Mounting shows in first-run syndication has become financially daunting as production costs have risen and ratings have plummeted. As a result, TV stations and producers are finding innovative ways to get offerings on the air — acquiring shows off streaming services, allowing them to air concurrently on other platforms, expanding existing programs and creating local offerings that can also run regionally. While local linear television is an increasingly challenged business, broadcasters are devising interesting new solutions to solve their programming problems.
“It’s really hard to pay for things these days,” Fox Television Stations executive VP Frank Cicha said. “People are figuring out how to do some interesting stuff to pay for new programming. That’s the upside and the optimism of it all.”
Dual- (or more) stream financing is “necessary now,” Stacy Rader, senior VP, first-run development and brand extensions at CBS Media Ventures (CMV), said. “Single-source financing is hard to pull off these days, particularly for new product.”
Fox this fall will launch six programs: Good Morning Football: Overtime from NFL Network and Sony Pictures Television; Flip Side from CBS Media Ventures and Game Show Network; and two new true-crime shows: Warner Bros.’ True Crime News and Trifecta’s Crime Expose With Nancy O’Dell. Fox has its own limited-edition news program, Battleground, which is airing across its own group and on a few other stations. And Fox picked up an off-network run of Suits from NBCUniversal that will air weekly in primetime on its MyNet stations. Separately, Warner Bros. is debuting Chuck Lorre’s off-CBS Bob Hearts Abishola on stations across the country.
Fox has a big advantage over other station groups in clearing shows, with duopolies in the top three markets of New York, Los Angeles and Chicago and plenty of periods to fill. As a result, all roads lead through Fox.
Fox Likes Live and Local
Fox has some specific priorities for its syndicated programs: ideally they are day-and-date — a mandate filled by shows like GMFB: Overtime and True Crime News — and it’s even better if they offer a live component. Fox also seeks shows that allow close integration with its owned TV stations. True Crime News plans to work with its local affiliates to showcase crime stories from their markets, for example. Fox already has sent its Good Day LA team from KTTV Los Angeles to Inglewood to shoot on the SoFi Stadium-based set of GMFB: Overtime.
Fox also is producing more shows that work regionally. For example, The Jason Show comes from Fox’s KMSP Minneapolis-St. Paul but airs regionally in 11 markets.
Lifestyle talk show Portia airs on Fox-owned stations in Atlanta, Orlando and San Francisco, as well as on Fox-owned streamer Fox Soul, which is programmed to connect with Black audiences, and on faith-based streamer Impact Network.
Fox this fall also is doing something completely different with Battleground, a news-oriented program that will cover politics in the country’s swing states. In its final 60 days or so, the presidential election continues to be hard-fought, dramatic and too close to call. Fox aims to help viewers keep track of it all via Battleground, which is hosted by S.E. Cupp and features reporting from across Fox’s station groups and from reporters from Gannett, McClatchy and the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
“It’s really hyperlocal and it’s all about the swing states,” Stephen Brown, executive VP, programming and development, Fox First Run and Fox Television Stations, said. “We’re in every single market in Michigan and Wisconsin. We’re leaning into what we see on the ground and how that’s affecting the race.”
This fall’s biggest swing, GMFB: Overtime, is a two-hour expansion of Good Morning Football, a two-hour sports talk panel that has aired on NFL Network since 2016 and has relocated to Los Angeles from New York. The expansion series will run on streaming service Roku and on TV stations, with Fox Television Stations serving as the show’s broadcast launch group and the show cleared in 92% of the country. Half of the stations who are airing the show will be taking it live, Flory Bramnick, executive VP, distribution, Sony Pictures Television, said.
Stations also can air the show in two-hour blocks or split it into two separate hours to run at different times of day. GMFB: Overtime is a prime example of a show that’s being produced under a more flexible economic model.
Even back when executive producer Michael Davies was pitching the show to the NFL, he knew that “the show needed to be more famous” than just one daily run on the NFL Network could make it.
“In an era of declining linear cable, we needed to be more distribution forward.” Davies said. “I really believed we could make this show work and not just as an NFL show or a sports-talk show. This goes beyond sports.”
Davies brought with him a lot of experience in syndication, having developed and produced Who Wants To Be a Millionaire for ABC in primetime and then in syndication from 2002-2019, and having executive produced Jeopardy! since 2021.
Sony and the NFL also had preexisting relationships with Roku, so it made sense to bring the streaming service in as well.
“Overall, as a business, we are always looking for ways to expand the reach of our content, whether that content is live games or studio content and shows,” NFL Media VP, original content and entertainment Angela Ellis said. “This came up as an opportunity to get the GMFB brand out there in a way that gives it a lot more exposure.”
And TV stations are more than happy to share: “Roku Channel is chipping in in a big way for GMFB: Overtime,” Cicha said. “To me, that needed to start happening about five years ago.”
