TCA-Balls to the Wall at Comedy

Comedy Central's the first network to have an entire panel for broadband shows. They've got these schmo creators of new MotherLoad show Baxter & McGuire, a "buddy comedy" about a pair of testicles. The one just said they would have "had to bring the concept that it's balls in real late" if they were pitching network TV.

The critics are indulging them with questions, most about the concept of TV about testicles. But someone just asked the executives about where they think broadband is going. Lauren Corrao, Comedy's Executive Vice President of Original Programming and Development said: "What cable was to broadcast television 15 years ago, broadband is to television now, it’s just another platform for content."

Another critic asked what the economic model was. "It’s shorter form, more rudimentary production values. I would synopsize it as lower-risk, high reward," said Lou Wallach, Senior VP, original programming and development. "Two minutes are not expensive, but it gives us the opportunity to get viewers in the short term in this emerging kind of platform."

He also said the lower cost of broadband videos "play into that kind of viral, user-generated kind of quality and feel of the form itself."

Someone asked whether these shows could branch onto the traditional platforms. Wallach said "the goal in developing these things are for the digital platforms. Again, I think there’s not a world where the kind of fences between these platforms are so rigid that if something were to evolve and it make sense organically – that’s the threshold – I think we’d certainly be open to it."

By Anne Becker