What rates, what doesn’t

(Second of two parts)

The other day, I enumerated some of the topics that don’t necessarily help showbiz talk shows in the ratings game: Drug-related issues, religion, lawyers advertising themselves on TV and outright cheapness. This time, I’m giving you a list of subjects that deliver viewers to entertainment talk shows. Again, this is not based on a formal research and study, but simply a personal observation after monitoring and actually participating in a TV work all these years.

Pregnancies and births — In my Tuesday column, I wrote about how catfights help bring in the ratings, except that it depends on the people fighting. It’s the same with pregnancies. Viewers of talk shows are only interested if the would-be mom is a major (or popular enough) celebrity and not some no-name member of this and that sexy group. Now, if it’s a member of the Sexbomb or EB Babe, that’s a different story because these girls are known to regular TV audiences and get daily exposure on Eat, Bulaga!. If it’s an actress of note — that’s even better. Sadly, the interest in the subject doubles or even triples if the celebrity is unwed since that’s more scandalous. Oh well, that’s television for you.

However, I am happy to note that a recent interview I did with the two-month pregnant Danica Sotto on Startalk still did well in the ratings even if she and husband Marc Pingris went through the conventional route of going through the courtship stage, having a formal engagement and getting married properly in church first before having their first baby (due in July of next year). This only proves that viewers don’t necessarily just look for dirt. Hurray, there’s still room for decency in the world of TV!

Deaths — This may be morbid and I may sound jaded, but deaths of celebrities are followed with extreme interest by viewers, especially if the personality is young and at the peak of his or her career. When I was still with Showbiz Lingo, we found it uncanny that movie stars were dying either on a Saturday night or Sunday morning — just right in time for the show’s Sunday afternoon telecast. There was even a period when there was a celebrity dying every weekend and the ratings of Showbiz Lingo really did soar.

Please don’t think that I’m already so callous to news of deaths and that this is so insensitive of me to even bring this up, but this is how it is in media and I apologize if I have offended anyone’s sensibilities.

Reunions — As they say in showbiz: There are no permanent friends, no permanent enemies — only TV shows that try to reunite friends-turned-foes for the sake of ratings.

But most dramatic are scenes featuring celebrities reunited with family, especially if it is about a young star who was given for adoption as a baby and is reunited  with the biological parents. Segments like these, however, require a lot of hard work and research on the part of the staff and you still don’t have your story until you follow up every detail and make sure that every character involved is already in the studio (there is always a reluctance on the part  of every participant).

To this day, I don’t think anything can top the Startalk reunion of Rosanna Roces with her biological mother and siblings. That was real family drama unfolding on the screen that brought tears to the eyes of every viewer.

Sex videos — Sex sells — anywhere — including on television. Public affairs programs know that too well.

A couple of years ago, when every cell phone carried a camera with it, sex videos were being passed around through the wonders of modern technology. Oh, TV had its field day — especially when there was a new sex video involving celebrities that was coming out practically every month.

But have you noticed how it has stopped? I can imagine that sex videos are still being passed around — with the latest misdemeanor of local celebrities. However, only a few of these get to TV (the ones that you cannot ignore anymore, especially those involving major celebrities) and if ever they do, these have been sanitized. The way I understand it, advertisers frown on sex videos being featured on TV and even the networks discourage it. Even Mahal and Madame Auring have been pretty scarce on TV lately.  Apparently, there is still hope to clean up TV and finally restore decency.