Television show

  (Redirected from Television programme)


A live television show set and cameras

Television shows can be viewed: live (real time); be recorded on home video; a digital video recorder for later viewing; be viewed on demand via a set-top box or streamed over the internet.

A television show is also called a television program (British English: programme), especially if it lacks a narrative structure.

In the US and Canada, a television series is usually released in episodes that follow a narrative and are usually divided into seasons. In the UK, a television series, is a yearly or semiannual set of new episodes. (In effect, a "series" in the UK is the same as a "season" in the US and Canada)

With approximately three to six episodes, a serials can be inside of or a small collection of episodes. A small collection may also be called a limited/ mini-series. A one-off collection of episodes may be called a "'special"' or limited series. A motion picture for television is initially broadcast as such rather than direct-to-video or the traditional big screen.




Formats and genresEdit






United StatesEdit


To create the pilot, the structure and team of the whole series must be put together. If audiences respond well to the pilot, the network will pick up the show to air it the next season (usually Fall).[citation needed] Sometimes they save it for mid-season, or request rewrites and additional review (known in the industry as development hell).[citation needed] Other times, they pass entirely, forcing the show's creator to "shop it around" to other networks. Many shows never make it past the pilot stage.[citation needed]



United KingdomEdit


There are still a significant number of programs (usually sitcoms) that are built by just one or two writers and a small, close-knit production team. These are "pitched" in the traditional way, but since the creators handle all the writing requirements, there is a run of six or seven episodes per series once approval has been given. Many of the most popular British comedies have been made this way, including Monty Python's Flying Circus (albeit with an exclusive team of six writer-performers), Fawlty Towers, Blackadder and The Office.

Other nationsEdit



Arthur Schlesinger Jr.


Pre-production tasks include storyboarding; construction of sets, props, and costumes; casting guest stars; budgeting; acquiring resources like lighting, special effects, stunts, etc. Once the show is planned, it must then be scheduled: scenes are often filmed out of sequence, guest actors or even regulars may only be available at certain times. Sometimes the principal photography of different episodes must be done at the same time, complicating the schedule (a guest star might shoot scenes from two episodes on the same afternoon). Complex scenes are translated from storyboard to animatics to further clarify the action. Scripts are adjusted to meet altering requirements.


Principal photographyEdit





Budgets and revenuesEdit

Most television networks throughout the world are 'commercial', dependent on selling advertising time or acquiring sponsors.[citation needed] Broadcasting executives' main concern over their programming is audience size.[citation needed] In the past, the number of 'free to air' stations was restricted by the availability of channel frequencies, but cable TV (outside the United States, satellite television) technology has allowed an expansion in the number of channels available to viewers (sometimes at premium rates) in a much more competitive environment.[citation needed]

In the United States, the average broadcast network drama costs $3 million an episode to produce, while cable dramas cost $2 million on average.[9] The pilot episode may be more expensive than a regular episode.[citation needed] In 2004, Lost's two-hour pilot cost $10 to $14 million, in 2008 Fringe's two-hour pilot cost $10 million, and in 2010, Boardwalk Empire was $18 million for the first episode. In 2011, Game of Thrones was $5 to $10 million, Pan Am cost an estimated $10 million, while Terra Nova's two-hour pilot was between $10 to $20 million.[10][11]

Many scripted network television shows in the United States are financed through deficit financing: a studio finances the production cost of a show and a network pays a license fee to the studio for the right to air the show. This license fee does not cover the show's production costs, leading to the deficit. Although the studio does not make its money back in the original airing of the show, it retains ownership of the show. This allows the studio to make its money back and earn a profit through syndication and sales of DVDs and Blu-rays. This system places most of the financial risk on the studios; however a hit show in the syndication and home video markets can more than make up for the misses. Although deficit financing places minimal financial risk on the networks, they lose out on the future profits of big hits since they are only licensing the shows.[12]

