How I Met Your Mother sure to be renewed for at least a couple more years ?
By fred | September 16, 2008
Finally there might be some good news for the awesomeness that is How I Met Your Mother, the CBS sitcom whose fourth season will debut next week, Monday, September 22nd at 8.30
In the past CBS hasn’t really been what you’d call supportive of the show, many times it seems the show was “on the bubble”, that a renewal wasn’t certain to come, even though the show always performed well. Then last year there was this whole stupid Britney mess, but now it’s time to put all that behind us and look into the future. And the future, for Barney and his friends, might be syndication.
Syndication can be a golden mine, and, not surprisingly, networks are very interested in the little show created by Craig Thomas and Carter Bays. Which could have one really good side-effect : to ensure the show will stay on the air for a few more years.
Many see lots of potential in How I Met Your Mother, because the show consistently averaged more than 9 million viewers in CBS’ Monday-night sitcom block since the comedy premiered in September 2005, and last season, on average it added 450 000 people in the beloved 18-49 demo. Even better, the show performs well in rerun, something that do attract networks, obviously. As a result, bidders are very much interested, and while there are no comments made on actual numbers, as said Chuck Larsen, the producers’ rep, “I’m really impressed that potential buyers are being so aggressive in bidding for the show.”
With an estimated potential revenue of $350 million in its first cycle, it’s quite understandable. And the best part in all that is that the four-year contract is for delivery to the buyers of 110 half-hours in 2010. But with only 64 episodes done by the end of last season, and an average season order of 22 episodes, that means the show would be guaranteed to be renewed for one more year at the very least !
I say at the very least, because that’s only to produce the required 110 half-hours, but for each additional year that CBS renews the show beyond 2010, an extra year gets tacked on to the contract. So unless the show tanked in the mean time, CBS would have all the reasons in the world to keep the show running even longer.
So while nothing is done yet, it seems very likely that the contract will be signed - in fact, the buzz over How I Met Your Mother is such that negotiations for another Twentieth sitcom, My Name Is Earl, have been delayed, even though the show will be available to stations sooner - and so we should have probably at least two more years secured ahead of us.
Just how awesome is that ?
Here’s the article from Variety about the deal :
Twentieth TV hits ‘Mother’ lode — Comedy draws $350 million from stations
By JOHN DEMPSEYOne of the most spirited auctions in the past couple of years has turned Twentieth TV’s How I Met Your Mother into a potential nonstop revenue machine, whose reruns are poised to harvest upward of $350 million in its first cycle.
At least three station groups — Tribune, Fox and CBS — have ponied up bids in some or all of the first seven cities opened by the distributor: N.Y., L.A., Chicago, Philadelphia, Dallas, Houston and Washington. Twentieth could disclose the identity of the winning bidders in the various cities as early as Wednesday.
In cable, the bidders include TBS, Lifetime, ABC Family, FX, Comedy Central and Spike. The cable deal will take longer to close because it encompasses two separate exposures of the series. The first is the standard 12 runs a week that kicks off in fall 2010, when cable will share the plays with TV stations. The second comprises two extra runs each week in advance of fall 2010, a repurposing that’s not available in syndication and that could start on cable before the year is out.
Twentieth TV declined to comment on the negotiations, but Chuck Larsen, the producers’ rep on Mother, while not discussing any financial details, said: “I’m really impressed that potential buyers are being so aggressive in bidding for the show.”
One of the reasons for the elevated demand is that Mother has consistently averaged more than 9 million viewers in CBS’ Monday-night sitcom block since the comedy premiered in September 2005.
Even more significantly, while the show’s total-viewer number has declined slightly each year, in the 2007-08 season, Mother has, on average, added 450,000 people in 18-to-49, the demo most sought after by Madison Avenue.
Another reason for the booming sellers market for Mother is that “there are so few sitcom reruns coming down the pike,” said Bill Carroll, VP and director of programming for Katz TV, which represents hundreds of TV stations. Broadcast networks have cut back drastically on sitcoms, filling their primetime schedules with lots more reality series, which are cheaper to produce, and a continuing steady stream of hour dramas.
Whatever the reason for the ascendancy of Mother, Twentieth could end up pocketing $2 million an episode from syndication through 1) cash license fees from stations, and 2) revenues from the three 30-second national spots the distrib is holding back in each half-hour run of the series.
Similarly, an additional $1 million an episode could flow into Twentieth’s coffers from the cable-network license fee and from the value of the three 30-second spots in cable.
The four-year contract calls for the delivery to the buyers of 110 half-hours in 2010. For each additional year that CBS renews the show beyond 2010, an extra year gets tacked on to the contract.
In TV syndication, Mother has leapfrogged over another Twentieth off-network sitcom, My Name Is Earl, which is available to stations in fall 2009, a year earlier than Mother. The distrib has sold Earl to TBS for cable exclusivity, but has not cleared any TV stations yet.
In effect, the buzz over Mother has forced Twentieth to shove Earl into the backseat.
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Shows: How I Met Your Mother
