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UPFRONTS 2013: The Overachievers 
In its first night of primetime on Jan.1, OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network averaged 1 million viewers, a respectable number, especially on a holiday Saturday night. On Day 2, the co-venture between Oprah’s Harpo and Discovery Communications, drew a primetime average of 822,000 viewers, a 18% drop from premiere night. That was still a dramatic improvement over the channel OWN replaced, Discovery Health, which averaged 252,000 viewers in primetime last year. (But with a price tag of $200 million, OWN had been under pressure to perform right out of the gate.) What is the biggest draw on the new network so far? Oprah’s old syndicated show. The two-hour debut of Season 25: Oprah Behind the Scenes, which chronicles the final season of Oprah’s daytime talk show, was the most watched OWN program in the first 2 days, posting a 1.2 million viewers at 8 PM on Jan.1 and propelling OWN to third place in the time period among all cable networks in women 25-54. Surprisingly, the most hyped new OWN series, Oprah Presents Master Class, in which the talk show host profiles successful artists, journalists and entrepreneurs, was the lowest-rated program so far by a wide margin, averaging 602,000 viewers for the premiere episode featuring Jay-Z on Jan.2. OWN is available in 67% of U.S. homes and 80% of cable homes.
TV Editor Nellie Andreeva - tip her here.
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Did anybody else happen to notice that virtually all of Oprah’s female producers are obese?
Yes. And it completely contradicts her network’s message about loving and taking care of yourself to be the best you can be. Fail.
Yeah, because being obese must automatically mean you’re not taking care of/loving yourself, as opposed to that just being your natural body shape.
Our natural state is NOT to be obese. Read up and get informed.
I noticed that Gail King has completely adopted Oprah’s speech pattern, cadence, and sounds like she’s doing an Oprah impression. We’re watching a real life “single black female.”
Actually it is the other way around. I use to watch Oprah and she changed her speech pattern. She is talking like Gale not the other way around. WE hear Oprah more so it is assumed that Gale is doing the impression. This really got going when she started that screaming thing..
Anyway I tried to watch the OWN but was just a bit confused. It felt like a long infomercial. Some of the shows seem like a platform for women that should just be ONE episode not an entire show. Shania Twain, Sarah Ferguson, I just don’t know what their shows are about. I kept thinking it would be like Ted Turner or something.. VARIETY. movies and junk. just don’t know..
I just hate too much SELF HELP STUFF..
why watch master class when the people have already done Charlie Rose?
What I am looking forward to is if Time-Warner or Comcast hand Oprah any crap about carrying her network she will buy them both.
I tried to watch Master Class but neither Jay Z or Diane Sawyer had anything of substance to say and with Oprah bumpers it was just boring self promotion.
Unfortunately, lets stop the catty comments and deal with what actually makes any network successful..good shows…and sadly,so far,everything presented is ALREADY on television?!!! Been there…done that???Why bother…we can just watch the Dr. Oz show…the Susie Orman show… Without any new product.why is an audience wasting their time??..On the other hand, Oprah by now, sadly is so way overexposed…Time to give it up…we’ve all moved on,she should too.
When you are expected to work 18 hr days, guess there’s not much time left over for exercise.
I was reading posts on another site, and it appears that many of her former viewers are very unhappy because they can’t watch OWN since it’s not on basic cable, and the people can’t afford the increased price to get the package with the channel.
I was expecting a little more variety on the programming but so far the most exciting programs are “Searching for …” and behind the Oprah show. Looking forward to the master class with Sidney Pointier and Condeleeza Rice (was not really interested in Jay-Z). I would like to see more shows geared toward improving your profession or starting your own business or something about unleashing your creativity. With all the junk on TV right now (I have more than 300 channels and only 1% is watchable), OWN has the opportunity to really distinguish itself with some creative programming. I hope that the OWN people read some of these comments and making some changes.
