For Hollywood, Christmas really is the most wonderful time of the year, because it doesn’t come but once:  with the exception of a New Year’s Eve dip, every day between December 25 and January 2 will perform like a Friday.  That’s great for the box office, but it makes any analysis of “comps” and […]

        NETWORK FINALS:  The adjustments were fewer and less steep than in recent days.  ABC:  The CELEBRITY FAMILY FEUD rerun stayed at this morning’s 0.8, and the season finale of THE BAKER & THE BEAUTY was at 0.5, compared to the morning’s 0.6/0.5 and last week’s 0.4. CBS:  The night’s reruns held […]

  There’s going to be a crowd at the top of the box office this weekend, but there’s not much good news in it for anyone.  According to preliminary numbers at Deadline, AMERICAN MADE (Cross Creek/Universal) took Friday with $6M (almost $1M of it from Thursday night), which should give it a $15-16M weekend.  However, […]

  OPENINGS:  DARK WATERS (Focus/Universal) expanded into wide release at 2012 theatres, and emerged with a mild $4.1M.  (By comparison, Focus’s previous release Harriet opened at 2059 with an $11.7M weekend.)  Its lack of awards traction thus far suggests that it’s going to have a hard time building any momentum for a run through the […]

Based on Friday’s grosses, weekend #44 of 2014 looks like $82 million for the top 12 films Friday-Sunday, down 33% the norm for this weekend ($123 million), which admittedly does not usually have Halloween ruining it by falling on Friday. Opening at 2,766 theaters, Nightcrawler from Open Road Films grossed $3.2 million Friday and $4.7 million […]

  BROADCAST FINALS: ABC:  A MOST MAGICAL STORY special was at 0.61, then 20/20 ticked down to 0.34. CBS:  SWAT moved from Wednesdays, and its season premiere was at 0.42, just about the same as last year’s 0.4 premiere.  The season premiere of MAGNUM PI was at 0.39 compared to last year’s 0.5, and the […]

  MADAM SECRETARY:  Sunday 8PM on CBS  – Potential DVR Alert PLAYERS:  Series creator Barbara Hall, a veteran of everything from Northern Exposure to Joan of Arcadia (which she created), and Army Wives to Homeland.  Star Tea Leoni, and an A-list supporting cast that includes Keith Carradine, Tim Daly, Bebe Neuwirth and Zeljko Ivanek.  Pilot […]

In addition to the four usual NFL time periods on Sunday (two 1:00 pm games, a 4:30 pm national game and the 8:30 game on NBC), Thanksgiving day featured a national NFL tripleheader.  Of all the games this week, the 12:45 Thanksgiving game on CBS was the highest-rated (15.2 household rating in the 56 metered […]