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LifeStyle ready for Garden Angels
The LifeStyle Channel has commissioned a 12-part half-hour practical gardening series, featuring former gardening experts from several free to air shows.
Melissa King (Battlefronts and Gardening Australia), Jody Rigby (Backyard Blitz and The Outdoor Room) and Linda Ross (Ground Force and radio’s The Garden Clinic) will host ‘ acomplete garden guide – taking viewers through everything that needs to be done in the garden, no matter what part of Australia they are in.’
To be produced by Southern Star Entertainment, Garden Angels will premiere in September.
Nicole Sheffield, The LifeStyle Channel’s General …
Domestic Blitz axed?
TV Tonight is hearing unconfirmed reports that production staff on Nine’s Domestic Blitz were advised the show was given its marching orders yesterday.
This week the makeover show was just pipped by TEN’s Biggest Loser, but nudged ahead of Seven’s new Sunday Night show.
The week before it hovered around 1m viewers. The show, which incorporates plenty of sponsor products, is down about 500,000 on its 2008 figures.
Nine has several other feelgood shows in the pipeline. Late last year Nine CEO David Gyngell recently said, “There’s a substantial sea change in recent times …
Nine’s Secret Millionaire
In Nine’s 2008 ratings report it indicated some of the shows that are due next year. While most are already known to us there were two new titles:
Secret Millionaire and Little Britain.
Secret Millionaire is a British format in which millionaires give away tens of thousand of their own money after spending time living in a community where no one knows that they are wealthy. A US version also begins this week on FOX.
At this stage it’s unclear if Nine airs an international or local version -presumably, it wouldn’t involve a Packer….
As …
Returning: Battlefronts
Nine’s ‘other’ makeover show, Battlefronts, returns with unaired episodes this month.
Hosted by Giaan Rooney, the series is back 6:30pm Sun Dec 14.
Once again two teams return to makeover neighbouring houses in eight hours for a cash prize.
The show was taken off air after average ratings, which trailed the more emotionally-driven Domestic Blitz.
Airdate: The Hills, Battlefronts, Police Ten 7
Several other summer shows and dates were confirmed yesterday by the Nine Network.
Sudden Impact, an observational series narrated by Gary Sweet premieres Tuesday, December 9th at 8.00pm. It is to follow new episodes of reality series Police Ten 7.
Emergency returns Thursdays at 7.30pm from December 4th.
Battlefronts is back Sundays at 6.30pm from December 14th. Meanwhile long-running MTV reality series The Hills (pictured) premieres Saturday, December 6th at 12.30pm. The series, which is heavily constructed by producers, has already aired on subscription TV.
Press Release:
SUDDEN IMPACT
Premieres Tuesday, December 9 at 8.00pm
Behind every car …
Nine’s summer of Gossip
Gossip Girl, Pushing Daisies, Survivor: Gabon, Temptation, Fringe, ER, McLeod’s Daughters -are all coming to Channel Nine over summer.
Gossip Girl, the teen soap set in affluent Manhattan high school circles, has been screening on FOX8 (Pay TV has season two from December) but finally gets a Free to Air screening. Nine, which on-sold the rights to FOX8, will start with Series One. It is the second time the network on-sold a series by writer / producer Josh Schwartz, after it let TEN take The OC.
Also on Nine over summer is …
Packered by the Rafters
It was the week the Packer family parted ways with Nine causing David Gyngell to vow to prove James Packer wrong, TEN announced a new channel, Pay TV launched another three, Minister Stephen Conroy signalled support for increased ABC & SBS funding, commercial networks (briefly) found a conscience but upset David Leckie, WIN sat down at the gambling table, Kath & Kim (US) got a greenlight for a full season, Andrew Denton announced the end of Enough Rope, David Tennant set his exit from his iconic role, Rove visited …
The dumping ground of television
It’s become one of the stories of the 2008 television year: dumping shows ad infinitum. This month we’ve lost Fringe, Cold Case, Wipeout, Battlefronts, Kitchen Nightmares USA, Kath & Kim (US), 90210, Bondi Rescue: Bali and even a repeat series of Friends. Dropping shows isn’t new, but its rapidity is increasing, confusing audiences and disintegrating trust between viewers and networks.
Nine’s Head of Acquisitions, Daytime and HD programming Les Sampson spoke to TV Tonight about the challenges and ramifications of scheduling.
As we all know, delivering demographics to advertisers is an artform. Programming …
Auditions: Home Run
Channel Nine is looking for participants for a new home renovation program, Home Run.
The show is seeking participants with two or more bedrooms needing a makeover.
“All you need to do is find a neighbour or family in your street that has a similar sized house that you can battle it out against and then follow the instructions below,” says Nine’s website.
As with many shows in this genre, a team of professionals will “help make their vision come alive, as they compete with another family for big prize money.”
Nine’s most recent …
Current affairs surge at Seven
It was the week that current affairs and finance dominated. Ray Martin lamented the state of commercial news and current affairs at the same time as a former sports presenter won his first week behind a public affairs desk, a CEO lashed out at his rival networks but shot off about the starting date of his new current affairs project, while the network signed a former Sunday journo, TEN reported a 25% slump in earnings, a Telstra boss said Foxtel subscriptions were slowing, another Murdoch stitched up a production deal with …
Rudd talks money with Seven special
Seven has just announced another news special for 6:30pm Sunday night, Minding Your Money: An Audience with the Prime Minister.
The half hour special, to replace The Outdoor Room, will see PM Rudd talking to a forum of Aussies in a pre-recorded special filmed on Sunday afternoon.
Seven says there will be “no moderator, no filter,” just the PM one on one with audience members. Last week’s hurried Financial Crisis Special did well for Seven, at over 1.4m viewers. Nine even dropped Battlefronts from its forthcoming schedule as a result.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd …
Gone: Battlefronts
Channel Nine is dropping Battlefronts from its Sunday line-up effective immediately.
It will be replaced by new episodes of 20 to 1.
On Sunday the show rated 857,000 trailing Seven’s Financial Crisis special at 1.44m / Kath & Kim 1.23m viewers and a repeat of Thank God You’re Here on 962,000.
When it last screened two weeks ago, Nine’s show had 963,000 behind The Outdoor Room’s 1.04m and Outback Wildlife Rescue’s 961,000. Thank God You’re Here had 1.04m in the same week -a comparable performance by Nine, really.
Nine’s Domestic Blitz fared much better gaining …