Life on the Bubble
The Business
KCRW
4.5 • 699 Ratings
🗓️ 7 June 2010
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
If a TV show isn't getting good ratings it goes "on the bubble." So how do the writers cope with the threat of cancellation hanging over their heads, and what happens when the bubble pops? We talk with two TV producers Liz Heldens and Scott Rosenbaum, who know life on the bubble all too well.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | From KCRW in Santa Monica and KCRW.com, I'm Kim Masters, and this is the business. |
| 0:07.0 | You listen, if you listen and learn, then you're going to be able to do anything you want next time. |
| 0:12.7 | Everybody takes his own business. |
| 0:15.2 | Really, really, really, all white life. |
| 0:18.5 | He doesn't clean. |
| 0:20.2 | What's with him? |
| 0:23.6 | Oh, I'm afraid he's gone Hollywood. This week. What's with him? Oh, I'm afraid he's gone Hollywood. This week on business, when a TV show is wobbling in the ratings, it winds up in a limbo state known as On the Bubble. |
| 0:32.6 | So how does the writer in charge cope with the uncertainty and what happens when the bubble bursts? |
| 0:37.9 | We talked with two executive producers who've lived inside that bubble on shows including |
| 0:42.8 | Chuck and Friday Night Lights. But first, it's the Hollywood news banter. Stick around. It's |
| 0:47.8 | the business from KCRW. |
| 0:52.2 | You can imagine Hollywood everything is really driven by making money. |
| 0:57.6 | What's with him? |
| 0:58.4 | Oh, I'm afraid he's gone to Hollywood. |
| 1:02.4 | I'm joined in the studio by my banter buddy, John Horn of the Los Angeles Times. |
| 1:07.0 | Hello, John. |
| 1:07.9 | Hello, Kim. |
| 1:09.0 | So, John, grim news at the box office, huh? The studios must be |
| 1:12.6 | feeling kind of punk. The lowest Memorial Day ticket sales in 17 years. And if you look a little bit |
| 1:19.2 | more closely, May of 2010 was off nearly 24 percent from the last time there were four weekends |
| 1:25.5 | in May. So the signs are not good. |
| 1:27.7 | And I don't know if it's the movies, the ticket prices, combination of both the studios have their own explanations, but none of them seem to really hold water. |
... |
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