TV Roundup

Because we get a large number of foreign shows on TV in South Africa, we are at an advantage because we can find out if what we are currently watching was a success or failure overseas.

• Good news for SABC 3 viewers is that the boring sitcom "Lost at Home", currently showing on Wednesdays at 21:00 only lasted four episodes in the United States. Once again American TV executives have saved us from being subjected to months of absolute rubbish that sometimes gets put on our screens.


• "Undeclared", M-Net's lame college comedy aired at 18:30 on Wednesdays also lasted only one season.


• "Keen Eddie" about a New York cop working in London doesn't seem to have gone beyond one season either


• "The Kumars at No 42", the hilarious British chat show on SABC 3 at 21:30 on Wednesdays is still going strong

Speaking of "The Kumars at No 42", the show has a local connection in Vincent Ebrahim, who plays Ashwin Kumar, the longwinded, and money-obsessed father in that show. He was born in South Africa.

If you are interested in how American networks decide to kill off underperforming shows in a process called sweeps see this article, which also lists some other shows which may be facing the axe in the USA.

As this article points out, "sweeps" ensure that unpopular and lame shows get booted out. If only South African-made TV programmes faced the pressure of "sweeps"...