The Eye Has It : CBS Wins Sweeps With Programming--and Luck

It was like drawing four aces every hand.

In one spectacular month, CBS rose from the dead with shrewd and dazzling entertainment, a breathtaking coup in the Gulf War--and lucky timing of its program choices that assured maximum success.

During the February ratings sweeps, just concluded, CBS looked like the Tiffany network again. From a tribute to Ed Sullivan to this week’s smart new miniseries, “And the Sea Will Tell,” to reporter Bob McKeown’s historic and exclusive footage from liberated Kuwait City, CBS was a reminder of its glorious past, when it dominated TV in both news and entertainment.

Who could have guessed beforehand that long-shot CBS would win the sweeps with escapist and nostalgic programming that proved to be the perfect antidote for viewers’ wartime blues?

“And the Sea Will Tell,” for instance, neatly combined two almost unbeatable entertainment ingredients--courtroom drama and a faraway island paradise. What a perfect relief for a few hours from a nightmarish war--escape to the South Seas. And in February, too, when viewers are in the grip of winter.

Who also could have guessed that CBS News, badly outgunned at the start of the Gulf conflict, would finish in a blaze of glory--breaking ahead on the ground war and then thrilling viewers with its joyous footage as Kuwait City was being freed?

Thus, when the sweeps ended Wednesday night, CBS had redeemed itself, to a significant degree, in both prestige and commercial success.

Whether this continues depends on management’s commitment to CBS News--once the jewel of TV--and the entertainment department’s ability to land just a few more hit series as successful as “Murphy Brown” and “Designing Women.”

But after a year of amazingly bad luck--which pushed CBS to the wall financially--the network may well be thinking, after February, that its fortunes are looking up. It got every break possible during the sweeps, and knew what to do with them.

Consider, for instance, CBS’ disastrous “dream season” of sports last year--when such events as the World Series, the Super Bowl, the NBA finals and the NCAA basketball championship all turned into boring blowouts.

But in February, the breaks went the other way. CBS had lucked into a perfect introduction to its escapist wartime schedule by showing, in late January, a rerun of “Lonesome Dove,” a classic TV Western miniseries that harked back to a simpler world with old-time values.

As the sweeps began--and the war escalated--another traditional CBS tale, “Sarah, Plain and Tall,” with Glenn Close as a woman who answers a farmer’s ad for a wife, was a success. So was a CBS musical special with Cher from Las Vegas. So were CBS tributes to Sullivan, “All in the Family” and “The Mary Tyler Moore Show.”

And then, in the final week of the sweeps, CBS had a phenomenal string of successes that blew No. 1 NBC and contender ABC, both slipping, right out of the water. CBS’ Grammy Awards and Miss USA Pageant, two more undemanding, escapist specials, scored big, and so did “And the Sea Will Tell,” with Richard Crenna and Rachel Ward.

CBS had the good sense not to tout its February lineup as a relaxation in nervous times. But that’s what it was. And the network’s research chief, David Poltrack, knew it, saying in late January that traditional “American stories,” comedies and programs that “are not inherently depressing,” would appeal to audiences during wartime.

He was right on the money. CBS came on with a rush.

But even Poltrack and CBS Entertainment President Jeff Sagansky probably could not have imagined CBS’ wipeout of the opposition in the last week of the sweeps, which help determine ad rates for local TV stations.

Here’s what happened:

CBS usually dies on Wednesday nights. So Sagansky scheduled the Grammy Awards for Wednesday of last week, and it won the entire night and finished No. 5 in the ratings.

The network also usually dies on Fridays. So Sagansky scheduled the Miss USA Pageant for Friday last week, and it led CBS to victory on that night, too.

On Saturday night of last week, in the surreal mix of the Gulf War and network programming, the allies launched their ground offensive, and of course most prime-time shows were preempted by the coverage.

Would you believe that there has actually been conversation to the effect that the war coverage cost NBC its usual Saturday blowout by preempting “The Golden Girls” and “Empty Nest,” thus helping CBS? Well, there has. Welcome to Hollywood. And you’re not alone if you’re muttering in disbelief.

On Sunday, “And the Sea Will Tell” weighed in big with 31% of the audience and ranked No. 3 for the week. On Monday, CBS scored heavily with its potent lineup led by “Murphy Brown” (a special one-hour episode) and “Designing Women.”

And on Tuesday, CBS’ growing new hit, “Rescue 911,” combined with the strong second half of “And the Sea Will Tell” to keep the network rolling.

It was a day of euphoria for CBS because Tuesday morning, McKeown had brought great pride to the network with his live footage from Kuwait City. For sheer journalistic drama, it ranked up there with the extraordinary audio reports by CNN’s Peter Arnett, Bernard Shaw and John Holliman from their hotel room in Baghdad as allied bombing of the city launched the war.

By Wednesday, the final night of the sweeps, there was little remaining doubt that CBS would win February--an especially key period because, according to Poltrack, it is one of the two highest-viewing months of each TV year, along with January, as cold weather keeps people at home.

As it turned out, Wednesday night belonged to the American people rather than any network as President Bush took to the airwaves to announce victory in the Persian Gulf War, thus climaxing an unforgettable month for TV viewers.

CBS, meanwhile, hopes its February showing is a harbinger of things to come. While specials were a key to its triumph, the fact is that it trailed NBC--once dominant in series--by only one-tenth of a rating point in regularly-scheduled shows.

NBC still has the goods--but it is captive to several series, including “Cheers” and “The Cosby Show,” which can make incredible financial demands on the network, now dependent on them because it has failed to develop new comedy hits. Without its old standbys, NBC could sink fast.

ABC has also lost momentum, partly because--as the sweeps indicated--it no longer seems to be developing the major TV movies and miniseries, such as “Roots” and “The Winds of War,” that made it stand apart.

In short, CBS is climbing because NBC and ABC are fading. It’s still weak Wednesdays through Saturdays. But a few new hits could take it to the top. And the way things went in February, CBS executives may feel especially confident that somebody up there likes them.