Rosie Leaves, and So Do 'view'-ers
There's a lot of Rosie O'Donnell news this morning.
First, I can tell you that she met with the producers of CBS's "The Price Is Right" on Thursday, but wound up passing on their offer to host the show.
I'm told the they made her a substantial offer, but that the location of the show ? Los Angeles ? was the deal-breaker. Just as I predicted, Rosie will not move from New York. She's set here, and in Miami. So that's it. No amount of money can change it.
But "The Price Is Right," like other TV people interested in Rosie, should know this: Since O'Donnell left "The View" on May 25, the ABC talk-fest has lost over 400,000 viewers.
Yes, I know: the New York Times said last week that the numbers were up from a year ago, and that without Rosie the show was still popular.
Not exactly. According to figures obtained from Nielsen/Soundscan by our research department, "The View" sank like a stone during the first two weeks of June, right after Rosie left.
Indeed, "The View" suffered a 13 percent decline in household ratings, and a 9 percent decline in overall ratings during the combined weeks of June 4 and 11 compared with Rosie's last two weeks.
Here are some stats: The week of May 21, Rosie's last week (even though no one knew it), the show had an average of 3.8 million viewers a day. But the week of June 11, the ratings were down to 3.35 million viewers a day.
It's that simple: People are either watching or they are not. And a lot fewer of them are tuning in since O'Donnell split for greener pastures.
Now the question is: Who will make the price and the situation right for Rosie to return to TV? It's obvious she has an enormous following and remains incredibly popular among morning TV viewers.
The word is that some kind of package that would put her on daytime, where she's friendly, and nighttime, where she can be "herself," is the apparent answer to getting O'Donnell to sign on the dotted line.
And, it all must take place in New York.
Meanwhile, when numbers come in this week for last week's final ratings of the season for "The View" is when ABC execs will be crawling out on a ledge.
Losing O'Donnell was an unmitigated disaster for them. ABC Daytime would appear to be in disarray. They can't even manage to execute the return of Genie Francis to "General Hospital" after she won an Emmy last week.
It's not looking good over there. Maybe it's time for a management change.
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