SitcomsOnline.com News Blog: WABC

Showing posts with label WABC. Show all posts

Friday, December 03, 2021

Fri-Yay: It’s Always Sunny Returns, Bold and Funny as Ever; Jon Stewart Joins Live in Front of a Studio Audience for The Facts of Life; Remembering Eddie Mekka of Laverne & Shirley

It's time for another edition of Fri-Yay! That means we will take a look back on some sitcom happenings in recent days or weeks or other fun sitcomy stuff. It's a sitcom lover's paradise! Happy Fri-Yay!

by Vincent

This week, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia returned for its landmark 15th season on FX. The show has remained one of the funniest shows on TV through and through, and even though it isn't always as consistent as it was in its prime, it's incredible that it still manages to be as funny and consistent as it has been.

Always Sunny season 15 has promised to bring some of the realities of our world to the show's twisted universe. Being the show's first season since 2019, the world has obviously become a very different place since then, and without giving too much away, the premiere addresses this in typically funny Always Sunny ways. The ending of the episode in particular is one for the ages, and shows that even as the world changes, Always Sunny will always be its twisted, reliable self.

Jon Stewart

Live in Front of a Studio Audience: The Facts of Life and Diff'rent Strokes adds more star power to its cast ahead of the live show airing on ABC, Tuesday, Dec. 7 (8:00-9:30 p.m. EST). Jon Stewart takes on a mystery role in The Facts of Life episode. Who will he play? You'll have to tune-in to see! There will be other special cameos as well. Still no word on which episodes are being recreated, but for Diff'rent Strokes the word is that it will be "Willis' Privacy" from season one which had Arnold as Super Arnold.

The live special event produced by Sony Pictures Television will feature reenactments of the hit series The Facts of Life, created by Dick Clair and Jenna McMahon, and Diff'rent Strokes, created by Bernie Kukoff and Jeff Harris, and will reunite executive producers Norman Lear, Jimmy Kimmel, Brent Miller, Kerry Washington, Will Ferrell, Justin Theroux and Jim Burrows. Previously announced cast members taking on the famed Diff'rent Strokes roles include John Lithgow, who will play Mr. Drummond; Kevin Hart, assuming the role of Arnold; and Damon Wayans, who will play Willis. The Facts of Life will feature Jennifer Aniston, playing the role of Blair; Gabrielle Union, taking on the role of Tootie; Allison Tolman, who will play Natalie; Kathryn Hahn, recreating the role of Jo; and Ann Dowd, who will tackle the role of Mrs. Garrett in both episodes.

Eddie Mekka

Actor Eddie Mekka, who was best known for his role as Carmine Ragusa on Laverne & Shirley, has died. He died in Newhall, California, on November 27. Mr. Mekka was 69.

Laverne & Shirley

Mekka starred as Carmine Ragusa on the 1976-1983 ABC sitcom Laverne & Shirley. He appeared in 150 of the 178 episodes during the show's eight seasons. Carmine was Shirley's (Cindy Williams) high-school sweetheart and on-again, off-again romance. He was known by the name "The Big Ragoo" and was a part-time boxer and former Golden Gloves champion. He owns a dance studio and was constantly working to make it big as a dancer and singer. Mekka appeared as Carmine Ragusa in two episodes of Happy Days. The cast of Laverne & Shirley also included Penny Marshall, Michael McKean, David L. Lander, Phil Foster, Betty Garrett (1976-1981), Carole Ita White (1976-1977), Ed Marinaro (1980-1981) and Leslie Easterbrook (1980-1983).

Blansky's Beauties - Eddie Mekka and Nancy Walker

He starred as Joey DeLuca on the short-lived 1977 ABC sitcom Blansky's Beauties. Joey DeLuca was the choreographer of the Las Vegas showgirls' big numbers at the Oasis Hotel. He was a younger cousin to Carmine Ragusa, Mekka's 1950s-era character on Laverne & Shirley. The Garry Marshall created and produced series also starred Nancy Walker, Caren Kaye, Lynda Goodfriend, Johnny Desmond, Scott Baio, George Pentecost, Taaffe O'Connell, Rhonda Bates, Bond Gideon, Gerri Reddick, Shirley Kirkes, Antoinette Yuskis, Jill Owens, Elaine Bolton and Pat Morita.