Costs are recouped mainly by advertising revenues for broadcast networks and some cable channels, while other cable channels depend on subscriptions. In general, advertisers, and consequently networks that depend on advertising, are more interested in the number of viewers within the 18–49 age range than in the total number of viewers.[13][14] Advertisers are willing to pay more to advertise on shows successful with young adults because they watch less television and are harder to reach.[15] According to Advertising Age, during the 2007–08 season, Grey's Anatomy was able to charge $419,000 per commercial, compared to only $248,000 for a commercial during CSI, despite CSI having almost five million more viewers on average.[16] Due to its strength with younger viewers, Friends was able to charge almost three times as much for a commercial as Murder, She Wrote, even though the two series had similar total viewer numbers at that time.[13] Glee and The Office drew fewer total viewers than NCIS during the 2009–10 season, but earned an average of $272,694 and $213,617 respectively, compared to $150,708 for NCIS.[17]




In the United States, if the show is popular or lucrative, and a minimum number of episodes (usually 100) have been made, it can go into broadcast syndication, where rights to broadcast the program are then resold for cash or put into a barter exchange (offered to an outlet for free in exchange for airing additional commercials elsewhere in the station's broadcast day).



North American usageEdit

In North American television, a series is a connected set of television program episodes that run under the same title, possibly spanning many seasons. Since the late 1960s, this broadcast programming schedule typically includes between 20 and 26 episodes. Before then, a regular television season could average at least 30 episodes, and some TV series may have had as many as 39 episodes in a season.


A full season is sometimes split into two separate units with a hiatus around the end of the calendar year, such as the first season of Jericho on CBS. When this split occurs, the last half of the episodes sometimes are referred to with the letter B as in "The last nine episodes (of The Sopranos) will be part of what is being called either "Season 6, Part 2" or "Season 6B",[19] or in "Futurama is splitting its seasons similar to how South Park does, doing half a season at a time, so this is season 6B for them."[20] Since the 1990s, these shorter seasons also have been referred to as ".5" or half seasons, where the run of shows between September and December is labeled "Season X", and the second run between January and May labeled "Season X.5". Examples of this include the 2004 incarnation of Battlestar Galactica, ABC's FlashForward, Fox Kids's Rhino Man: The Series and ABC Family's Make It or Break It.


A standard television season in the United States runs predominantly across the fall and winter, from late September to May. During the summer months of June through roughly mid-September, network schedules typically feature reruns of their flagship programs, first-run series with lower ratings expectations, and other specials. First-run scripted series are typically shorter and of a lower profile than those aired during the main season and can also include limited series events. Reality and game shows have also been a fixture of the schedule.


Miniseries, limited series, and event seriesEdit

While network orders for 13- or 22-episode seasons are still pervasive in the television industry, several shows have deviated from this traditional trend. Written to be closed-ended and of shorter length than other shows, they are marketed with a variety of terms.

  • Miniseries: a very short, closed-ended series, typically six or more hours in two or more parts (nights), similar to an extended television movie. Many early miniseries were adaptations of popular novels of the day, such as The National Dream (1974), Roots (1977), and North and South (1985). In recent years, as described by several television executives interviewed by The Hollywood Reporter, the term miniseries has grown to have negative connotations within the industry, having become associated with melodrama-heavy works that were commonly produced under the format, while limited series or event series receive higher respect.[22]


In India, the shows are particularly referred to as serials, wherein the production is complex as well. The shows usually amount to at least 200 episodes, of 20 to 25 minutes each. On special episodes, referred to as Maha-Episodes, the duration last up to about 45 to 50 minutes. The show airs till the TRP (television rating point) is a little less than decent. The rating points depend on various criteria. Usually, shows which fail to attract TRP for a long time are shut down.

UK, Ireland and Australia usageEdit

In the United Kingdom and other countries, these sets of episodes are referred to as a "series". In Australia, the broadcasting may be different from North American usage. The terms series and season are both used and are the same. For example, Battlestar Galactica has an original series as well as a remake, both are considered a different series each with their own number of individual seasons.