True Crime Fits the Bill
Switching gears, True Crime News, hosted by Ana Garcia and produced by Warner Bros./Telepictures, will cover the day’s top crime stories. It’s been staffed up with assignment editors and producers who formerly worked for such news organizations as ABC, CBS, CNN, Vice and more.
“We are the only program that will be covering true-crime news as it happens,” Albert Lewitinn, executive producer of True Crime News, said. The show is also executive-produced by Extra’s Jeremy Spiegel and Theresa Coffino. “We also have the ability to leverage all of the affiliates that are taking part in this. Fox, Scripps, Tegna, Hearst — they are all on board and it’s great to see them being partners with us in this. It’s a lot of back and forth between us and our affiliates — they’re the eyes and ears.”
That kind of collaboration appeals to stations looking to grab broader reach for their local news brands.
True Crime News is cleared in 98% of the country and in 204 markets. It already has a website, a YouTube channel and a video and audio podcast, hosted by Garcia, that have been up and running for years. The website gets an average of 2.5 million viewers per month, while the YouTube channel has 5.45 million subscribers.
Also coming online this fall is Crime Exposé With Nancy O’Dell from Trifecta, Michael Eisner’s Tornante and Scott Sternberg Productions, with Sternberg as executive producer. Sternberg, who also has a strong reputation for producing game shows, has been in the true-crime business for years. ID’s On the Case with Paula Zahn, which Sternberg’s company executive produces and also streams on Max, just got renewed for a 15th season.
While True Crime News will cover the true-crime news of the day, Crime Exposé will focus on one murder in each half-hour episode. All cases that make it to air will already be through the trial and conviction phase, so every story has a beginning, middle and end — a format that true-crime addicts can’t seem to get enough of.
“No one has done a true-crime murder story every day in first run,” Sternberg said. “But this makes sense because this audience just wants to consume as much of it as they can.”
It’s a bit of a homecoming for O’Dell, who is best known for her stints hosting Access Hollywood and Entertainment Tonight, but who worked as an on-air crime reporter in Charleston, South Carolina, earlier in her broadcast career.
Crime Exposé With Nancy O’Dell is cleared in just under 98% of the U.S. with 24 weeks of original programming.
Trifecta also has renewed iCrime With Elizabeth Vargas for a third season, and the two shows are expected to be paired in many markets. iCrime relies on clips submitted by users, and in season three, plans to use even more clips at a faster pace. Both Crime Exposé and iCrime are sold on an all-barter basis.
‘Flip Side’ Looks To Connect
Finally, CBS Media Ventures has partnered with Game Show Network to produce Flip Side, a half-hour game show starring Jaleel White, who audiences know as Steve Urkel from ‘90s sitcom Family Matters.
White came to producers’ attention after making several appearances on current syndicated game shows Pictionary and 25 Words or Less.
“I feel like my place in the business is connecting with people,” White
said. “The celebrity thing is about how you make the viewer feel about themselves.”
White also is charged with ensuring the show stays on track while also keeping it fun and fast-paced. He’s been part of the show’s development since it began in 2020, joining CBS’s John Budkins, production company Keller/Noll and executive producer Ken Ross on Zoom calls once things really started picking up in the winter and spring of 2023.
“We liked Jaleel and wanted to find a vehicle for him,” Budkins, senior VP, programming and scheduling, CBS TV Stations, said. “We built the show around him and his talent for working wth people.”
Flip Side premieres September 9 on CBS-owned stations — mostly duopoly stations in top markets — and September 16 on GSN. CBS stations get the first run with GSN getting a second run shortly thereafter.
“All of the platforms are completely different and social followers now are much savvier,” Rader said. “I look at the social piece as a way to get people engaged in playing the game so they want to see more of it on the linear side.”
With more series coming to syndication from other platforms, the line between first-run and off-network is getting increasingly blurred. One interesting entry this fall is Suits, a one-hour drama from Universal that originally aired on USA Network from 2011 to 2019, and starred Patrick J. Adams, Gabriel Macht and Meghan Markle, who went on to marry Prince Harry and become globally famous.
The show started running on Netflix in 2023 and shot to the top of the streaming charts. NBCUniversal Syndication Studios executive VP of syndication sales Sean O’Boyle saw the opportunity and took the show out to stations to run on an all-barter basis. MyNetworkTV, which airs one-hour off-net dramas in primetime, took NBCU up on its offer and will air Suits in a two-hour stack on Tuesday nights. It’s also been sold to stations covering more than 93% of the country (not including MyNet) on a “flexible scheduling” basis, meaning that stations can schedule the show however they want, whether that’s as a strip or once a week.
Another off-network show coming to syndication this fall is Judy Justice, which stars Judge Judy Sheindlin and originally aired on Amazon Freevee. Judy Justice is the only new court show coming to syndication this fall after several years where multiple court shows were offered.
Looking ahead, executives agree that first-run syndication will likely be financed by this type of creative dealmaking.
“Streaming and linear are complementary audiences and we are going where the viewers are,” Bramnick said. “Having multiple platforms and players involved means that the economics of the shows hold up.”
