Nine pins hopes on Top Gear, The Voice, Hamish & Andy and Underbelly for bounceback
The Nine Network has this afternoon made a series of programming announcements as it attempts to get its disastrous ratings year back on track.
The network has announced that Hamish & Andy’s Gap Year will air on Thursday nights at 8.30pm from July 28. The show will feature the US adventures of radio duo Hamish Blake and Andy Lee.
Nine also revealed more details of its reality talent content The Voice, a co-production with Shine and Talpa Productions – which it said would be going to air “in coming months”.
According to the announcement:
“The Voice is a vocal competition and will feature the same innovative format as its US counterpart – three stages of competition with a blind audition, battle rounds and finally the live shows, revealing Australia’s very best undiscovered artists, coached by four superstars.
“During the blind auditions, if a coach is impressed, he/she pushes a button to select the artist for his/her team of competitors. At this point, the coach’s chair will swivel so that he/she can face the artist he/she has selected. If more than one coach selects the artist, the power shifts to the artist who may choose which coach he/she wants to work with throughout the competition. An artist is eliminated when he/she is not chosen by one of our coaches who are superstar music talents themselves.”
And new episodes of Top Gear will also return to the schedule with series 17 being aired from Tuesday July 19 at 8.30pm. The network saw a dramatic decline in audience for the previous series as viewers became disillusioned with a mixture of repeats and new episodes and what they saw as a high ad ratio.
The network is also beginning to promote the next instalment of Underbelly – Razor.
So far this year, Seven has opened up a clear lead in the ratings which Nine will now find almost impossible to close.
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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If the voice works, I’ll start eating alfalfa and brussell sprouts for breakfast
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Disbelief – you better trade in your cereal, because the US version averaged 12 million viewers per epsiode, and roughly 19 other countries have taken this format on too…..
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I would not want to sit next to “Disbelief” in a confined office if this show’s a success then.
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Nick, interesting stats and food for thought. I wasn’t aware it was tracking that well, but I still believe that this market has had enough singing shows with judges bla bla bla…I’m also over many programs being purchased simply because they do well in other territories and becomes a fad. I won’t bore readers here with my own incomplete list of how many ‘huge formats’ have failed here, but I will remain suspect of The Voice’s chances
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I always considered the nine network the most un creative of the Australian free to air networks. Sure nine was the one for decades under Kerry’s rule but that was due to its sports & current affairs. Not so important now & it just can’t succeed. Apart from that, its too blokey & that just doesn’t cut it any more
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