Talk's the Talk of Syndie Development

After a few slow years, syndicated daytime talk could surge in the 2009-10 season, with shows featuring Marie Osmond and Oprah regular Dr. Mehmet C. Oz leading the way.

Although Program Partners' Marie and Dr. Oz, the joint Harpo Productions/Sony Pictures Television series, are the only two talk shows that have been officially green lighted for fall 2009, there are a host of others in the works, industry watchers say.

Among them: Debmar-Mercury's The Wendy Williams Show, hosted by the popular radio personality, which began a six-week test run on July 14 on Fox stations in four markets — New York, Los Angeles, Dallas and Detroit.

Other projects in development include CBS Television shows hosted by Valerie Bertinelli and Bishop T.D. Jakes, the author and clergyman; a Sony show featuring Marissa Jaret Winokur of Dancing With the Stars; and a Warner Bros. show with The Food Network's Paula Deen.

Twentieth Television appears to be breaking away from the pack, concentrating not on traditional talk shows but instead on The Mom Show, a celebrity-laden lifestyle show that had been floated for fall 2008; a court show featuring former New York Senator Alfonse D'Amato and morphing Fox's primetime Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader into a daily strip.

Not all will go to market, says Bill Carroll, who tracks syndicated programming for Katz Television.

"At this stage of the game the number of new shows being considered is roughly three or four times the number of what it ultimately ends up being," he says, adding that the initial cuts will be made over the next few months.

Nonetheless, the future is looking brighter for talk than it has in recent seasons, in which court shows have proliferated, Carroll says. But with roughly a dozen court shows already on air, the distributors are talking more talk, he adds.

And it's not surprising the producers and distributors are considering so many, he says. "When you launch two new talk shows the odds are that both of them are not going to succeed."

In turn, producers are marketing the shows that have been announced using some non-traditional tactics.

Using a strategy pioneered for CBS Television's The Doctors, one of this fall's big launches, Marie and Dr. Oz are being marketed early and aggressively.

Marie made a surprise debut last January at NATPE. Sony began its campaign for Dr. Oz right after it won the distribution rights from Harpo Productions in June.

Traditionally, distributors begin marketing shows to stations just a year in advance.

Selling a show like Marie now gives its backers the chance to make early matches with stations that already have identified holes in their 2009-10 lineups, says Program Partners co-founder Ritch Colbert.

The process will continue through January, as a number of stations will not make their 2009 decisions until they know what the fall 2008 successes and failures are, he says.

Colbert says that the show is gaining traction, but that early clearances will not be announced until August. "Our goal is to achieve critical mass by mid summer," he says. "We are absolutely on track."

Dr. Oz has benefited from the backing of Oprah Winfrey, who propelled Oz's popularity by featuring him as her show's health expert. Winfrey surprised many by turning to Sony Pictures Television rather than CBS Television for distribution. CBS is the distributor of Oprah.

Debmar-Mercury is pleased by the early performance of Wendy Williams in its four market test run.

In New York, the show's debut episode earned a first-place performance in its 10 a.m. time slot among women 18-34, 18-49 and 25-54, according to a Debmar-Mercury spokesman.

The debut episode also performed well in Los Angeles, where the show finished second in its 1 p.m. slot, he says.

"There are so many talk shows competing for such a limited number of time slots that we decided to do something unique to set our project apart," says Debmar-Mercury Co-President Mort Marcus.

"That led to the idea for the six-week on-air preview for Wendy, since we knew it would give stations that chance to look at concrete ratings results rather than empty promises."

That certainly could make it harder for other shows being considered, industry sources say.

Hearst-Argyle Television is apparently still weighing syndication options for Conversations with Carlos Watson, which airs on the group's stations as quarterly specials featuring the former CNN commentator.

Litton Entertainment will reportedly be offering Street Court, featuring former Brooklyn district attorney Michael Mazzariello, meeting litigants on location instead of a set staged as a courtroom.

Also brewing is an offshoot of one of Fox's existing court shows, although company reps aren't releasing details.

Garnett Losak, the programming maven at Petry Media, says the long list of projects this early in the process is due to the revived interest in talk shows, which take longer to develop than other popular daytime genres, such as court shows.

"You're not dealing with a format. You're dealing with a personality," Losak said. "It takes a little more effort."

True, says Colbert. "The thing that distinguishes Marie as a show is Marie. She is a living brand."