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RTE Gets Desperate

By
Debbie McGoldrick,
IrishCentral.com Staff Writer

Published Tuesday, March 10, 2009, 4:12 PM
Updated Thursday, July 23, 2009, 5:55 PM

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THE ongoing writers' strike in Hollywood is claiming victims left, right and center, with no end in sight.

The most prominent casualty, so far, was last Sunday's Golden Globes, but everyone across the board is suffering . . . including the suits at the national Irish network RTE, which airs tons of imported programming from the U.S. and is now facing the same problem at the networks here, i.e., how to fill all those soon to be empty hours.

According to reports in Ireland, RTE's biggest ratings earners are Desperate Housewives, Grey's Anatomy and Lost. Though we're fresh out of new episodes of those shows on this side of the pond, there's still a good few weeks left to go in Ireland before the well runs dry, and RTE execs are nervous about what happens next.

''It is serious," said Dermot Horan, RTE's director of broadcast and acquisitions. ''We haven't seen the full effect on air as yet but we will, as the year progresses. When you have a show like Desperate Housewives being cut short, then you will be affected."

Desperate aired its first show of the new season last week on RTE and garnered almost 44% of the viewing audience dying to see what happens next on Wisteria Lane, so clearly the show is a ratings juggernaut for the network.

RTE will perhaps schedule movies in place of the American shows when the scripts run out, or perhaps they'll turn to more reality program like what's happening here? Who knows. At least the Summer Olympics will help fill the time, should the strike's impact be felt that far in advance.

"I doubt the pain will be prolonged. We will have money left over because the series aren't complete and we can use that. We're ingenious enough to get by," said Horan.

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