LITTLE ROCK — Damages was a goner. Now it’s not. You need to pay close attention to what happened.
Damages is the critical darling on FX that stars five time Oscar nominee Glenn Close as ruthless, high-powered New York lawyer Patty Hewes.
Close does a good job. She won the Emmy for best actress in a drama in 2008 and 2009, becoming the first actress from a basic cable series to take home that statuette. She has been nominated again this year along with co-stars Rose Byrne, Zeljko Ivanek, Ted Danson and Lily Tomlin.
But as you probably know, the longer a series remains on the air, the more expensive it becomes. If that’s coupled with falling ratings, liabilities surpass assets and the show is doomed.
Such was the case with Damages. In Season 3 the show only averaged 927,000 viewers. Most of those were older viewers - another nail in the coffin.
With its targeted audiences, cable has lower ratings standards than broadcast TV. Ratings that would get a show swiftly canned on ABC or CBS are a cause for rejoicing on cable.
For example, 2.5 million viewers (younger viewers) are watching FX’s Justified, starring Timothy Olyphant. And 3.7 million are taking in the network’s Sons of Anarchy. FX is thrilled. Damages, on the other hand, was on the road to oblivion.
Before the FX ax fell, DirecTV stepped in to give Damages a stay of execution.
The satellite provider has done something similar in the past with NBC and Friday Night Lights. In that case, DirecTV split the cost of production and got the rights to air the series first. Once the season was over, NBC would rerun the episodes.
In the case of Damages, DirecTV has taken the thing over completely and will air it on its 101 Network for two more seasons of 10 episodes each. Production begins early in 2011.
Just to be clear - Damages is off FX and can only be seen if you have DirecTV, which also has the rights to all three previous seasons of the series.
You may not watch Damages. Why should you care what happens to it?
You should care because if this experiment works forDirecTV, then the television industry has one more way to extend the life of worthwhile programs that have fallen from the favor of a fickle audience always eager for the next big thing.
How many times has a program you really enjoyed disappeared quietly without a murmur? Certainly the still miffed fans of CBS’ Moonlight wish there had been a DirectTV white knight out there when their show went belly up.
There are already TV shows popping up on the Internet, and Internet-only series (webisodes) that have been transformed and tweaked into traditional TV series.
The industry is changing and if DirecTV has its way, 101 Network will become a subscriber magnet. We’ll be watching to see what happens.
Gag reflex. VH1 announced last week that one of the (many) women who claim to have had sex with Tiger Woods will be on a reality show. What took Rachel Uchitel so long?
She’ll be on Celebrity Rehab With Dr. Drew. Rehabilitated from what? Being a skanky publicity, um, hound? Is there detox for that?
Other has-beens or wannabes lined up for Season 4 include Jeremy London (Party of Five, 7th Heaven), Janice Dickinson (The Surreal Life), Leif Garrett (teen idol circa 1977), Frankie Lons (singer Keyshia Cole’s mother), Jason Wahler (The Hills) and Jason Davis (spoiled rich guy, The Millionaire Matchmaker).
No air date yet, but you’ll know it by the darkening of the skies and the rending of cloth.
More reality.
Here’s another one from the “Who’s Gonna Watch This Swill?” department.
Growing Up Twisted debuts at 9 and 9:30 p.m. today on A&E. The seven episodes will follow rocker and Twisted Sister front man Dee Snider as he and his family do whatever it is they do.
Dates announced.
For the two readers who e-mailed, Showtime will bring back Californication at 9 p.m. Jan. 10.
That will be followed at 9:30 by a new comedy, Episodes, starring Friends’ Matt Le-Blanc. Maybe it’ll help us forget Joey.
A better bet will be the Jan. 9 debut of a new Showtime drama, Shameless, starring the inimitable William H. Macy and Emmy Rossum. The series is from John Wells (ER). More on this when we get closer.
The TV Column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. E-mail:
Style, Pages 26 on 07/27/2010