Sizzling 'CSI' Reruns

Echoing their primetime network performance, procedural dramas are burning up the off-net drama ratings charts.

In its first year in syndication, CBS's CSI: New York is mimicking the success of its forebears, CSI and CSI: Miami, and leading the pack in off-net weekly hours. In the week ending Oct. 19, CSI: New York scored a 3.2 live-plus-same-day average household rating, according to Nielsen Media Research, beating NBC Universal's sophomore Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, which is also a steady performer both in primetime and in syndication. During the same week, Law & Order: SVU averaged a 2.7.

CSI: New York's syndicated success is mimicked in primetime, where the show is up 13% in viewers and 5% among adults 18-49 on Wednesdays at 10 p.m.

Tied for third place are CSI: Miami, the top off-net weekly hour for the past two years, and NBC Universal's rookie House, each coming in at a 2.2. CSI: Miami declined this year after CBS Television Distribution elected to push the show back an hour—most stations run off-net dramas on weekends in late fringe—in order to give CSI: New York a fair shake.

CSI and CSI: Miami began their syndicated lives as once-a-week runs on cable networks Spike and A&E, which paid $1.9 million and $1 million-plus per episode for each show, respectively. After those two years were up, both shows were supposed to go back to airing on cable only, but CTD convinced A&E to change that deal.


This year, however, CBS Television Distribution renegotiated CSI: Miami’s deal with A&E, allowing both CSI: New York and CSI: Miami to air in weekend broadcast syndication while being stripped on the cable networks, says CTD President John Nogawski. “[Renegotiating that deal] has turned out to be really fantastic for us,” he says.

NBCU has also been able to turn its popular procedurals into revenue-raisers on multiple platforms. Next year, Law & Order: SVU will follow in the footsteps of Law & Order: Criminal Intent, and premiere as an afternoon strip on broadcast stations. The show is already cleared in 93% of the country, says Sean O'Boyle, NBC Universal Domestic Television Distribution's executive VP and general sales manager. Whether Law & Order: CI will return as a strip next fall remains undecided, O'Boyle says.

While other syndication chiefs acknowledge that stripping off-net procedurals is a good idea, it's not always financially feasible. Because NBCU produces both Law & Order shows and also owns USA Network, on which both shows air, NBCU was able to negotiate a cost-sharing arrangement that allows it to offer both shows to TV stations as strips.

“When you buy an off-net program, you are buying the audience that is built in on primetime,” O'Boyle says. “The key to these dramas is the fact that they are procedural. A case or a medical mystery gets resolved in every one.”

House, the sixth-highest-rated program in primetime among adults 18-49, isn't a typical crime procedural like CSI or Law & Order, but its medical mysteries allow viewers to get some resolution while enjoying Hugh Laurie's depiction of a gruff but brilliant diagnostician and the show's dark sense of humor. “Other than Two and a Half Men, House had the best repeat retention of any show on primetime this past summer,” O'Boyle says.

Even Twentieth's Boston Legal and NBCU's Monk, holding their own in a fourth-place tie at 1.9, are procedurals in their way. Boston Legal completes a case or two each week, while Monk goes through his quirky paces to get his man.

Meanwhile, Disney-ABC's rookie serials Desperate Housewives and Lost premiered a bit lower, with Housewives holding at 1.5 and Lost steady at 1.1.

Paige Albiniak

Contributing editor Paige Albiniak has been covering the business of television for more than 25 years. She is a longtime contributor to Next TV, Broadcasting + Cable and Multichannel News. She concurrently serves as editorial director for The Global Entertainment Marketing Academy of Arts & Sciences (G.E.M.A.). She has written for such publications as TVNewsCheck, The New York Post, Variety, CBS Watch and more. Albiniak was B+C’s Los Angeles bureau chief from September 2002 to 2004, and an associate editor covering Congress and lobbying for the magazine in Washington, D.C., from January 1997 - September 2002.