TV Bulletin Board (Jan. 5)
01/05/07 17:06
By ED BARK
***Gonged in mid-performance are Geraldo Rivera and Megan Mullally, whose syndicated shows have been canceled.
Geraldo At Large, airing in D-FW at 10:30 p.m. weeknights on Fox4, will have its last gasp on Jan. 26th. The host will still have a weekend forum on Fox News Channel, though. Fox4 will replace At Large with Access Hollywood and then run an hour's worth of Judge Joe Brown from 11 p.m. to midnight.
Mullally's daytime talk show, airing at 9 a.m. on Ch. 21 locally, will run through January and then no more. The former Will & Grace Emmy-winner was being outdrawn by just about every competing program in D-FW, including Jerry Springer and Ch. 27's court shows. No replacement show is in place yet, says Ch. 21.
***FX's Dirt, starring Courteney Cox as a muckraking Hollywood magazine editor, delivered solid ratings for its Jan. 2nd premiere. The drama drew 3.7 million total viewers, with 2.4 million of them in the advertiser-craved 18-to-49-year-old demographic.
That compares favorably with the first-season premieres of FX hits such as Nip/Tuck, which also drew 3.7 million total viewers, and Rescue Me (4.1 million). The Shield is still the champ. Its inaugural episode pulled in 4.8 million total viewers, including 3 million 18-to-49-year-olds.
FX says the gender split for Dirt's premiere was 56 percent female, 44 percent male. Other FX series have skewed more to male viewers.