With the television content bubble showing no signs of imminent recession, cancelled shows are in a bit of a pickle. While networks are able to make lower linear ratings work thanks to vertical integration and product placement, thereby extending the life spans of projects that wouldn’t have made it even a few years earlier, there’s not a whole lot of room for shows to be resurrected on another platform. In recent years, the only instances of cancelled broadcast shows network hopping involve platforms looking to make a splash in the world of original content (e.g. TBS and Cougar Town, Hulu and The Mindy Project, Yahoo Screen and Community), thereby announcing themselves as a content-friendly place for creators to bring their next projects. Instead, networks have been focusing on bringing back established properties due to name recognition (enhanced by the age of digital streaming) and the subsequent easier marketing, a practice that leaves promising shows that finish just outside the bubble without a safety net of which to speak.
One such bubble show that doesn’t deserve to fall victim to such conditions is Telenovela, NBC’s workplace comedy that takes place behind the scenes at Las Leyes de Pasion, a fictional telenovela. Starring Eva Longoria (Desperate Housewives) as Ana Sofia Calderon, a popular soap actress forced to work with her ex-husband Xavi (Jencarlos Canela) following a messy breakup, and centering on the soap’s supporting cast and crew, Telenovela wasn’t put in a great situation by NBC, as the show was given an unproven lead-in in fellow new comedy Superstore and the two were left by themselves to compete against The Bachelor, Love & Hip Hop, the College Football Playoff Championship, The X-Files, and the Grammys, among other heavy hitters. Despite generating some buzz, along with solid reviews and okay retention, the show fell victim to NBC’s continued struggle with its comedy brand and unfortunately wasn’t picked up for a second season. However, Telenovela showed enough potential, and has enough upside, that this should not be the end for the show.
One of the most difficult things about transitioning a show across networks is the issue of ownership, which has become more important in the past couple of seasons. In lieu of sinking linear ratings, networks want to own their shows so they can license them both domestically and internationally, meaning that money from syndication and streaming deals will go back to them vs. going to another company. It also means there’s more incentive to keep 
shows they own in production, as the more episodes a show has, the better it looks to foreign markets and streaming platforms. As NBC Universal produces Telenovela, it makes finding a new host for the show easier, given that NBC Universal is a corporate sister to networks like Bravo, the ideal place for the show to end up for a second season. Universal will want to do the financial gymnastics necessary to make the show feasible for future seasons, given that it has an international-friendly cast and that the premise has a high level of familiarity in Central and South America, and said gymnastics will be much easier to complete working with a network under the same umbrella. Since traditional syndication is heavily skewed toward multi-camera comedies and Telenovela has only completed 11 episodes to date, the show would have to rely on its international ceiling in order to entice Bravo, but it has such an usually high international ceiling that an okay domestic performance might not be that much to overcome.
Particularly since Telenovela actually makes for a good fit with both Bravo’s unscripted and scripted properties. With the former, the show shares a sense of glamour (e.g. the beautiful setting, the expensive wardrobe), a glimpse into the world of show business, and a silly, over the top sensibility that pushes through into self-awareness. With the latter, the show shares a similar premise, that of a 40-something lead trying to balance rocky personal and professional lives, all filtered through a distinct sense of humor. Therefore, a pickup for Telenovela would only enhance and deepen the Bravo brand by providing diversity of tone (i.e. its satirical silliness a nice contrast to Girlfriends’ Guide to Divorce‘s romantic cynicism and Odd Mom Out‘s class-based musings), of place (Bravo’s scripted shows are set in Los Angeles and New York, making Telenovela‘s Miami setting stand out that much more, particularly since no unscripted show takes place there), and of race, in addition to providing the network with a huge star in Longoria. Bravo has done a fine job of establishing a scripted brand through Divorce, Out, and upcoming dark comedy My So Called Wife, but they can only be further legitimized if they could court Longoria; if someone with her media profile and history with television was on the network’s roster, it would make it easier for Bravo to go after bigger names for their burgeoning scripted portfolio. A pickup for Telenovela would say a lot about Bravo as a network, raising the already increasing clout it has among the creative community in addition to benefiting NBC Universal’s pocketbook.
And it’s not as if Telenovela was a real failure for NBC. Stripping out the two Voice-infused episodes and an out-of-timeslot airing of an episode released online weeks prior, the show averaged a 1.05 in the 18-49 demo, putting it ahead of Crowded (0.89) and renewed The Carmichael Show (0.92) once those shows had their own Voice-infused episodes taken out of their seasonal averages. All this comes despite Telenovela airing without a Little Big Shots-sized lead-in and on a night with increased competition, making its performance more impressive. As Girlfriends’ Guide to Divorce and Odd Mom Out finished around a 0.30 in the demo for their most recent season finales, Telenovela could lose around 70% of its audience while still being in renewal territory and while some decline is only natural given the change in network coverage, said declines would be softened by better scheduling from Bravo, as well as lessened expectations, the show’s longer tail, and the network having only a handful of scripted shows to look after. Plus, there’s the matter of Telenovela targeting a similar upscale audience to Girlfriends’ Guide to Divorce and Odd Mom Out, as the show’s February finale indexed at a 114 among adults 18-49 living in homes with $100K+ incomes, outdrawing the finale of Superstore (112). Whereas Girlfriends’ Guide rates #1 among upscale viewers and Odd Mom Out finished its first season as 2015’s most upscale new scripted comedy, Telenovela also overindexes with Latino viewers, meaning that while the trio go after a similar income demographic, Telenovela would be able to bring audience that Bravo isn’t currently getting, thereby making it a valuable asset.
In 2013, ABC unexpectedly rejected Devious Maids, the Desperate Housewives followup from creator Marc Cherry and co-executive produced by Eva Longoria, only for sister network Lifetime to pick it up and turn it into their scripted centerpiece. While Telenovela might not play that role should it be picked up by Bravo, it could still greatly contribute to the network’s scripted depth, the standing of the network in the creative community, and the bottomline for producer NBC Universal. It’s a show about a niche subject (telenovelas) set within broad parameters (workplace comedy), something that won’t have problems producing episodes given its structure and something that can bring in an audience that would be valuable to Bravo. Even though the show couldn’t gain traction while on NBC, it’s still a property worth extending because of how much upside it has and how favorable the numbers are toward some type of revival. Low-rated broadcast shows might have difficulty getting picked up by cable networks and streaming platforms once cancelled, but Telenovela is a special case that Bravo should take advantage of, a show that with a little nurturing, could turn into something worthwhile.
The first season of Telenovela concluded on Monday, February 22nd on NBC. You can catch up on the show through NBC.com, Hulu, Video On Demand, and the NBC app.
