Fuji Television Faces Allegations of Clipping and Power Harassment in a New Program
“It is like the chicken that produces the golden egg. If a program is an excellent project that reflects the times, it is sure to get high ratings once it is made into a TV program. Drama and variety shows depend on planning. Many of them are brought to the programming department of each station by production companies that have talented creators.”
TV Asahi and Fuji Television were divided over this program proposal.
Every day, producers and directors from production companies stand in line with their proposals in hand at the general programming department of TV Asahi in Roppongi, Tokyo. The reason for this is that the company has announced the end of its 23-year-old Thursday 8:00 p.m. drama series, “Thursday Mystery”. After the seventh season of the drama series “Inquest,” starring Takaya Uekawa. The drama series will be replaced by a new variety show starting in October.
“The drama series “Kimisu” was the pride of TV Asahi, which had aired many masterpieces such as “Kagaku Shoken no Onna” (“The Woman in the H.Q. Police H.Q.”), “Keishicho: Chousen Ichijo” (“Chief Investigator”), and “Kyoto Lost Palace Guide”. The main reason for ending the program is to rejuvenate the viewer base. The main viewer demographics for “Kimisu” are 50-70 year olds. This is the core demographic that is well received by the sponsors. The Television Broadcasting Corporation is waiting for a proposal for an aggressive variety program that will be the centerpiece of the station. Teresa is eagerly awaiting the proposals for offensive variety programs that will be the centerpiece of the station. Production companies are also changing the color of their eyes,” said a production company executive.
Is there anything sadder than this?
Fuji is being hit hard by the concentration of good quality projects on Teresa.
“The ones that are brought to Fuji are those that are seen somewhere else, or those that are not. What we get are plans that look like something we’ve seen somewhere else or copied from YouTube. (see above).”
As a result of the lack of excellent program proposals, there has been some trouble: the “pacifier scandal” surrounding “Calling Teacher Tanaka,” which started in April and is hosted by Takushi Tanaka of Ungirls. The company’s legendary popular variety show “Mecha-Mecha Iketeru!” which ended four years ago. Takashi Okamura of Ninety Nine, who appeared on the said show, complained on his radio program “Ninety Nine’s All Night Nippon” (Nippon Broadcasting System),
“Tanaka-kun is not to blame. Tanaka-kun did nothing wrong. I wonder how the staff of Mecha-Mecha Iketeru think about making the show. I wondered if they couldn’t picture my face or Masaru Hamaguchi’s face at all. Is there anything sadder than that? I wonder how the other members feel about it.”
Hitoshi Matsumoto of “Downtown” also criticized the show in Fuji’s “Hitoshi Matsumoto no Sake no Tsumami ni Naru Hanashi” as follows.
“Joon. People know about that show. It’s a cloned program.”
An employee of another commercial key station said discreetly, “The regularity of ‘Mecha-Mecha Iketeru’ is not good enough.
“Okamura-san, Koji Kato of Gokuraku Tombo, Hamaguchi-san, and others who were regulars on Mecha-Mecha Iketeru do not have good feelings toward the show. It is not normal for a new program to be made up of excerpts from popular corner programs on their own station.”
If “Calling Teacher Tanaka” is getting high ratings, there is still hope. The show is still getting high ratings, but it’s still a relief.
“Household ratings for the first episode on April 24 was 6.2% Household viewer ratings on May 15 was 5.3%, for the first episode on May 15 was 2%, and on the 22nd, it was 4.6%. June 5th was 5.8% while June 12th was 4.5%. The ratings were also at the “call-in” level.” said a person involved in production.
The negative cycle of Fuji’s inability to gather outstanding proposals is causing further negative impact. One of the most disturbing issues is the alleged power harassment in the information program “Pop-Up! Shukan Bunshun” (June 9).
The report stated, “Mr. X, the chief producer of the program and a station employee of the company, took advantage of his superior position to bully Mr. A, an assistant producer at a production company, using LINE and other means. According to Shukan Bunshun, Mr. A attempted suicide twice. A distant cause is the low ratings of the program, which has lowered his morale. It is possible that Mr. X, feeling the pressure, was relieving his stress through power harassment.”
There was some concern about Fuji’s new program even before it started.
“It’s a negative spiral. Because we can’t get ratings, we can’t get sponsors. Because there are no sponsors, production costs are low. Because production costs are low, labor costs don’t come out. The production company is the subcontractor, and the production company is the one that gets the short end of the stick. So it is not surprising that the production companies are thinking of taking their projects to other stations,” said an employee of another station.
Fuji’s troubles are likely to continue for some time.
Photographed by： Kojiro Yamada
