KEY POINTS:
TVNZ has ditched its planned weekday drama series The Point after spending $600,000 of Government funds developing scripts.
The soap opera - dubbed the next Shortland Street - was to be set in a harbourside suburb "where brand-new mansions mix with ordinary weatherboard homes". It was due to launch week nights on TV One at 5.30pm this year as the lead-in to the channel's under-pressure flagship One News.
Despite industry criticism of $8.5 million of New Zealand on Air money - plus $3.5 million of direct Government funding - being ploughed into a single project, the budget was not big enough.
TVNZ head of television Jeff Latch and NZ On Air chief executive Jane Wrightson said in a joint statement yesterday that the organisations believed the series was not feasible financially.
Mr Latch said about $600,000 of the Government funding was spent developing scripts, which might be adapted for a future programme. The remaining $2.9 million would be diverted into other drama and comedy initiatives.
The NZ On Air funds would be available for reallocation.
Competitor CanWest MediaWorks chief executive Brent Impey had criticised the Government decision to fund the show for three years as frustrating and inconsistent. He said cancelling it was the right move.
"It was taxpayers' money going into an off-peak show against a genre that was already on," said Mr Impey. "I think that sense has finally prevailed."
TV One has scheduled several shows in the 5.30pm slot during past years, including local entertainment programme Headliners and US talk show Ellen.
At present Australian soap opera Neighbours screens, seen by some as a move to build a following for The Point. Since moving to TV One last month, Neighbours attracted a 9.7 per cent share of the channel's target audience of 25- to 54-year-old viewers.
TV3's Australian soap Home and Away pulled a 41.2 per cent share on average in that period, according to AGB Nielsen Media Research data.
During the same time last year, TV One attracted a 23.7 per cent share of the age-group viewers in the timeslot with A Place in Spain.
TVNZ staff were unhappy about Neighbours' performance, with one asking chief executive Rick Ellis in an internal email: "Are we trying to kill One News altogether? ... How long will we stay with this bizarre programming decision before we pull the plug on it?"
Martin Gillman, chief executive of media planning and buying agency Total Media, said the decision not to go ahead with The Point was not unexpected.
He said the show would cost a lot to produce relative to its potential income from advertising.
Mr Gillman said the slot had around a third of the potential income of that occupied by Shortland Street.
Screen Production and Development Association chief executive Penelope Borland said the organisation had always been sceptical about the project.
