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With Earlier Leno, Whither TV Drama?

Earlier this week, NBC announced that it was not yet ready to cut ties with late-night host Jay Leno.

Instead, the network is moving him to a 10 p.m. slot.

Although that's good news for Leno, it's bad news for scripted TV series, which have been squeezed in recent years by cheaper — and easier to produce — reality programming.

Anthony E. Zuiker, co-creator of the CSI franchise, says he was "rather shocked" when he heard about the Leno news.

"It does gobble up five, arguably, hours of potential [scripted] programs," he says.

Zuiker says such events tend to "have a trickle-down effect" on the other networks.

"For every time slot that goes away, it's one less scripted program," he says. He calls scripted programming "white-hot."

"I literally can count on fingers and toes 20 great scripted programming shows from network television to cable," he says. "This is the golden era."

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

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