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Saturday Night Live last night spoofed the Bravo crap which Lauren Zalaznick programs. Last Monday she was replaced after a restructuring. (Now Bonnie Hammer adds Bravo to her NBCU cable portfolio.) So SNL lets it rip:
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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Funny…cause it’s true. More importantly, how does Andy Cohen always get out unscathed? Just cause of that horrendous talk show?
There is good, creative reality TV programming, and then there’s the pond scum, no-talents who grab anybody who’s ever said five words on camera, string together a little package and hand it off to somebody that owes them a favor…..a person desperate for as many ideas as they can lob at the most pathetic networks. I see it happen every single day, and it’s barf worthy. I have personally seen 3 pitches in two years starring the same dress designer of one of the Real Housewives. This stuff is the last refuge of the most talentless people in Hollywood. Happy to see a shakeup at Bravo. Maybe this will stop them before they get around to giving Kandi Burruss’ production-assistant boyfriend his own hour on Sunday nights.
OH! You mean Ben Silverman’s Electus!
I would watch some of those shows!
Me too—because they’d probably be better than anything on Bravo’s current lineup. Talk about art imitating life (aka “shit” in this case).
Thanks for the takedown, Nikki—cruel but richly, richly deserved.
Lauren Zalaznick is an extremely talented executive, who took an arts network that noone watched and made ground breaking tv with no budget to put the network on the map. That is what she did. Alot more than most ever accomplish. I am sure some other smart network will snap her up the minute there is an opening. As for Comcast, they needed to restructure just because there was no structure. But Laurens loss of Bravo has nothing to do with her talent and creativity and great management style.
“took an arts-network that noone watched and made ground breaking tv” HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAH
funny what’s considered “ground breaking” these days
Just because Lauren promised to make you a “producer” someday, you can’t use the title yet. You’re still her assistant. Or…ex-assistant now. Sorry.
SNL did a Cohen spoof last season
THANK YOU, NIKKI! I didn’t have to suffer through Bieber, to see the best of SNL last night. That clip is HYSTERICAL! And you’re absolutely right on your assessment of LZ.
I adore you and it’s posts like these that keep me reading DEADLINE before the NY Times. Yikes! It’s true. xoxoxo
It *is* true. They should rename Bravo: The Ratchet Candlelight Vigil for Humanity Network. Or, just Ratchet, for short. That being said, I kinda like Andy’s show. It’s bad in a good way.
Can’t wait to see Reasons 1-7 and 9-15.
Putting all of Lauren’s mean, odd, superiority-complex stuff aside, she and Andy are representative of another bad trend both in and outside of networks today… hiring marking execs to head networks. Marketing execs are NOT the same as programmers. Because cable nets tend to focus more on pre-determined brand “voice” to make content decisions Vs broadcast nets whose brand is simply determined by what shows are working, management has made it OK for marketing execs to pretend to be GM’s, Heads of Programming, and Presidents. This is a huge mistake, most of the time…OWN, Style, Bravo, Oxygen… just to name a few. The training and instincts of a marketer are NOT the same as a seasoned programmer with deep content, production, scheduling, and research history. Marketing instincts are really important and the best network lead execs have a keen since of marketing (e.g. Nancy Dubuc who get brand marketing like no one we’ve seen in years.)
Now back to Lauren. She was brought into NBC, promoted as a “genius,” and put in that chair by former self-proclaimed genius Jeff Gaspin (where is he now btw?) after they destroyed VH1 together. That should be all you need to know. Hey Lauren, whose “Brilliant but cancelled now?”
SB
SB, I could kiss you if it weren’t harassment. You’re spot on in your assessment of the marketer as network head. LZ moved JK over from Bravo to head up Oxygen…six years later, how did THAT work out?
What in the world are you talking about? It’s an interesting conversation- whether marketers or programmers make better GM/Presidents- but get your facts straight. Bravo and Style are run day to day by programmers (Frances/Salaam). OWN is run by Oprah. Dubuc is a big talent who did great at History, but has yet to show major success at Lifetime, and many top nets (TNT, TBS, Syfy, USA (co-heads)) are led by marketers.
Again, I don’t necessarily disagree with your premise, but sprinkle in some facts to better support it.
JK: get your a user name of your own, little boy…
Hey kids, I’ve been posting as Mr. Reality for years and I’d appreciate if u both get new handles.
Hey all you haters….jealous much?
Sarah B— Neither Andy Cohen nor any of the VPs of Production at Bravo (who oversee programming) have marketing backgrounds. In fact, most, including Andy, have backgrounds in news, not marketing. Andy is a protege of Barry Diller and has never worked in a marketing capacity…
what is your BEEF with her? SNL makes fun of BRAVO because people watch BRAVO. if it wasn’t successful it wouldn’t be worth spoofing. imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. bravo routinely bests scripted dramas in ratings because people like it. love it or hate it, they deliver ratings for shows that cost them nothing. does the crap the other networks put on elevate culture? even the so-called quality programming of the fancy cable networks – it’s just preference. mad men and girls are not better or worse for the world than the housewives. sorry. high and low culture is an elitist b.s. distinction. and there is no accounting for taste.
The current state of Bravo is profoundly depressing. I remember seeing my first Janus Collection films on Bravo as a kid, including the Kurosawas that I still love. Melvyn Bragg and the South Bank Show also turned me on to a number of interesting artists and filmmakers. Now Bravo is the worst sort of bottom-feeder, regurgitating cultural vomit. It’s a crime, really.
Spot on, sadly. Bravo and every other crap network are just flinging s–t against a wall to see if it’ll stick.
Trash tv. Total trash. Thursday on cohens show he aired Jenny mcarthy exposing her vagina by way of tge excuse of displaying a nearby tatoo of andys face.
Bravo ????????????
the highest ROI on cost per pixel captured is by putting a camera on fringe-dweller semi attractive or extremely unattractive people behaving badly. that’s the CFO’s formula for success. would bravo ever spend $100M on “house of cards”? not in a million zillion katrillion years.
So wait hasn’t bravo had double digit comps for years now? Is the point of programming a cable network not to make money? This is an industry/business driven website no sometimes you all should just shut up and realize how stupid you sound
Say what you want…but when SNL is making fun of something, that means it’s struck a nerve. The shows are watched (I don’t like them either, so what do I know?). but, the notion that this is emblematic of why Zalaznick is out is exactly backward. This is funny because Bravo is successful and EVERYONE OF YOU knew exactly what they were skewering here. So, get some perspective on parody…and when it works and more importantly, why!