Some of his sitcom guest appearances included The Love Boat (3 episodes), The Munsters Today, Family Matters (2 episodes), California Dreams, Dream On, Weird Science, The Jamie Foxx Show, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, The Suite Life of Zack & Cody, Pastor Greg (2 episodes) and Childrens Hospital.

Some of his drama guest appearances included Fantasy Island (4 episodes), Moonlighting, True Blue, The Big Easy, Power Rangers Wild Force, 24, Crossing Jordan and ER. His soap opera guest appearances included Guiding Light, The Bold and the Beautiful, Sunset Beach and The Young and the Restless.

He had a small role as the dance partner of Mae (Madonna) in the bar in the 1992 film A League of Their Own, which was directed by Penny Marshall. Some of his other film credits included Top of the World (1997), Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star (2003), Dreamgirls (2006) and C Me Dance (2009). He played Detective Murdoch in the 1998 Fox television movie Catch Me If You Can.

Mekka was also known for his theater work. He was nominated for Broadway's 1975 Tony Award as Best Actor (Musical) for The Lieutenant. He performed in Hairspray at the Luxor in Las Vegas, Nevada and in a national tour of Grease with Cindy Williams.

Eddie Mekka

Mr. Mekka was a man of many talents as an actor, dancer and singer. He was very funny and memorable as Carmine Ragusa. We thank him for the laughs and entertainment he brought us. He will be greatly missed.

Share your memories on our Laverne & Shirley message board. View photos in our galleries.

Thursday, August 29, 2013

New York City Local Stations Fall 2013 Schedules; MeTV Network Says "West is Best" Batman

It's that time of year again...fall schedules for New York City stations! We have for you the full Fall 2013 schedules for WABC, WNBC WNYW, WWOR, WPIX, and WLNY. Unfortunately, I couldn't obtain the full line-up for WLNY at press time, but we have all the details on the new additions for WLNY below. We cannot cover every market's local schedules, so we will give you an idea what to expect by giving you the #1 market in the country: New York. And of course it helps because I live in the market!

We'll start with WNYW's (Fox5) Fall 2013 schedule. The main story is the launch of Modern Family. The sitcom makes its off-network debut on Monday, Sept. 23 and will air weekdays at 7:00pm & 7:30pm on WNYW. The other new additions to the schedule will be first-run series. New talker Bethenny will launch Sept. 9 and air weekdays at 11am, while TMZ's one-hour spin-off series TMZ Live will launch Sept. 9 at 1pm. Everything else is pretty much set for WNYW, but King of the Hill will be leaving, while The Simpsons will be moving to sister station WWOR. The Big Bang Theory will remain on WNYW at 11pm, but its other 7:30pm airing moves to WWOR at that same time. Other changes include both airings of The Office will now be on WNYW, at 12:30am & 1am following an hour of 30 Rock. That's about it, with everything else being just minor changes, like King of Queens weekend airings moving to WNYW.

Sister network WWOR (My9) will be making some changes as well. New series will be Law & Order: SVU airing weekdays at 10am starting Sept. 23 replacing Law & Order: Criminal Intent. On weekends, Glee joins the Sunday line-up airing Sundays at 6pm & 7pm beginning Sept. 29. WWOR will also air weekend airings of Modern Family, airing it Sundays at 10pm & 10:30pm, following a two-hour block of Big Bang Theory from 8-10pm. Joining the schedule from sister network WNYW will be The Simpsons airing weekdays at 6:30pm & 7:00pm starting Sept. 23, The Big Bang Theory weekdays at 7:30pm starting Sept. 23 and an encore of Bethenny weekdays at 3pm. Among the series leaving are Everybody Loves Raymond, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Law & Order, That '70s Show , and Jeremy Kyle. Current series moving to new timeslots include How I Met Your Mother and The King of Queens weekdays from 11pm-1am starting Sept. 23.

