Johnson’s Stumbles Here… The Changing Face of TV’s “Viewer Participation Programming Boom

FNS 27 Hours Television: Japan’s Most Fun School Festival! (Fuji Television Network, Inc.), which ended on a high note.

The COVID-19 crisis has prevented large-scale location shooting for a long time, and this is seen as a reaction to that. Another major factor is that private high schools, which have become difficult to manage due to the declining birthrate and high prices, have become more cooperative in filming. School productions are a key factor in increasing core viewership ratings (among men and women aged 13-49), which is a priority for TV stations, so they are putting a lot of effort into it,” said a producer at a key station.

Perhaps in response to the success of the “School Hide and Seek” project on “New Key” (Fuji), “Ohasuta” (TV Tokyo), which was renewed this spring, has launched “Nazoto Kingdom,” a project by Ryogo Matsumaru (28), a mystery solving creator, that takes place in an elementary school.

Chubu-Nippon Broadcasting Co., Ltd. has been airing “New Genius Quiz,” a viewer-participation special program every year, which is a power-up of the long-running program “Genius Quiz” that was broadcast from 1967 to 2004.

The greatest attraction of this program is the happenings that the viewers, who are not accustomed to television, cause. When the solvers are celebrities, we can usually guess their answers and the contents of their talks. There are many viewers who say, “I don’t like the informal atmosphere of celebrities.

Of course, there are disadvantages to using amateur viewers. One of the disadvantages is that “you can’t do a bad job of directing because it will be exposed on social networking sites.

For example, if someone says, “I didn’t intend to say what I said,” it will cause a firestorm. There are cases of confusion on the spot when someone says, ‘I don’t want to be in the show after all, so I want it cut.

Just a pause

This broadcaster points out that it is also important to use staff and talent that match the “amateur participation program.

Akane-chan, the famous director of “Human Commentary Omo Umaiiten” (NTV), is so good at getting into the hearts of the store owners and their families that they cry when they are reunited with their customers. That is why his VTRs have depth. The demand for talents who can interact with amateurs without putting up walls, such as “Hanako,” whose stock rose in the recent “27 Hours TV” episode, and “Robert” Akiyama Ryuji (46) of “Akiyama Location Map” (TV TOKYO), who interacts with people in the city, is increasing.

On the other hand, “Johnson” (TBS) is said to be “one of the reasons for the failure of the project in which amateurs participated.

The “Mt. Fuji battle! 500-man tug-of-war” broadcast in April was a fairly large-scale project. However, the drama that would take two hours to air did not happen, and it just seemed to drag on and on. The performers in “Johnson,” including “Kamaitachi” and “New York,” are good at edgy laughs, but they are not the type to stand by amateurs. I think that is the reason why they did not get into it. On the other hand, SHIMOFURI MYOJO’s Goshina (31), who is known for his tongue, does not assert himself too much when he is involved with amateurs, but instead complements his co-stars. He uses different characters depending on the project. I feel he has a high level of skill,” said a director of a production company.

With the advent of the boom in viewer-participation programs, the cast and crew of terrestrial TV may be transformed.

From the September 6-13, 2024 issue of “FRIDAY