ARI SHAPIRO, Host:
2008 was a rough year for network television. It began with the writers' strike. And then by the end of the year, NBC had announced its plan to try something new - Jay Leno at 10 p.m. That basically writes off a full hour of what had been primetime scripted programs. Linda Holmes writes for NPR's entertainment blog "Monkey See." She's here in our studios. Good morning.
LINDA HOLMES: Good morning.
SHAPIRO: OK. Well, if there were plenty of losers in this year of television, let's talk about who some of the winners were. Who did well in 2008?
HOLMES: There continue to be a couple of comedies that are doing well, but a relatively small number. You still see good returns from "The Office" and "30 Rock."
SHAPIRO: The interest in politics really seemed to help topical, political satire shows.
HOLMES: Absolutely true. I think "Saturday Night Live" probably was more relevant culturally than it's been in a very long time. "Saturday Night Live" got very lucky when people immediately latched onto the, just, similarity in physical appearance between Sarah Palin and Tina Fey, and they sort of rolled.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW "SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE")
TINA FEY: (As Governor Sarah Palin) And who wouldn't want the complete set of limited edition Joe action figures?
(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)
FEY: (As Governor Sarah Palin) There's Joe the Plumber, Joe Six-Pack, and my personal favorite, Joe Biden.
(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE)
FEY: (As Governor Sarah Palin) If you pull this cord, he talks for 45 minutes.
(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)
HOLMES: Jon Stewart on the "Daily Show" and Stephen Colbert on "The Colbert Report" both also had really strong years and were able to take advantage of the political events to good results.
SHAPIRO: Another big winner, Jay Leno. What's the impact of NBC moving him to 10 p.m.?
HOLMES: Well, I think widespread depression for a lot of people is the impact.
(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)
SHAPIRO: A lot of people in the industry, you mean?
HOLMES: People in the industry and also people who like scripted programming. It's not a good sign for specifically shows on NBC that sort of teeter on the edge of being canceled. They have a couple of shows - "Chuck" is one, "Friday Night Lights" is another - which have, sort of, always been on the bubble and are probably going to die as result of this move. The immediate impact, though, for NBC is the saving of a lot of money.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW "THE TONIGHT SHOW")
JAY LENO: The latest trend is wedding cakes for dogs. Have you heard about this? More and more owners are holding wedding ceremonies for their dogs.
(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)
LENO: You know, how does this make gay people feel, huh?
(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)
HOLMES: Everybody is short of money. Everybody is trying to find cheaper ways to make programming. There have been some news reports about budgets being cut across the board at some of the networks. So everybody is trying to figure out how to do more with less in this industry, as well as, you know, lots of others.
SHAPIRO: And then there are Web sites like Hulu where people can now watch full-length TV shows for free.
HOLMES: You know, Hulu, I think, has been a success story in that they have found a way to carry a lot of TV shows and to provide them in an interface that's really user-friendly and...
SHAPIRO: And you can't zip through the commercials.
HOLMES: You can't zip through the commercials. But the commercials are - there are fewer of them than you would find if you watched something on television.
SHAPIRO: Is Web-only television doing well?
HOLMES: Web-only television had a very big story this year which was "Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog," which is a production that was...
SHAPIRO: "Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog."
HOLMES: Yeah, it was a Web-only musical, a total of just about 45 minutes long. It was done by Joss Whedon who did "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and some other shows. It was something they sort of came up with during the strike. And that again is something that has had a life entirely outside of network television, which is interesting on a business level, obviously, because they're using some different delivery mechanisms. But also it was very interesting creatively because you can sort of tell when things are made lovingly, and it was something that was made lovingly.
SHAPIRO: Let's listen to a clip from "Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog" in which Neil Patrick Harris plays a super-villain trying to take over the world.
(Soundbite of Web musical "Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog")
NEIL PATRICK HARRIS: (As Dr. Horrible) And by the way, it's not about making money. It's about taking money, destroying the status quo, because the status is not quo. The world is a mess, and I just need to rule it.
SHAPIRO: So if this was a huge success online and it had no life on television, what's the takeaway lesson?
HOLMES: You know, if you look back at the story of the Radiohead album that they did where it was not released in the...
SHAPIRO: "In Rainbows"?
HOLMES: Exactly - where it was not released in, sort of, a conventional way. But they released it with a, sort of, pay what you want. One of the arguments that came out of that was, first in order to do that, you have to be Radiohead. And one of things about "Dr. Horrible" is it might turn out to be that in order to do this, you have to be Joss Whedon. It's not clear yet whether this is a model that's going to work for everyone.
SHAPIRO: Linda Holmes is a writer for the NPR blog "Monkey See." Thanks for talking with us.
HOLMES: Thank you.
SHAPIRO: And you can read her thoughts on whether we have just ended a golden age in television at npr.org/monkeysee.