Moving on to WPIX's (CW11) Fall 2013 schedule. New series this fall are The Test weekdays at 3pm starting Sept. 9, Arsenio Hall weekdays at 11pm starting Sept. 9 and SAF3 Sundays at 5pm starting Sept. 22. One of the biggest news for WPIX this fall is the return of Everybody Loves Raymond starting Sept. 9. The sitcom will air weekdays at 6pm & 12:30am, paired with Seinfeld both times. Among the series leaving are According to Jim. Current series moving to new times include Seinfeld moving to 6:30pm & 12am, Friends moving to 1am & 3:30am, and Family Guy moving to 1:30am. On weekends, we have comedies mainly in the evening and late night. Everybody Loves Raymond will air Saturdays at 5pm & 6:30pm, Family Guy will air Saturdays 7-8pm and Sundays 1-2am, while Rules of Engagement will air Saturdays 8-9pm into Two and a Half Men from 9-10pm. We also mentioned beginning Sept. 14, classic sitcom The Honeymooners will air every weekend at 11pm & 11:30pm after the PIX11 News at 10.

Elsewhere, WABC (ABC7), which is #1 in NY and the most watched station in the nation, will not be making any changes at all except replacing Scrubs (weekdays 1:30am and Saturdays at 2am) with rotating series from Live Well TV: Deals, Sweet Retreats, Food Rush, My Family Recipe, Live Big with Ali V and Mirror, Mirror. Everything else is exactly the same. For WCBS (CBS2), they are adding Queen Latifah and the new talk show will air weekdays at 9am, bumping The Doctors off of WCBS. The Doctors will remain on sister station WLNY at 6pm.
And WNBC (NBC4) will not be adding anything new, but canceled talk show Jeff Probst at 2pm is gone and as of now WNBC will air Steve Harvey talk show repeats into a new airing at 3pm. Moving on to WLNY (TV 10/55), they are adding new series The Middle weeknights at 12am & 12:30am, Community weeknights at 1am & 1:30am, Queen Latifah weeknights at 7pm, Paternity Court weekdays at 1pm & 1:30pm, Cops Reloaded weekdays at 3pm & 3:30pm, and OK! TV weeknights at 11:30pm. Among the series leaving are Frasier, Inside Edition, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Eye for an Eye and America's Funniest Home Videos. No word on when The Cleveland Show will air in New York, but no sign of it right now.

View the FULL Fall 2013 schedules for WNYW, WWOR, WPIX, in New York City! And view the full list of new series coming to local syndication. Stay tuned for updates, if any. From New York, goodnight!

Holy campaigns, Batman! There's been so much talk about the cast of the upcoming Batman film starring Ben Affleck as Batman, that The MeTV Network just had to chime in. MeTV believes that it's always best to stick with a classic - and Adam West is pure memorable entertainment. Join MeTV in their quest for West - sign their petition and leave a comment to show your support for putting Adam West in the new Batman film. MeTV hopes to present this petition and comments to the man himself! Sign the petition today and maybe Adam West himself will see it and have a chuckle, old chum! And don't forget to tune in to Batman on MeTV every Saturday at 7PM & 7:30PM! Same bat time, same bat channel!

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

New York City Local Stations Fall 2011 Schedules; Dancing with the Stars Season 13 Cast

It's that time of year again...fall 2011 schedules for New York City stations! I have for you the full schedules for WABC, WNBC WNYW, WWOR and WPIX. Unfortunately, I couldn't obtain the schedules for WCBS and independent WLNY at press time, but WCBS rarely make changes. We cannot cover every market's local schedules, so we will give you an idea what to expect by giving you the #1 market in the country: New York. And it helps because I live in the market!

We'll start with WNYW's (Fox5) Fall 2011 schedule. New series this fall are sitcoms The Big Bang Theory airing 7:30pm & 11:30pm starting Sept. 19 and 30 Rock will air Sun-Fri 11:30pm & 12am also starting Sept. 19. New to WNYW this fall will be Inside Edition, airing weekdays at 12 noon starting Sept. 12, as it comes from WPIX, and also new to New York will be Better TV, weekdays at 3am starting Sept. 12. Everything else is will not be new, but we do have some time changes. Judge Alex will come from sister station WWOR and air on WNYW weekdays 1-2pm, replacing Swift Justice. And The Simpsons will now be down to two airings (from three), airing weeknights at 7pm and 12:30am. The Office will be moving to sister station WWOR, but it will air still air on WNYW on weekedays: Saturdays at 7:30pm and Sundays at 11pm. Judge Jeanine Pirro was canceled, so it will leave the line-up after this week. True Hollywood Story leaves Sundays at 1am, as TMZ Weekend moves from Saturdays at 12:30pm to Sundays at 1am.

