White 'Knight' for 'Crime Time';
Numbers have bite; CBS confident show is last piece of 5-night slate
By Lisa de Moraes
May 11, 1992
CBS late-night debut of the new vampire-cop action-hour "Forever Knight" last week showed signs it could be the final piece to the "Crime Time After Prime Time" Monday-through-Friday puzzle.
The show, which will fill the Tuesday time slot, kicked off in a two-parter last week, which aired Tuesday and Wednesday nights. The first installment pulled in a 3.6 rating/13 share in overnight numbers in the 20 metered markets, according to the Nielsen Television Index.
Its predecessor, "Scene of the Crime," had been averaging a 3.0/11 in the Tuesday slot and was the lowest-rated of CBS' "Crime Time" lineup.
The first show tried out on Tuesday, "Urban Angel," had less success, with a 2.7/11 average.
"Forever Knight" accomplished the increase, even though it came up against a "Nightline" town hall meeting about sex and rape on ABC, which pulled in a whopping 7 rating for the news show.
"Knight's" second installment, on Wednesday night, moved up even further, to 3.8/13, in the 20 markets.
CBS late-night vice president Rod Perth said he's confident he's found the last piece for his five-night slate.
"At this point we think we've fixed the schedule. We've got five shows that are pretty uniform in their competitiveness," Perth said.
Overnight ratings for the week of May 24, for example, had Monday's "Sweating Bullets" at 4.0/14, "Forever Knight's" Tuesday predecessor "Scene of the Crime" down at 3.0/11, Wednesday's "Dangerous Curves" at 4.1/14, Thursday's "Silk Stalkings" at 4.2/14, and Friday's "Dark Justice" at 4.0/13.
"What is important is how all of these shows do collectively," Perth said. "We have put five pieces together into an overall programming strategy. But most importantly, we've got a real bead on what works in late night in terms of action-adventure. The latest two shows premiered prove we know how to improve on our past experiences."
Only two of the five original series are still on the air, "Dark Justice" and "Sweating Bullets," which both debuted in April 1991.
When "Crime Time" debuted, CBS execs said some of the shows might make their way to primetime. So far none have. In fact, "Forever Knight" is a revamp of a primetime series pilot of about three years ago, called "Nick Knight," starring Rick Springfield.
However, Perth said that the stars of his shows are strong candidates for primetime series.
"I am known as the guy who owns all the farm clubs; I'm proud of that," Perth said. "These stars on our shows are clearly the future stars of primetime. While the farm team aspect may not appeal to everyone, on the other hand there are not a lot of places that actors can -- if they're lucky enough to be chosen for a series -- get at least 13 (episodes) on the air and a high likelihood of a minimum of 22 on the air, and it's network television."
CBS late night has come a long way in one year; a year ago the network was airing a news program that started up with the outset of the Persian Gulf war and "Wiseguy" reruns, and picking up the pieces from its "The Pat Sajak Show" experiment.
And, in a daypart fraught with instability, both in network and first-run programming, CBS' experiment has ironically emerged as perhaps the most stable of the lot.
Through April 5 this past season, CBS' "Crime Time" was up 30 percent in ratings compared with the net's 11:30 p.m.-12:30 a.m. performance the same time last year. "Crime Time" also was up 27 percent among adults ages 18-34, and 31 percent among adults 18-49.
ABC -- which got out of the midnight-12:30 a.m. business -- except for Friday's "In Concert" -- is down 15 percent in ratings among adults 18-34 and down 13 percent among adults 18-49 in the 11:30 p.m.-12:30 a.m. block.
Meanwhile, the ratings on NBC's "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson" dropped 8 percent among adults 18-34 for the same dates, and 4 percent among adults 18-49, though "The Tonight Show" was up 2 percent in households.
"My feeling is (Jay) Leno is not only going to have trouble holding on to an institution, but people tend to forget that 'The Tonight Show' is going to have problems because NBC is out of first place now," Perth said. "This is absolutely going to affect 'Tonight Show.' As we get stronger in primetime, it is affecting our late night."
Perth's last hurdle is clearances. To date, they hover at about 87 percent on "Crime Time."
"We're still fighting what happened in the wake of the Pat Sajak fiasco," said the CBS exec who was hired long after that show debuted.
"In some critical markets CBS affiliates were wooed into buying 'Arsenio Hall.' We're literally blacked out in Atlanta, Washington, D.C., Detroit, Cleveland, Cincinnati and Houston, and that's a huge handicap, and makes it even more remarkable how well we're doing without those markets.
Perth is confident he'll get back many affiliates.
"Arsenio has been declining and we have increased -- we're the only network schedule to have increased," he said.
In this past Nielsen February sweeps, "The Arsenio Hall Show" drifted down to a 3.1 household rating from a 3.4 the previous February; among women 18-34 its 3.2 was down from the 3.5 the year before; and among men 18-34 it garnered a 2.3 rating, down from 2.7 in February 1991.
At its high point, in 1990, "Arsenio Hall" pulled in a 3.7 among women 18-34 and a 4.5 among men 18-34.
"I'm not saying (Arsenio) is out of business," Perth said, "But I am saying that 'Crime Time' . . . is the little schedule that did. 'Crime
Time' is the only successful schedule in late-night television other than 'Arsenio' to be introduced in years."
Copyright 1992 BPI Communications, Inc.