Australian television does not follow "seasons" in the way that US television does; for example, there is no "fall season" or "fall schedule". For many years, popular night-time dramas in Australia would run for much of the year, and would only go into recess during the summer period (December to February, as Australia is in the Southern Hemisphere), when ratings are not taken. Therefore, popular dramas would usually run from February through November each year. This schedule was used in the 1970s for popular dramas including Number 96. Many drama series, such as McLeod's Daughters, have received between 22 and 32 episodes per season. Typically, soap operas, which have always run in season format in Australia, such as Home and Away, would usually begin a new season in late January, while the season finale would air in late November, as the show is off air for two months, or sometimes longer, depending on the schedule. In recent years, a new season would begin in early February, and the season finale would broadcast in early December. Since Home and Away's inception, it normally receives 230 episodes per season. Some seasons have seen between 205 and 235 episodes commissioned. During the Olympics, Home and Away would often go on hiatus, which was referred to as an "Olympic cliffhanger". Therefore, the number of episodes would decrease. Australian situation comedy series' seasons are approximately 13 episodes long and premiere any time between February and November.

British shows have tended toward shorter series in recent years. For example, the first series of long-running science fiction show Doctor Who in 1963 featured forty-two 25‑minute episodes, this dropped to twenty-five by 1970 to accommodate changes in production and continued to 1984. For 1985 fewer but longer episodes were shown, but even after a return to shorter episodes in 1986, lack of support within the BBC meant fewer episodes were commissioned leading to only fourteen 25‑minute episodes up to those in 1989 after which it was cancelled. The revival of Doctor Who from 2005 has comprised thirteen 45‑minute installments. There are some series in the UK that have a larger number of episodes, for example Waterloo Road started with 8 to 12 episodes, but from series three onward it increased to twenty episodes and series seven will contain 30 episodes. Recently, American non-cable networks have also begun to experiment with shorter series for some programs, particularly reality shows, such as Survivor. They often air two series per year, resulting in roughly the same number of episodes per year as a drama.


The usage of "season" and "series" differ for DVD and Blu-ray releases in both Australia and the UK. In Australia, many locally produced shows are termed differently on home video releases. For example, a set of the television drama series Packed to the Rafters or Wentworth is referred to as "season" ("The Complete First Season", etc.), whereas drama series such as Tangle are known as a "series" ("Series 1", etc.). British-produced shows such as Mrs. Brown's Boys are referred to as "season" in Australia for the DVD and Blu-ray releases.

In the UK and Ireland, most programmes are referred to as 'series' while 'season' is starting to be used for some American and international releases.

Running timeEdit

In the United States, dramas produced for hour-long time slots typically are 39 to 42 minutes in length (excluding advertisements), while sitcoms produced for 30-minute time slots typically are 18 to 21 minutes long. There are exceptions: subscription-based TV channels, such as HBO, Starz, Cinemax, and Showtime, have episodes that are 45 to 48 minutes long, similar to The UK.

In Britain dramas typically run from 46 to 48 minutes on commercial channels, and 57 to 59 minutes on the BBC. Half-hour programs are around 22 minutes on commercial channels and around 28 minutes on the BBC. The longer duration on the BBC is due to the lack of advertising breaks.


See alsoEdit


  4. ^ Arneson, Erik. "Hill Street Blues: A Cop TV Turning Point". Mysterynet. Archived from the original on June 27, 2009.
  7. ^ Heintjies, Tom (September 21, 2012). "The Oral History of SpongeBob SquarePants" (#17). Hogan's Alley. Retrieved November 14, 2017.
  13. ^ a b Storey, Michael (April 23, 2009). "THE TV COLUMN: Not in 18–49 age group? TV execs write you off". Arkansas Democrat Gazette. Retrieved May 2, 2008.
  16. ^ Santiago, Rosario (October 3, 2007). "For Advertising Purposes, 'Grey's Anatomy' May Well be Colored Green". BuddyTV. Retrieved May 3, 2009.
  24. ^ Morin, Fabien (March 9, 2015). "Pourquoi les programmes durent-ils 52 minutes à la télévision ?". TV Magazine (in French). Retrieved July 24, 2017.

External linksEdit