Sister network WWOR (My9) will be making more changes than WNYW in Fall 2011, as usual. New series this fall are Excused weekdays at 11pm starting Sept. 12, Jeremy Kyle Show weekdays at 4pm starting Sept. 19, Law & Order: Criminal Intent weekdays at 1pm starting Sept. 19, Law & Order weekends at 10pm starting Sept. 19 and The Big Bang Theory weekend play on Sundays from 8-10pm starting Sept. 25. 'Til Death was set to join WWOR, but it has now been pulled. It was slated for weeknights at 2:30am and Saturdays 12:30am & 1am, but WWOR will air paid in all those slots now. New E/I series are Big World Fridays at 7a starting Sept. 9 and Live, Life & Win Wednesdays at 7a starting Sept. 21. Joining the schedule from sister network WNYW will be The Office airing weeknights at 10:30pm & 11:30pm starting Sept. 19. Punk'd and The Hills will join WWOR and share the 2am half-hour Tues-Fri starting Sept. 12. Among the series leaving are My Wife & Kids, America's Funniest Home Videos, Don't Forget the Lyrics, Law & Order: SVU, Deadliest Catch, Dog Tales, and Mystery Hunters. All of those series are leaving broadcast syndication. Current series moving to new timeslots are That '70s Show and Everybody Hates Chris weekdays at 7:30am & 8am starting Sept. 19; a House of Payne airing weekdays at 8:30am starting Sept. 19, Divorce Court moves to 12 noon starting Sept. 12 as Judge Alex moves to WNYW. Weekdays at 11am will be Swift Justice starting Sept. 12, which comes from WNYW. Family Feud moves from 1pm to 2pm starting Sept. 19. The Wendy Williams Show will move to weekdays at 3pm starting Sept. 19, as Everybody Loves Raymond moves to 5-6pm leading into The King of Queens from 6-7pm and How I Met Your Mother from 7-8pm. In late nights, we mentioned The Office and Excused starting at 10:30pm, but My Name is Earl will air at 1am starting week of Sept. 19, as House of Payne moves to 12am. Meet the Browns follows at 12:30pm, pushing South Park to 1:30am. As for weekends, we mentioned The Big Bang Theory on Sundays in primetime, but you can still expect dramas Bones, House, The Unit and The Closer to join new addition Law & Order. & 9pm starting Sept. 18 and Bones will air on weekends at 10pm. Sitcoms on weekends include House of Payne, Meet the Browns, Chris, Raymond, King of Queens, How I Met Your Mother and That '70s Show.

Moving on to WPIX's (CW11) Fall 2011 schedule. New series this fall are Bill Cunningham Show weekdays at 1pm starting Sept. 19, Anderson weekdays at 4pm starting Sept. 12, POX News at 5P weeknights at 5pm starting Sept. 19, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia Mon-Fri nights at 2am starting Sept. 19 and Saturdays 11pm-12am, American Dad! weeknights at 2:30am starting Sept. 19 and Sundays 4-5pm, Last Shot with Judge Gunn weeknights at 3am starting Sept. 26, and Futurama Saturdays 4-5pm and 12-1am starting Sept. 24. New on Saturdays in late night is Live from Daryl's House from 1-2am starting Sept. 24. CW Daytime is will replace Best of Tyra Banks with new series Dr. Drew's Lifechangers, weekdays at 3pm starting Sept. 19. New from WNBC will be America's Court With Judge Ross, weeknights at 3:30am starting Sept. 12. Among the series leaving are Entourage, Curb Your Enthusiasm, George Lopez, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Scrubs, The Odd Couple, Judge Karen, Tyra, Inside Edition, Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader, Smash Cuts, Stargate Atlantis, Stargate Universe and The Honeymooners. Current series moving to new times are Judge Mathis to weekdays at 2pm, and Friends moves to 12-1am, Saturdays 9-10pm & Sundays 8-9pm.