I tuned into the premiere of OWN over the weekend. And I must admit: it’s nothing terribly innovative or creative (both in terms of tone, aesthetics, or mission). The truth is that we’ve experienced an unbelievable renaissance with cable TV. Couple that with an outpouring of “unscripted” fare that taps into every age/demographic and socio-economic status, and, well, the arrival of OWN feels almost dated. OWN really follows a very conventional cable model which is aimed at females. Although I feel that Oprah’s content will ultimately be more though-provoking and refined than her competition, including WE and the network she once co-founded with Geraldine Laybourne, et al, Oxygen, I became bored 10 minutes into the big reveal of her programming slate.
Although she’s arguably admirable, genuine, and brilliant, the Diane Sawyer installment on the series premiere of “Master Class” felt like it lacked focus and direction. Sawyer started getting too figurative in her reflection and commentary on her journalistic career and marriage to to Mike Nichols. It’s nothing that we haven’t seen before — on Bio or elsewhere.
Nellie’s point about the documentary of Oprah’s 25 season was the highest rated overall. And I can see why. Of course — everybody loves the legacy of the show that started it all.
We’ll see how OWN comes into play in this very competitive cable landscape.
I must say Master Class is a good series but what is off-putting about it are the colors used – or lack thereof. A bit more color guys? I like the person talking directly to the camera, the series overall has some interesting features but I think the overall look is making people switch channels – I wanted to. It doesn’t appear to be a “hopeful” series at first glance. The music is also somewhat depressing. It almost seems like some murder mystery lecture if you watch it with the sound off.
Speaking of color, I’m also hopeful the OWN logo remains more in purple then the other colors. I noticed the all purple logo was used more often. Curious to see how long those big block letters in CAPS remain.
And oh my gosh people a network isn’t born overnight give it a break. There isn’t even all of their programming. Most new shows are not going to work. I HATE to admit it – seriously hate to – the kidnapped by the kids show – I secretly got a tear in my eye! The All Star show felt thrown together, but they needed names to start with and the other ones aren’t ready yet. The names got the press, etc.
I think OWN will eventually do fine and settle in nicely.
I too watched oprah over the week-end, and thought the most interesting discussions were between the individual producers of the show.They are under a lot of pressure to keep the suspense high, and the interest of the home and TV audience at peak. This requires an enormous amount of work, pressure, and long hours. It appears that many of the producers work 18 hours a day. Who has time to exercise with this schedule, which is why all the female producers are very overweight. The brains, creativity and devotion to their boss and programs have produced lots of great content. The amount of planning and scheduling before hand surprised me. It all seems so easy to watch, and not think of the amount of work that makes it all run smoothly. I was impressed! Hope to see more of the backstage planning and discussions!Good luck to all the staff and continued success! A Boston viewer!
The Own network will fail because Oprah’s team haven’t learn anything from the Oxygen Network experiment.People don’t want to see the same old same old.So far the networks is like one big episodes of Oprah.How much feel good TV for middle age housewives can one cram into a day.How about getting out of the Oprah land comfort zone and dare to try something new, risky, or just slightly innovative.
WHILE IM NOT A BIG FAN OF OPRAH, I FIND IT AMUSING HOW THIN PEOPLE THINK ITS THEIR RIGHT TO DENIGRATE OVER-WEIGHT OR OBESE PEOPLE, SO TRUE ITS NOT IN YOUR BEST HEALTH PRACTICES. MOST OF THE SKINNY-MINIS ARE A BUNCH OF NEUROTIC NUTCASES. WHO AREN’T HAPPY,CAN’T BE IN LOVING RELATIONSHIP AND COULD HAVE AN ORGASM IF THEIR LIFE DEPENEDE UPON IT.
In a free country, being overweight would be your own business. But in our socialist leaning country where we all have to pay for each others health care, being overweight could be said to be immoral. You are asking your neighbors to pay the very high costs of diabetes, nursing home care, heart attack and stroke, osteoarthritis, chronic sleep apnea (which requires monitoring by a physician), vision problems from high blood pressure, etc., etc.
