Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
©Associated Press
© St. Petersburg Times, published September 26, 2000
LOS ANGELES -- Besieged by protests from gay activists, advertiser boycotts and low ratings, radio talk queen Dr. Laura Schlessinger's new television show has stopped production for nearly a week.
A spokeswoman for Dr. Laura said the break was part of a pre-planned hiatus that was moved up, allowing the show to add a producer and revamp its format. New episodes will air every weekday.
"The show is not going off," said publicist Daniella Cracknell, shrugging off a retooling that comes less than two weeks after the program's premiere. "We're just preparing for (November ratings) sweeps."
"The show came off as trying to be too vanilla . . . the producers were playing it too safe," said Chris Raynor, spokeswoman for area ABC affiliate WFTS-Ch. 28, where Dr. Laura airs weekdays at 4 p.m. "It's not had the (viewership) we thought it would."
Schlessinger, 53, first gained fame through a radio call-in show where she aggressively confronts callers about their problems and moral shortcomings, lecturing and occasionally hanging up on those who incur her wrath. But her TV show has largely remained absent of such conflict.
The difference may have disappointed viewers. Nationally, Dr. Laura averaged roughly 3-million viewers the week of its Sept. 11 debut, though ratings dropped 11 percent in the second week, said Marc Berman, an analyst for Mediaweek.com.
Locally, Dr. Laura drew significant viewership in its first two days, but quickly dropped to a 1.7 rating over it's first nine days on air, Raynor said. Critics have suggested her TV show's suppressed tone was a response to gay activists who roundly criticized her past comments on the radio show regarding homosexuality, which she has termed "deviant" and "a biological error."
Advocates say they have persuaded more than 26 sponsors to halt advertising on the TV show. Procter & Gamble, one of the nation's largest advertisers, pulled ads from Schlessinger's radio program in May and dropped plans to advertise on the television show.
-- Times TV Critic Eric Deggans contributed to this report.