Elsewhere, WABC (ABC7), which is #1 in NY and the most watched station in the nation, will add Scrubs to weeknights at 1am, followed by a second run of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire at 1:30am replacing Oprah starting Sept. 12. Scrubs comes from WPIX. It is so nice to see a sitcom on WABC! The Chew of course takes over for All My Children on ABC Daytime at 1pm starting Sept. 26, while ABC Kids on Saturday mornings is leaving and will be replaced by Litton Weekend Adventure series from 10am-1pm starting Sept. 2. Brothers & Sisters will remain Saturdays on late nights and Grey's Anatomy remains on WABC Sunday nights at 11:35am & 12:35am. For WCBS (CBS2), we do not have any updates, so we apologize for that. Nothing is likely changing, though.
And WNBC (NBC4) will make the most drastic changes of the big three stations, with new court series We the People With Gloria Allred airing at 12:30pm starting Sept. 5. Among schedule changes, The Nate Berkus Show will now air at 2pm leading into lifestyle series New York Live at 3pm, which is being moved here due to the return of news at 5pm on WNBC, which started yesterday. That's all we know for WNBC, because we do not have any weekend updates. As we mentioned, we don't have any details yet on independent WLNY-55.
View the FULL Fall 20011 schedules for WABC, WNYW, WWOR, and WPIX in New York City! And view the full list of new series coming to local syndication. Stay tuned for updates, if any. From New York, goodnight!

A dynamic lineup of stars – including a U.S. veteran, an NBA champion, a film and TV star, a TV host and journalist, a Grammy-nominated singer, a supermodel, a reality TV star, a showbiz legacy and activist, and a World Cup star -- will take the stage for the new season of Dancing with the Stars, beginning Monday, Sept. 19, 2011 from 8-10pm ET/PT on ABC.
All 12 couples will dance for the first time on live national television on Monfday, Sept. 19, either performing the Cha Cha Cha or The Viennese Waltz. Airing on Tuesday, Sept. 20 at 8:00 p.m., ET., a live, one-hour special, Dancing with the Stars: Meet the Cast, will feature the most exciting moments from Monday night's season premiere performances, with commentary from the judges and never-before-seen footage from the teams' first weeks of training. Then, on the season premiere of Dancing with the Stars the Results Show, at 9:00pm, ET, the couple with the lowest combined judges' scores and public votes for their performance will be sent home in the season's first elimination.
And the new cast is... Ricki Lake, Ron Artest, Kristin Cavallari, Chynna Phillips, David Arquette, Carson Kressley, Nancy Grace, J.R. Martinez, Hope Solo, Rob Kardashian, Elisabetta Canalis, and Chaz Bono. Read more about them.

Monday, December 20, 2010

Watch Local Stations from NYC, LA, Seattle and Now Chicago Online on ivi TV; NBC Previews Upcoming Sitcom Perfect Couples Tonight

ivi TV, the online cable system, has announced that it has added Chicago to its Seattle, New York, and Los Angeles broadcast channel offerings. The addition of 12 stations from the Chicago market brings the total number of OTA (over-the-air) channels available on ivi TV to an impressive 65, excluding international offerings ranging from Sport Italia to English-language news from China on CCTV9, among others.
ivi TV offers more content than Hulu and the ability to legally watch live major broadcast channels anywhere there's an Internet connection, including hit shows and popular sports programming from ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, The CW, PBS, and others from a growing number of local affiliates, all available from a downloadable app at ivi TV.
Consumers who live in other parts of the country can watch live local programming from their hometown or favorite city. People with no conventional cable access or left adrift by the shift to DTV can watch TV with ivi TV. As ivi TV rolls out new markets (Philadelphia might be next), the channels it includes from each respective market are available to all ivi TV subscribers, regardless of where they presently reside within the U.S.
After spending a week in Washington, D.C. meeting with lawmakers and the FCC to vocalize concerns over the proposed Comcast-NBC Universal merger and its likelihood to leave consumers with less high quality programming and higher rates, ivi TV keeps rolling out new markets to offer an affordable cable subscription with more choice and flexibility. A growing number of voices are rising in opposition to the Comcast-NBCU merger. ivi TV simply wants a level playing field and is calling on Congress and the FCC to ensure consumers don't become the ultimate victims in Comcast's conquests. ivi TV delivers what consumers have wanted for a long time -- the ability to watch live broadcast television on the Internet. For only $4.99 a month, consumers can watch popular TV programming from all the major stations anytime and anywhere they want. And the first month is FREE!
Among the cool stations you can watch are KTLA, WGN-TV (local Chicago), WPIX, national Me-TV Network, Me-Too (Chicago), RTV (Seattle affiliate), and the big guns like WABC. This is very cool and I wish this was around back in the '90s when local broadcast stations were better with lots of cool sitcoms. But ivi TV is certainly worth the buy if you aren't in Chicago (for Me-TV and Me-Too) or don't have a RTV affiliate. Me-TV Network is now a national network, but as of now Chicago, Milwaukee, and South Bend are the only markets carrying it, so now is your chance to preview Me-TV and if you like it, you should request it to your local affiliates to add it to their digital stations! Antenna TV launches on Jan. 1, and perhaps we will get it on ivi TV, as all four ivi TV markets will have an Antenna TV affiliate, so there is a good chance we will have one on ivi TV. If that is the case and you don't have Antenna TV scheduled to come to your market, like Me-TV, try it on ivi TV and request it to your local affiliate that they add it!