You’ve been paying the very high costs of care for diabetes, nursing homes, heart attacks and strokes, osteoarthritis, chronic sleep apnea (which requires monitoring by a physician) and vision problems from high blood pressure of the uninsured for decades. Well before this country magically became socialist on March 30, 2010. Or did that magically happen on January 20, 2009?
Also, do understand the concept of insurance?
I’m with you!! From here on out, we should only denigrate people who can’t figure out how to properly use the caps lock function on their keyboard.
LOL – funny lowercase. Rarely do I laugh at something someone posts that was funny.
in my next life i am returning – hopefully – as gayle king. this woman could not be more fortunate. i’m surprised she wasn’t made network boss. but i guess she’ll be fine with whatever silly new talk show she has on the oprah network. gayle will never be out of work – this much is true!
good for you gayle. enjoy it all!!
My child and I were addicted to the Discovery Health hoarders, 19 kids and crazy, ER, and women who didn’t know they were pregnant series. Maybe Discovery didn’t promote the channel well enough, but the series on it were actually great, low-key shows about important subjects.
We’ve been tuning in to OWN just to see if Oprah kept at least some of the Discovery Health shows. Unfortunately, all the old shows are gone, and there’s no sign that any of them have found new homes.
As for OWN itself: we’ve barely been able to see any of the shows because, whenever we turn to that channel, all we see is Oprah doing an out-of-date show about how great her shows will be.
We did see the OWN, de-clutterer version of the hoarders show that Discovery Health was running. (I’m not sure whether that was homegrown or syndicated.) OWN is supposed to be nice and positive, but the de-clutterer in the OWN show is really a lot meaner than the organizers in the hoarders show.
We also watched the kids kidnapping the consultant show. I think the people who made that show are clearly either hypocrites or fabulously rich Oprah employees who have no idea what ordinary parents are up against. The producers made no effort whatsoever to show why a well-paid consultant in Southern California might be terrified of cutting back on his workload or changing jobs in this economy. The consultant probably did need to change his life, but the people who made the show are either too ignorant or too weak at incorporating their knowledge of real life into the show to have anything interesting to say about parenting.
I’m a long time Oprah Show viewer and getting a glimpse into the inner workings is priceless to me. There’s not much “reality” when there are cameras present, but in comparison to what else is passing as reality TV, I’ll take this thank you very much. As for the producers, some are overly fat some are overly skinny, most are overworked. Happens at my job too.
I have enjoyed Peter Walsh from his days on Clean Sweep — which Enough Already! is taken from. I’ve missed him in this setting and I’m glad to see the focus is on the emotional baggage moreso than the physical stuff.
Master Class is educational, if you’re interested and I’m interested to know how someone like Jay-Z has sustained a career in an industry that people wrote off as a fad more than 20 years ago.
One show I can’t get behind is Miracle Detectives…leave peoples faith alone. Not a must see show on my schedule but interesting to some I’m sure.
I understand that OWN is not for everybody but it so far it has done incredibly well for me and I’ll continue watching.
I watched Oprahs network today and I HATE it. There are no medical shows anymore. That is the whole point of a Health station.
Tabitha – It is no longer a health station!! My gosh, how many readers does this blog have now?
Get this psycho egotistical witch off the tv!! Who does she think she is, GOD? Oh that’s right she has her OWN religion, the perfect example of a false prophet. Evidently she does think she’s God if she thinks people should watch her BS 24/7!! Give me back my Discovery Health channel!! She can take her imbecile WTF channel and shove it!
it will fail for the same reasons her ratings for her current show are falling. Its all celebrities. I think all “non-celebrities” should be insulted that she is not interested in regular people, just celebrities. Her powerhouse years were stories about various subjects – not just celebs promoting their latest gig.
When you have so many love it or hate it people writing in, you don’t get a valid and/or reliable indicator of how something is doing;good-bad…interesting-boring…innovative-same old somae oldand on and on.. you just get people who have already made up there mind about Oprah and/or her network. I’m giving it at leasta couple months, and not watching it 24/7. I will then try and give somewhat of an objective opinion. And yes , I do really admire Oprah, and hope she does well. I don’t think she put all this effort into regurgitating the past!