movie in 2013. In Canada, Sharknado 2 earned 389,000 viewers, an increase of 26 per cent over the first movie.
Source: Deadline
FIGHTNG BACK
Monica Lewinsky has responded to her name being used in Orange is the New Black. The former White House intern's name is dropped in a decidedly vulgar fashion in the 11th episode of the Netflix drama set in a women's correctional facility. Earlier this week, Lewinsky wrote a short essay about the episode for Vanity Fair, in which she said: "After the cringing embarrassment, the whiff of shame and the sense that I am no longer an agent running my own life, I shuddered, I got up off the sofa and I turned it off."
Source: Vanity Fair
BARE NECESSITIES
Chris Pratt has admitted that he once flashed his Parks & Recreation costar Amy Poehler. During his appearance on Late Night with Seth Meyers this week, the burly actor recalled a P&R scene in which his character of Andy was supposed to show up at the house of ex-girlfriend Anne (Rashida Jones) but instead catches Leslie (Poehler) off-guard when she opens the door. After a few takes, Pratt decided to do the scene naked. "I'm not quite eliciting the response that I was hoping for from Amy," said Pratt. "I was like three or four takes in. And to Mitch, our boom operator, I was like, 'Mitch, I'm gonna go snake out on this one. I'm gonna go naked!"
Source: People
REGGAE COP
Have you seen the video of the Toronto police officer dancing to a reggae beat? Facebook user Francis Bayotas was attending the recent Beaches Jazz Festival when he spotted one of Toronto's finest dancing away to the music of a local reggae band. Bayotas captured the moment and posted it to his Facebook page, where it has so far earned close to 70,000 shares.
Source: People
ARTHUR'S BACK!
Chance the Rapper has recorded and released his own take on the theme song from the animated kids series Arthur. The rap artist released his own version of Wonderful Everyday: Arthur this week after performing the song at concerts earlier this year. The Chance rendition was recorded with the assistance of Wyclef Jean and is currently available on iTunes.
Source: Us