Try and test ivi TV out for a month at least, it is free for the first month and you can cancel at anytime. I don't think you should watch your favorite primetime network shows on here, but it is a good service with decent (but not great) video quality if you want to test something like Me-TV and Antenna TV, especially if your markets are not carrying them. I certainly enjoyed testing out Me-TV Network this weekend and watching cool local fare on Me-Too Chicago (like Gilligan's Island) and KTLA Los Angeles (like Dennis the Menace on the Antenna TV preview on KTLA).

NBC is previewing upcoming mid-season single-camera sitcom Perfect Couples tonight (Dec. 20) with a special airing after the finale of The Sing-Off, which airs from 8-10pm. NBC will not air the pilot of the sitcom, instead a later episode (titled "Perfect Tens") will air. The series will still premiere with the pilot episode on its actual premiere date on Thursday, Jan. 20 at 8:30pm. Tonight NBC is just going to have viewers "sample" the series. The sampling preview airs tonight at 10pm on NBC. A repeat of The Office will follow at 10:29pm.
Perfect Couples depicts the misadventures of three engaging couples as they struggle to find out what makes the ideal relationship -- and how to maintain it through humorous trial-and-error. The series explores their heroic journey in search of the perfect relationship without destroying each other in the process.
Dave (Kyle Bornheimer, Worst Week, Romantically Challenged) and Julia (Christine Woods, FLASHFORWARD) are the relatable, normal couple, but Julia's hope of remaining the cool, low-maintenance chick is tested by Dave's attempts to keep both his wife and his needy best friend Vance (David Walton, 100 Questions) equally happy. Vance, along with the neurotic Amy (Mary Elizabeth Ellis, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia"), are the high-passion, high-drama couple who bring out the best and worst in each other. The third duo features Rex (Hayes MacArthur, She's Out of My League), a reformed party guy, and, and his wife, Leigh (Olivia Munn, Attack of the Show), who considers herself as the group's mother hen. Believing that they are relationship experts, Rex and Leigh have attended every class and seminar on relationships -- and regard themselves as the "perfect couple."
On tonight's episode, after Dave (Kyle Bornheimer) is disappointed that Julia (Christine Woods) dresses down for him, they both decide to be "perfect 10s" and live it up with a night out. Meanwhile, an infestation of bed bugs misleads Amy (Mary Elizabeth Ellis) into thinking that Vance (David Walton) is not ready to commit to her, while Rex (Hayes MacArthur) and Leigh (Olivia Munn) plan an Italian vacation and struggle trying to adjust to the time difference.
We did not get a review copy of this episode, but we will have a review of the pilot episode closer to series launch on Jan. 20. So stay tuned! Sample if you want tonight, but people who have seen the pilot and an additional episode (not tonight's episode), haven't been too kind to this series. Our review will cover those two episodes (and we might give our thoughts on tonight's episode in that review, too).

