Key insights from this report:
Embassy Row Productions is the brainchild of Michael Davies, who executive produced a number of popular game, competition, and talk show series before he founded Embassy Row in 2005. Before founding Embassy Row, which was purchased by Sony Pictures TV in 2008, Davies was Founder of Diplomatic, where he produced multiple projects including ESPN’s game show 2 Minute Drill, among others. Prior to that, Davies served as EVP of Alternative Series and Specials for ABC Entertainment, where he oversaw the development of Whose Line is it Anyway? David Blaine magic specials, the original pilot for Comedy Central’s The Man Show and the 1998 and 1999 Academy Awards. But one can make a strong argument that Davies really made a name for himself for his work executive producing more than 1,000 episodes of ABC’s Who Wants to be a Millionaire, hosted by the venerable Regis Philbin from 1999 – 2002 before hitting syndication.
These days, Embassy Row is the creative force behind some of the most popular cable live talk and competition series on TV. They include the unscripted Food Network primetime series Cutthroat Kitchen, the Andy Cohen-hosted Watch What Happens Live on Bravo, AMC’s Talking Dead and the completed Talking Bad, Discovery’s Naked After Dark (the companion to Naked and Afraid) and Shark After Dark (the live talk show companion to Shark Week) as well as Bravo’s Fashion Queens. Embassy Row also produced the short-lived Fox Sports 1 live talk show Crowd Goes Wild and is now currently producing the NBC Sports Network talk show Men in Blazers, hosted by Michael Davies himself.
The company has also been involved with many digital and online productions, including the web series Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee featuring Jerry Seinfeld, as well as branded content for brands including Pepsi, ELLE Magazine, Hellmann’s, LG, American Express, and Swarovski.
Let’s take a look at how Embassy Row’s current productions are performing and find how the company has and can differentiate itself from competitors.
Embassy Row Program Performance 2014 To-Date (Live+SD)
Below is how the most recent seasons of Embassy Row-produced series have performed. Some finished up their respective runs this year, some are ratings/impressions to-date and other programs will be returning but are currently on hiatus.
Measurement Interval | Originator | Standard Daypart | Program | P 18-49 Rtg% | P 18-49 Proj (000s) | P 25-54 Rtg% | P 25-54 Proj (000s) | P 2+ Proj (000s) |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
10/13/2013 – 03/30/2014 (All) | AMC | PRIME TIME | TALKING DEAD | 2.56 | 3247 | 2.46 | 2952 | 4946 |
08/01/2013 – 10/01/2013 (All) | AMC | PRIME TIME | TALKING BAD | 2.32 | 2944 | 1.99 | 2381 | 4434 |
01/01/2014 – 10/09/2014 (All) | BRAVO | PRIME TIME | WATCH WHAT HAPPENS LIVE | 0.77 | 973 | 0.88 | 1048 | 1842 |
01/01/2014 – 10/09/2014 (All) | DISCOVERY CHANNEL | Total Day | SHARK AFTER DARK LIVE | 0.69 | 875 | 0.72 | 866 | 1463 |
01/01/2014 – 10/09/2014 (All) | BRAVO | PRIME TIME | FASHION QUEENS | 0.61 | 779 | 0.63 | 751 | 1325 |
09/21/2014 – 10/09/2014 (All) | FOOD NETWORK | PRIME TIME | CUTTHROAT KITCHEN | 0.57 | 725 | 0.63 | 752 | 1407 |
01/01/2014 – 10/09/2014 (All) | DISCOVERY CHANNEL | PRIME TIME | NAKED AFTER DARK | 0.49 | 619 | 0.53 | 638 | 1262 |
08/17/2013 – 05/31/2014 (All) | FOX SPORTS 1 | Total Day | CROWD GOES WILD WEEKEND | 0.03 | 35 | 0.04 | 46 | 107 |
08/01/2013 – 05/31/2014 (All) | FOX SPORTS 1 | Total Day | CROWD GOES WILD L | 0.02 | 27 | 0.02 | 25 | 53 |
01/01/2014 – 10/09/2014 (All) | NBC SPORTS NETWORK | Total Day | MEN IN BLAZERS | 0.01 | 17 | 0.01 | 16 | 31 |
As one might expect, the series-companion talk shows are easily the highest-rated of Embassy Row’s productions. The most-recent season of The Walking Dead is the most popular series on cable (and TV if using time-delayed data), and its companion show performed quite well thanks in part to a hefty lead-in. The company’s other late night talk shows perform well, while their sports shows frankly haven’t. The problem with the sports shows was and continues to be part timeslot, part airing on a low-rated niche sports network, and part “unique” nature of the way the personalities talk about sports. In regard to Crowd Goes Wild, it was a wacky, off-beat sports show hosted by Regis Philbin. Regis is a talk show icon, but not necessarily someone the sports TV fanatic can relate to. The program was often amusing, and it could have conceivably worked as a late-night program (after all, Embassy Row’s late-night talk shows have fared well). Unfortunately, most people who are tuning into sports TV during the day are expecting up-to-date sports news, not necessarily a variety show featuring panelists with a varying degree of sports knowledge. Going up against Around The Horn didn’t help.
