In the Crystal Ball : How a Media Observer Sees The Fall Season

When the fall season rolls around next month, there won’t be anything like “Twin Peaks,” “Cop Rock” or “thirtysomething.”

According to Betsy Frank of the New York-based advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi, last season was the “noble experiment” in innovation that failed. This year, familiarity--comedy and non-episodic programming (movies, variety, reality, sports)--is back.

“My sense this year is that all four networks, at least the three big ones, are trying to go back to basics,” said Frank, director of television information and new media for Saatchi & Saatchi, which for the past 20 years has surveyed and analyzed television programming.

“They are going back to the core audience they have been successful in delivering in the past.”

And that core audience is women. “With ABC, it’s young women with kids,” Frank said. “With CBS, it’s an older female audience, and in the case of NBC, a somewhat more affluent and upscale female ... We now have a TV season where anybody can be No. 1 and each network would like it to be them.”

According to Frank, returning to a tried and true formula isn’t necessarily bad. “Last year was the season of innovation and what we got instead was the hitless year,” she said. “ ‘Law and Order’ and ‘Fresh Prince of Bel Air’ were the top-rated (new) shows, but when you think about it the highest-rated shows for the season were the well-established shows like ‘Cheers’ and ’60 Minutes.’ ”

This year, the schedule seems more focused, she said.

With the four networks finding their audiences dwindling every year because of competition from cable and home video, Frank said she believes it’s important the networks put shows on the air the majority of viewers want to see.

“There’s nothing like network TV to introduce a product, so it is imperative that networks keep the audience levels up,” she said. “‘Cop Rock’ didn’t do it. Even ‘thirtysomething’ didn’t do it, and ‘Twin Peaks’ didn’t to it. In fact, ‘Twin Peaks’ reached fewer people with each subsequent episode.”

There is just a handful of new dramas this season, Frank said, and it’s too early to predict their demise. She pointed out that the year before “The Cosby Show” debuted in 1983, it was the exact opposite: The only comedies in the Top 10 were “MASH” and “Three’s Company.”

“The conventional wisdom was comedies were dead. Now, of course, you have different variables: the economics--(comedies) are cheaper to make--and the syndication potential. At least with a comedy, if it hits, it’s going to hit fast. A drama needs time to find an audience. So comedies would seem to make a lot of sense right now. But the population is aging and dramatic shows tend to be more popular among older audiences.”

Frank gives Fox high marks for introducing its new year-round season this summer, enabling the network to launch a series every month. “If you get the four network presidents in a room, the one thing they’ll agree on is its lunacy to premiere all your new shows during the space of two weeks in September,” Frank said. “The other networks will be watching the results of this experiment carefully.”

As for the new season, Frank likes the two new ABC comedies: “Home Improvement,” starring comic Tim Allen (Tuesdays at 8:30 p.m.), and “Step by Step” (Fridays at 8:30 p.m.) starring Patrick Duffy and Suzanne Sommers. “They happen to have terrific time periods and lead-ins, but they also seem like legitimately funny shows.”

“I’ll Fly Away” (Tuesdays at 8 p.m.), a new dramatic series set in the ‘50s South from producers John Falsey and Joshua Brand (“St. Elsewhere,” “Northern Exposure”) starring Sam Waterston, is Frank’s favorite NBC entry.

“That’s a show where the quality seems to show so strong in terms of acting, writing and production values,” she said. “It also is in a pretty good established time period for NBC (the “Matlock” time slot). I am just hoping that viewers will find it because it’s worth finding.”

Frank’s pick over at CBS is the Redd Foxx-Della Reese comedy “The Royal Family” (Wednesdays at 8 p.m.). “CBS has had a lot of problems in their 8 p.m. time period,” she said. “They’ve been addressing them and finally solved Monday and Tuesday and now they’re going to work on Wednesday. It’s such a funny show--a show I wouldn’t have believed I would be telling you is such a funny show a couple of weeks ago. I think this is a show that might reverse their fortunes on Wednesday.”

Of the new Fox series, Frank likes the comedy “Roc” (Sundays at 8:30 p.m.), about a working-class black family, but feels it may not belong on Fox. “It looks more like a traditional living room-based situation comedy that could air on any of the networks,” she said.