Thursday, August 21, 2008

New York City Locals Fall 2008 Update; TV Land Airs Special CSI Promotion Stunt

Today we are giving you an update for New York City's local channels for Fall 2008. The number one market and the best market--New York! And I'm in that market! Anyway, we primarily are covering WNYW, WWOR and WPIX, though. Let's start with WNYW. WNYW is going to be adding just one new series on weekdays and that is a veteran court series coming over from WNBC. Judge Joe Brown will move from WNBC to WNYW and will air weekdays at 3pm. Other weekday changes for WNYW is the second run of Tyra Banks Show at 10am replacing Montel Williams, which has ended. WNYW or WWOR will not air the Best of Montel package being offered to stations this fall. At 12 noon TMZ's encore will air replacing Judge Hatchett's third-run. Now Judge Hatchett has also ended and will still be available in repeats this fall, and WNYW will air the repeats at 12:30pm. The next change is the aforementioned Judge Joe Brown at 3pm replacing two Judge Hatchett episodes. The next change is at 12 midnight, with Scrubs replacing the TMZ encore. Then at 12:30am That '70s Show slide up a half-hour as well, replacing Scrubs. Finally, two episodes of King of the Hill will air from 1-2am coming over from WWOR, replacing That '70s Show and Bernie Mac. As for weekends, WNYW will add a few series. E/I series Real Winning Edge and Whaddyado? will air in the Saturday 12pm hour replacing Beakman's World. American Idol Rewind is moving from WPIX to WNYW/WWOR this fall and WNYW will air it Saturdays at 4PM. Among off-network dramas, House will air on Saturdays at 5PM. Finally, family-friendly comedy series Bananas will join WNYW airing Saturday nights at 1am. Leaving the WNYW weekend line-up is the syndicated series Masterminds.

Moving on to WNYW's sister station, WWOR now. First off, they will add three new shows to the weekday line-up: Family Court with Judge Penny, Trivial Pursuit and the sitcom House of Payne. They will air a second episode of One on One now at 7:30am, so the sitcom will air 7:30am and 8am now. 7:30am airing replaces That '70s Show. That '70s Show will move to 8:30am, replacing Still Standing. While the 9am hour will now also have sitcoms, with Scrubs and Still Standing airing replacing People's Court, which slides to 10am replacing Divorce Court. And you guessed it, Divorce Court will move to the 11am hour replacing Judge David Young as he will go to 12 noon now replacing the secondary Tyra Banks Show run. As I mentioned, that secondary run is now on WNYW at 10am, but the first run of course is still 5pm on WWOR. Anyway, 1-2pm will see the new court series Family Court with Judge Penny replacing Montel Williams. At 2pm, back-to-back episodes of the new game show Trivial Pursuit will try to do better than the canceled Temptation. The next change doesn't happen until 6pm. King of Queens will move to 6pm and 6:30pm replacing Inside Edition & Everybody Loves Raymond. Airing in Queens' old slot of 7pm and 7:30pm will now be the sitcom House of Payne. Everybody Loves Raymond will now air back-to-back in the 12am hour, as the 12:30am airing will replace Malcolm in the Middle. Finally on weekdays, the 1-2am hour will be Bernie Mac and Malcolm in the Middle replacing King of the Hill, as we mentioned already that hour moves to WNYW now. As for weekends, they have quite a few series coming. American Idol Rewind will also air on WWOR airing Saturdays at 7pm. American Chopper will air Saturdays at 11pm. On Sundays, the weekend plays of House of Payne will air Sundays in the 5pm hour. Then airing at 6 and 7pm will be Boston Legal and House. Quite a few weekend series will leave WWOR: Stargate SG-1, Stargate Atlantis, Star Trek, and Girls Behaving Badly.

View the full WNYW and WWOR Fall 2008 Schedules to see the entire picture.

We now move on to WPIX. We don't have their full fall schedule just as of yet but we know what is coming and what is leaving. Their weekday line-up will not change much, but coming weekdays from 1-2pm will be new court series Judge Karen replacing the canceled Judge Maria Lopez. Then The CW Daytime line-up from 3-5pm has been altered starting Sept. 22 with All of Us, What I Like About You and Reba leaving in favor of new court series Judge Jeanine Pirro and veteran sitcoms The Jamie Foxx Show and The Wayans Bros.. These shows are not just WPIX, they will be on all CW affiliates under the CW Daytime brand from 3-5pm. Coming to WPIX on weekends are Star Trek (from WWOR) and Stargate Atlantis (also from WWOR). Later in the fall, starting Sept. 1, Saturdays at 8pm and 9pm will have the new first run syndicated series Legend of the Seeker from Disney-ABC Television. Leaving WPIX are Jury Duty, The Shield, Soul Train, and the old CW Daytime shows mentioned. We are not expecting any changes really to WPIX's weekday early evening sitcoms (5-8pm) or late night sitcoms (11pm-3am), but we will let you know as soon as we know on our message board.