Men in Blazers, starring company founder Michael Davies and Roger Bennett, was originally a soccer/pop culture podcast on ESPN’s Grantland before the two men found semi-stardom during ESPN’s World Cup coverage. The duo got their own show on NBCSN not long after, one which just premiered last month on Mondays at 10pm. Like Crowd Goes Wild, the program’s mission is to look at sports in a fun way mixed in with some pop culture. The show seems to have a niche audience, but the ratings have been poor. Will the poor ratings effect whether or not the show continues in the coming months, or is it just purely a low-cost, low-risk timeslot filler? Davies himself has played down any sort of expectations, describing his show “the least technically ambitious show in the history of the medium.”
An interesting finding is more often than not, an Embassy Row program is going to score more P 18-49 viewers than 25-54 viewers. Even when 25-54 viewers win out, the ratio is still pretty close. Even Crowd Goes Wild averaged more P 18-49 than 25-54, as has Men in Blazers. The company seems to have a knack for attracting the pop culture savvy viewers with their programming.
Next, let’s take a look at have performed over the seasons:
Embassy Row Programming Over the Years (Live+7)
Looking at Live+7 data, Watch What Happens Live is currently having its most successful year since 2010. Talking Dead numbers continue to increase, similar to The Walking Dead. On the other side, Cutthroat Kitchen averages have been worse this year to-date than last year. The same was the case for Shark Week’s Shark After Dark Live.
Measurement Interval | Originator | Program | P 18-49 Rtg% | P 18-49 Proj (000s) | P 25-54 Rtg% | P 25-54 Proj (000s) | P 2+ Proj (000s) |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
2013 | FOX SPORTS 1 | CROWD GOES WILD L | 0.03 | 32 | 0.03 | 31 | 60 |
2014 to-date | FOX SPORTS 1 | CROWD GOES WILD L | 0.02 | 26 | 0.02 | 24 | 49 |
2013 | FOX SPORTS 1 | CROWD GOES WILD WEEKEND | 0.04 | 56 | 0.07 | 78 | 188 |
2014 to-date | FOX SPORTS 1 | CROWD GOES WILD WEEKEND | 0.02 | 27 | 0.03 | 34 | 77 |
2013 | FOOD NETWORK | CUTTHROAT KITCHEN | 0.79 | 1004 | 0.88 | 1057 | 2090 |
2014 to-date | FOOD NETWORK | CUTTHROAT KITCHEN | 0.73 | 923 | 0.80 | 963 | 1833 |
2014 to-date | BRAVO | FASHION QUEENS | 0.63 | 795 | 0.65 | 784 | 1376 |
2014 to-date | NBC SPORTS NETWORK | MEN IN BLAZERS | 0.02 | 22 | 0.02 | 20 | 35 |
2014 to-date | DISCOVERY CHANNEL | NAKED AFTER DARK | 0.53 | 669 | 0.58 | 698 | 1369 |
2013 | DISCOVERY CHANNEL | SHARK AFTER DARK LIVE | 0.80 | 1007 | 0.76 | 904 | 1563 |
2014 to-date | DISCOVERY CHANNEL | SHARK AFTER DARK LIVE | 0.71 | 907 | 0.74 | 892 | 1519 |
2013 | AMC | TALKING BAD | 2.61 | 3316 | 2.31 | 2767 | 4991 |
2012 | AMC | TALKING DEAD | 1.39 | 1782 | 1.38 | 1669 | 2716 |
2013 | AMC | TALKING DEAD | 2.57 | 3255 | 2.44 | 2911 | 4892 |
2014 to-date | AMC | TALKING DEAD | 3.21 | 4076 | 3.21 | 3846 | 6177 |
2010 | BRAVO | WATCH WHAT HAPPENS LIVE | 0.50 | 660 | 0.57 | 704 | 1108 |
2011 | BRAVO | WATCH WHAT HAPPENS LIVE | 0.66 | 863 | 0.70 | 868 | 1271 |
2012 | BRAVO | WATCH WHAT HAPPENS LIVE | 0.36 | 465 | 0.49 | 589 | 863 |
2013 | BRAVO | WATCH WHAT HAPPENS LIVE | 0.47 | 590 | 0.61 | 724 | 1183 |
2014 to-date | BRAVO | WATCH WHAT HAPPENS LIVE | 0.94 | 1188 | 1.06 | 1273 | 2173 |
Embassy Row Program Viewership vs. Average Network Viewership (L+SD)
Most all of Embassy Row’s current programs garner an average P2+ viewership that outperforms the network’s average program P2+ viewership. This means that more often than not, Embassy Row programming will not only garner a good P 18-49 audience, but it will grab a solid number of viewers in total, more than the network’s average.
Embassy Row Primetime Programming vs. Timeslot
Four of Embassy Row’s programs air in the competitive Sunday 10pm time slot. Talking Dead is #1 overall across the board: P2+, P 18-49 and P 25-54 viewership. Each of the other three (Cutthroat Kitchen, Fashion Queens and Naked After Dark) fall into cable’s top 50 most-watched in the slot this year. Three of the four programs fall into the top 50 among P 18-49 (Discovery’s Naked After Dark is the exception).
Watch What Happens Live airs on Bravo at 11pm on Sundays through Thursdays and is in the top 10 most-watched programs in terms of P 18-49 and and P2+.
Embassy Row has made its mark via the cable talk and companion show. Should FX, with its popular scripted series, come calling? Telling Horror Stories has sort of a nice ring to it…