The Minearverse: YExpirationDateMV

Tim Minear - Mar 13, 2004 12:01:52 pm PST #4295 of 5085

Perfect example of when "nice" is so much better than "funny".

Jesse — been around and around with S&P on this show. We push it now and then. Often we get a dirty joke in that slips past them. Sometimes something that never even occurred to us as a dirty joke gets flagged. Then we end up fighting for it anyway, ’cause... the hell.

Okay, so here’s the testing story I was going to mention. About half way through production we tested two episodes — two random episodes, not the pilot. Also without recaps, so the test audience had no idea what they were going to see. No one told them anything about the show. We tested them in two different markets, the South and the Midwest.

So it’s me, Bryan Fuller, market testing people and executives from both the network and the studio all together in Century City watching two groups in each market (on different days -first the South, then on another day the Midwest) via a satellite link up. The test groups are broken into adults, one group male, one female. Each group member has been given an episode on tape to watch at home. We’ll call it “episode A.”

They sit around a table and a market research person, a very smart woman who knows what questions to ask and how to direct the discussion, asks them what they thought of the episode they were given to view at home.

The first episode doesn’t fair too well. There is some confusion. There is some real dislike. But one also gets the sense that people in these group settings feel a need to have “an opinion.” And generally a critical one. But for the most part, they make lots of good points.

Then, as a group, they watch a second episode. Episode “B.” We watch them on TV monitors as they watch TV. After which more group discussion. The second episode fairs much better. It’s “funnier.” Not as “annoying.” Makes “more sense.” That “girl” is “more likeable.” It seems “more sophisticated.”

The pattern is repeated exactly in the Midwest testing. First episode gets mild to negative response. Second episode gets a far more positive response.

But here’s what’s interesting: In the second test market, the viewing order was switched. In the Midwest, episode “B” and episode “A” were flopped. Suddenly episode “B” (or “A” in the Midwest instance — is anyone following this?) is the “less annoying” “funnier” and “more sophisticated” episode.

So it seemed that, for folks who knew nothing about the show, they needed to get their feet wet before they could open themselves up to liking it.

But the thing that surprised us the most — without exception, the series tested poorly with women. They didn’t like it, didn’t like her, hated the talking animals.

Men loved it.

We watched the oil painting of the women just staring at the screen. I thought maybe the transmission froze until one of them absently reached for a pork rind and cracked open a Tab.

Then we watched the men laughing out loud, leaning forward, and enjoying it muchly. There are lots of theories about this. And it’s a testing situation and offbeat shows NEVER test well. But no one expected the mysterious shrinking demographic of young men and adult men to like this show.