As for other stations in New York, they don't usually make many changes. WNBC will probably make the most changes from the rest of the batch. This fall WNBC will be adding the new syndicated talk show The Bonnie Hunt Show airing at 2pm, which means Day of Our Lives could be on the move to another slot, perhaps 1pm. We don't have WNBC's full line-up yet. The syndicated version of Deal or No Deal will air at 4pm on WNBC. Judge Joe Brown is leaving the station as it moves to WNYW, so 3pm hour will be free and it is likely Ellen DeGeneres Show could move there. Martha Stewart's show currently airs at 1pm, so that could move to either 11am or 12pm. So maybe Paid Programming will finally leave WNBC at 11am? One would hope. Anyway, weekends on WNBC, Monk will be coming. As soon as we have the full WNBC fall line-up we will post it on our message board.
Moving on to WCBS, new syndicated talk show The Doctors, a spin-off of Dr. Phil, will air weekday mornings at 9am replacing encores of ET/The Insider. No other changes are likely to be made during weekdays. On weekends, CSI: NY is coming replacing CSI: Miami. WCBS also airs Maximum Exposure on weekends, and that will be leaving syndication, so WCBS can't air it this fall.
WABC, which has the number one line-up ratings wise in NYC and the nation, will not make any changes to its weekday line-up. However, on Saturdays they will add reruns of Lost on Saturday nights at 12:35am after Eyewitness News. ABC airs College Football in the fall from 8-12 or so, so that's why WABC's Eyewitness News usually starts at 12am rather than 11pm. Lost will replace the Saturday late movie. WABC also has gotten rights to NASCAR Angels and Storm Stories and will air them in various times on weekends.
Finally, WLNY-TV55, an independent station, will make a lot of changes to its weekend line-up. WLNY has a tendency to get secondary rights to shows already on other New York locals and that is the case here once again for everything I am about to mention. Their new weekend line-up, both Saturday and Sundays, will have Monk at 4pm, Boston Legal at 5pm, Law & Order: SVU at 6pm, CSI: NY at 7pm, Lost at 8pm and House at 9pm. That's a lot of great dramas there! We do not have their weekday line-up yet, but it'll likely see a change or two since The Nanny/Mad About You hour is leaving syndication this Fall. We will let you know as soon as we do on our message board.
Now I have mentioned the message board a lot already, and you can view our Fall 2008 Syndication thread where we post updates and you can also post updates. It's team effort as we have 9 pages so far and growing! So join in if you haven't already. And to see a list of all the shows coming to syndication this fall, view our Fall 2008 Shows post.

TV Land is going to have a special promotion one-time-only marathon of CSI on Saturday, September 13 from 10pm-1am. TV Land is a sister station of both CBS and Spike TV. CBS airs the show in first-run and Spike TV airs the show in reruns on cable. It'll be weird seeing CSI on TV Land that night, indeed. As of now it is only a one-time-only stunt, but perhaps they could air the series in reruns sharing it with Spike TV in the future? We shall see...but for now view the episode info for the stunt.

Thursday, May 24, 2007

WABC-7 in NY Wins May Sweeps And Highest Rated Channel in the Nation; ABC Family Adds More 'Heaven' in June

WABC-TV is New York's most watched broadcast station for the twenty-eighth consecutive rating period, delivering a 4.1 rating/11 share in DMA Households, Monday-Sunday sign-on to sign-off in Nielsen's May 2007 sweeps, providing WABC-TV with a huge 52% lead over its nearest competitor. With each rating point representing 73,670 Tri-State area TV households, Channel 7 attracts a larger audience than any other station in the NATION!
WABC won all the local news races, along with the network news race at 6:30pm, and has strong syndicated programming like Live! With Regis & Kelly, Oprah, Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy! Not to mention the primetime programming such as Grey's Anatomy, Dancing with the Stars and Desperate Housewives.
It just amazes me how strong this channel is and it beats the local competition in everything. WABC won everything except the 7-9am weekday morning show race, with WNBC's Today show winning by 0.4 of a rating over Good Morning America, 4.2 to 3.8. WABC did win last May, 4.5 to 4.1.
For full details, including how the local syndicated airing of the sitcoms like King of Queens on WWOR and Everybody Loves Raymond on WPIX did, click HERE.

And remember last week when we posted the new June line-up for ABC Family Channel? Well family drama 7th Heaven will only be airing Sundays at 7 & 8am we reported...but now ABC Family has also added Saturday mornings at 7 & 8am starting June 16. I guess that is better than nothing. Weekday airings of 6pm will be removed by 8 Simple Rules on June 12.

SitcomsOnline.com News Blog