By Lisa de Moraes
Thursday, January 19, 2006; C01
PASADENA, Calif., Jan. 18
The season debut of "American Idol" smashed Fox ratings records again Tuesday night, delivering the network's largest entertainment programming audience in its history.
About 35.5 million people caught the start of "Idol's" march to May. Randy, Simon and Paula auditioned would-be contestants in Chicago, where "Lady Marmalade" appears to be the song of choice among the Seriously Delusional, and Seriously Twitchy Guy somehow got through to the next level of competition thanks to Paula and Randy, who were asked about that at Winter TV Press Tour 2006 by the Reporters Who Cover Television.
At least Randy was; Paula was a no-show at the "American Idol" panel on Tuesday after suffering a spontaneous eye infection.
The season unveiling outstrips the singing competition's previous audience high of 34.2 million for the second-edition finale in May '03. That's when Ruben Studdard edged Clay Aiken for the "Idol" crown, about which we're still pretty sore.
Once again, "Idol" logged more viewers than ABC, CBS and NBC combined.
"It's great to be wrong. I am drop-dead surprised," Fox reality programming guru Mike Darnell told The TV Column on Wednesday, having told us the day before that he thought "Idol" debut numbers would be down this year. (In fact, Tuesday's debut snagged 2 million more viewers than last year.)
Wednesday, Darnell had recovered his sense of optimism and then some, calling "Idol" the Super Bowl of entertainment programming.
"It's become that much a part of the fiber of the American culture. There's television hits and then there's this thing," he said.
Fox network programming chief Peter Liguori, who on Tuesday had kicked off the Just Us Chickens Here portion of Winter TV Press Tour 2006, also had been asked to forecast "Idol's" debut numbers. He noted that last year's Fox network programming chief had forecast the debut audience would drop about 10 percent and it went up 4 percent, so he forecast it would go down 20 percent in hopes it would in fact go up 8 percent.
Tuesday's "Idol" debut went up 9 percent among the 18-to-49-year-olds the network promised to deliver to advertisers.
Next stop for the auditions: Denver. Meanwhile, pray for Paula's eye.
* * *
It's too bad about Liguori's appearance at the press tour. At last summer's tour, when he was still a broadcast TV Press Tour Virgin, Liguori had some interesting things to say. Six months later, however, his handlers have completed his transformation into one of the Chickens Who Program TV. Genuinely lovely people all, and some very good programmers -- just afraid to say anything in front of a room full of reporters.
Nina Tassler, president of CBS Entertainment, and one of our faves, took the stage Wednesday.
She was willing to discuss some subjects with a minimum of fowl-itude, like her effort to bring the telenovela, a popular genre with Hispanic audiences, to CBS. She's developing five such projects, the best of which will be produced to air over the summer.
On the other hand, she said, "the bosoms might not heave as much" on the CBS project as they do on your typical telenovela, and a telenovela typically has "a lot of hyperbole and there's a lot of melodrama," which "I think we're going to modify . . . for our audiences." And they're going to be in English.
Last we checked, telenovela in English without too much bosom-heaving was spelled A-a-r-o-n S-p-e-l-l-i-n-g s-o-a-p.
But mostly, fowl-itude prevailed:
Q: Are you going to back off on all the storylines about violent crimes against women on your many procedural crime dramas?
A: Brawwwwwk, brawk, brawk, brawk! trusting our audience, brawk, brawk, we have Standards and Practices, brawwwwwwk, we trust our producers, brawk.
Q: Are you looking to expand your "CSI" franchise again?
A: Brawwwwk! never say never, brawk, brawk!
Q: Your Sunday movie has done badly this season, does it have a future?
A: Brawwwk, brawk, brawk, we are looking at the time period and realizing that it presents challenges, brawk, brawk.
Q: You've been careful to try out the new means of programming delivery in markets where CBS actually owns the CBS TV station; how are they reacting?
A: Brawk, brawk, they know we, brawk, respect them, brawk.
Q: Are you tired yet of the Male Pattern Optimism sitcom (hot wife married to tubby, dense man)?
A: Brawwwwwk, brawk, brawk, well, you know, my husband is . . . he would kill me, kill me, brawk brawwwwwk!
* * *
If Bob Schieffer wanted to remain anchor of "CBS Evening News," the job would be his, CBS News President Sean McManus said Wednesday.
But since Schieffer doesn't want it, the network will probably hire from outside, he said.
"If Bob wanted to do it, we probably wouldn't be having this discussion right now," he told critics, who peppered him with questions about Katie Couric, the NBC morning show diva who is presumed to be the network's primary target for the gig replacing Dan Rather.
McManus, who also heads CBS Sports, called Schieffer "the oldest overnight sensation that I know," noting that the newscast is in a closer ratings position to its broadcast competitors than it has been in years.
"Bob is respected, he's trusted and he's very, very comfortable giving the news and I think people are starting to appreciate this," McManus said.
"The other thing about Bob is, Bob talks like you and I do," he continued.
Schieffer's style, which McManus described as "the antithesis of 'voice of God,' " is what they're looking for in Rather's replacement -- someone who can deliver the news "in a respectful and a comfortable way, not as if you were preaching the Gospel from Mount Olympus."
That's about all McManus was willing to give up about his search for the new anchor during his Q&A session.
One clever critic finally asked him, "Is there any chance that you'll make an announcement of who the anchor is before Katie Couric's contract expires in May?"
"That is a very well-phrased question. I don't have a timetable," he responded.
"I thought you said you had a timetable," the critic shot back.
"Oh, a timetable I can discuss . . . You should work for '60 Minutes,' you already got me trapped up here. Yeah, sure, it's possible."
Morale is back at CBS News since he came on board, McManus insisted.
Of course, he also said "every single person at CBS News is currently being evaluated." And that people there "are a little bit scared."
"So I would say that there is not a fear at CBS News, but there is an understanding that 'I better be pretty darn good at what I do and better be working every single minute of my waking hours to make sure I'm doing the best job I can or I'm going to have a problem.' But to me, that's the way to run an organization. That's healthy."