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« Today's News: Our Take
Fox Boss: Canceling Back To You Was Tough Decision
Patricia Heaton and Kelsey Grammer in Back to You by Sam Jones/Fox
Having sitcom stalwarts Kelsey Grammer and Patricia Heaton in starring roles wasn't enough for Fox to bring Back to You back to you, the viewer, for a second season. "This was not an easy decision," said Fox Entertainment chief Kevin Reilly. "But with that kind of top-profile talent and...proximity to [American Idol] in the second half of the season, the expectations were higher."
Reilly emphasized Fox is working to develop a live-action comedy franchise, but Back To You didn't seem to fit that bill. "The show did not seem to be strking a chord, and in terms of creative direction...it was a pretty mixed bag," he said.
The show did go down with a fight. It got off to a strong start when it debuted last fall, attracting more than nine million viewers. Two episodes that followed Idol in April each brought in more than 12 million sets of eyeballs. While that's respectable — it won its timeslot on those two occasions, in terms of viewers and the highly coveted adult 18-49 group — more than half of the Idol viewers shouted "hey, who's got the remote?" and went away upon hearing "Seacrest Out!"
The show, however, never recovered following the writers' strike, mustering only about seven million viewers in the series' final four airings.
Could Back to You still have some life? TV Week reported that 20th Century Fox shopped the series to CBS, but the show is not on the network's fall schedule.
Executive producer Steven Levitan told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette the show wasn't a good fit on Fox to begin with. "We’ve been on the wrong network from the start," he said. "We got talked into it. That was our blunder. [Fox is] a network that appealed to a different kind of people than we’re aiming for." — J.R. Whalen
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May 15, 2008 3:08 PM
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I always thought from the moment I heard this show would be on Fox, it was the wrong network. Fox doesn't usually cater to high brow sitcoms and that is the type of fan Kelsey Grammar brings with him. They would have lasted longer on CBS and maybe NBC.
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May 15, 2008 3:37 PM
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Talked into it? By who exactly? Either way, tt was clearly a bad fit, but I can at least understand why the producers went with Fox since they won a bidding war for it. But, frankly, I don't know why Fox put up so much money for this show when it was clearly never going to appeal to their audience.
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May 15, 2008 3:58 PM
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The show was ok, but when it came back they changed the daughter- I liked the original one much more and got rid of the weathergirl, but we had to wait and find out a few weeks for an episode to explain that. I actually liked the weathergirl and the supporting characters. Grammer's character was ok - but Heaton's character was annoying. Fred Willard is great in anything - too bad.
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May 15, 2008 4:06 PM
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What sunk this show for me was the high quality of the talent on camera and the not-so-high caliber of talent in the writers' room. Heaton, Grammer and Willard deserve better, and now maybe they'll be able to find it.
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May 15, 2008 4:16 PM
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What a load of ****. What can you expect from Fox anyway? Back to You is not a family show and it doesn't benefit from AI. How many parents would sit with their kids to watch "Chuck and Kelly doing it again" and then tune in to AI. This show should have been on at 9 or 9:30 and given a chance to air without interruptions. Or better yet, if FOX really wanted to see its potential would have aired it after American Idol. Those two airings in February were not enough because the show had been off air for four months because of the strike. And it still got over 12 million viewers on the both nights.
By the way, I think it's so comic that Reilly thinks Til Death fits his model of the comedy of next generation. Way to go Reilly!
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May 15, 2008 5:03 PM
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The show sucked, plain and simple. I can't stand Kelsey Grammar's snooty voice, after watching Frasier for years. Can't he act any different?
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May 15, 2008 5:59 PM
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yeah, I'm pretty sure SEACREST, OUT! died along with his talk show...
ps. Frasier bugs me.
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May 15, 2008 6:50 PM
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C'mon, you Kelsey-hatahs! Sure, Frasier was an insufferable prig, but you've gotta love Sideshow Bob!!! A little respect, please! 
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May 15, 2008 7:40 PM
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It is obvious Fox mandated a directional change in the show because the post strike episode were so/so when the pre strike episodes were prety good...w/less Gracie. Fox decided they wanted a family show of some sort within the constranst of the original show. A show that was just the next generation Murphey Brown wasn't bad but truely Fox only had 1 spot on their schedule that become spuratic once AI returns. I don't undersand why Fox didn't break up their animation line up and keep The Simpson and King Of the Hill on Sun w/ War at Home/ Till Death/ and Back to You.
Family Guy/ American Dad and AI results show would of done well together.
Fox must of gained some underhanded piece of Til Deaths syndiction back-end either that or it is extreemly cheap for them because Back to You outperformed Til Death all season plus Back to You was produced by Fox. Til Death's only assetis that after it's mandated post strike changes(focuss on new character Kenny) the show is much stronger for it.
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May 15, 2008 10:54 PM
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I could not believe it when I heard that Fox once again decided to cancel yet another good show like Back to You. Remember what they did to Family Guy. I do hope that another network picks Back to You up. Hint, hint CBS…
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May 16, 2008 5:33 PM
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That stinks... Anything with Kelsey Grammer in it is going to be good. Although I don't think his character in this show was quite as animated as his Frasier character was, he is still an awesome comedy actor. I'm bummed that they canceled this show...
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May 18, 2008 6:58 PM
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not happy about the cancellation of back to you, hopefully another network is smart enough to pick it up, fox obviously not smart enough to know a good thing when it has it, or is it all about money and not quality.
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Jun 2, 2008 10:10 PM
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When has it EVER been about quality over money? It was about money DECADES before the Fox network came along? How naive are you???
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Jun 3, 2008 12:02 AM
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