Why is “American Idol” Better than “Dancing with the Stars”?

I have never seen a single episode of “Dancing with the Stars”, while I have been a faithful viewer of “American Idol” for years, so I’m certainly not qualified to discuss which is the better show. But a fascinating article in today’s New York Times business section explained why, even though DWTS was crowing last week about having more viewers (23 million!) than American Idol (21.8 million), advertisers still have to pay three times as much ($642,000) for a 30- second commercial on “Idol” compared to $209,000 for a commercial on “DWTS”

Why? Because “Dancing” appeals to women viewers over 50 years old (that’s us crones) and “Idol” appeals to young women.

According to the NYTimes, “When a show has a disproportionate number of women over 50 in its audience, it simply cannot charge as much for commercials. That is not because advertisers do not like older women, but because they are so easy to find all over the rest of television.”

One media seller noted that “it might seem odd that advertisers tend to devalue the audience that has the most money—that is older viewers, but the scarcity argument tends to rule: advertisers pay more to reach people who do not watch much television. Thus the most prized viewers of all watch the least amount of television: men under 35. The younger women who watch ‘Idol’ are also highly valuable to certain advertisers”…like sellers of soft drinks, beer and gadgets like computers and phones.

Right now I can hear my friends saying, “Why on earth would a person like yourself, a pseudo-intellectual with a master’s degree in journalism, BA in English literature, Phi Beta Kappa key, watch a show like “American Idol”? And why don’t you watch “Dancing with the Stars”?

It’s hard to explain, but I try to find some TV show every night for one or two hours from eight to ten that I can watch while pedaling my stationary bike for exercise – a show that will distract me from how much I hate exercising and it won’t matter if I miss some of the dialogue due to the noise of the bike. So “Idol” fits the bill, and so do re-runs of “Bones”, “House” and “Medium”. (I can’t make myself watch “ER” any more.)

Aside from the nightly hours on the bike, I don’t watch TV unless I turn it on for “The Good Wife”, “Medium” “Big Love”, “Madmen” or “Glee” (my current fave—can’t wait for next week when it starts again.) I used to watch “Lost” but became hopelessly out of the loop long ago.

I have no desire to watch “Dancing with the Stars” because it seems to me that it features has-been celebrities and people who are famous just for being famous –like Kate Gosselin—doing something they’re not very good at.

“Idol” on the other hand, features real people (most of them) with real background stories who are hoping to relive the Cinderella fairy tale and catch the brass ring. (Okay, I don’t like the way they hype the sob stories in the contestants’ past or the way, in the auditions, they exploit troubled, often mentally fragile bad singers. But I think they’re soft-pedaling that because so many felt the way I do. Uncomfortable.)

I also like the way the producers of “Idol” pretend that the contestants , backstage, are all a multi-colored, loving family supporting each other. I believe that other reality shows, in contrast, encourage in-fighting and bad behavior to drive up viewer numbers. And those “reality” shows only are encouraging rudeness, confrontation and horrible behavior in all the impressionable young people (and old people) who watch things like “Jersey Shore” (not that I’ve ever seen that one either.)

I believe I read somewhere that the Obamas watch “American Idol” with their girls – it’s a good family show – but that conflicts with what I read somewhere else – that the Obamas don’t let the girls watch ANY television on weekdays.

My own kids—all three in their thirties, run for the door when I try to bring up my favorites on American Idol. Over Easter weekend one daughter said, while begging me to drop the subject, “They say Idol is for everyone from nine to ninety, but I think the only people who watch it are either nine or ninety.”

So who are you rooting for – Crystal Bowersox? Siobhan is my favorite at the moment, and I’m predicting that Andrew Garcia gets sent home tonight. But I never guess that right. My husband always does, and he’s predicting Garcia too.

The Blog is Back! Sunday in the Park with Joan

(if you click on the photos they get bigger)

I haven’t written an entry since the weekend of "Brides and Pirates in New Orleans" and that was about six weeks ago! But I haven’t given up on the travels of A Rolling Crone.I had several writing deadlines and a hurricane of activity getting ready for our family trip to Greece but the deadlines were met (pretty much) and now I’m in Athens with Eleni and Marina waiting for Nick to arrive. Then we’re off to Mykonos for a wedding but I’ll tell you about that then.

Right now I want to celebrate Central Park the way it looked about four weeks ago. Everyone in Manhattan, young or old, flocked into the Park to savor the briefest but most glorious season in New York as Spring burst into bloom. There were horseback riders and bikers, brides and painters, boaters and picnickers, bands and singers and comedians and lots of pets. Nearly every year I visit the Park to photograph this evanescent miracle. This time I started off from daughter Eleni’s apartment on 80th and Third, stopped by Eli’s for an old-fashioned sugar cone, admired the flowers outside the brownstones. (One of them –double size—was just bought Madonna for a reported 40 million dollars.)

Into the Park by the Metropolitan Museum with background music by African steel drums. Children and their parents climbed over the Alice in Wonderland Statue (I used to take my kids to story hours there) and the statue of Hans Christian Anderson (I think that’s who he is—hence the goose?) On to the toy boat lake where you rent a remote-controlled sailboat. I headed toward the big lake and the Boat House Restaurant. (We had such fun there at a recent lunch watching Eleni’s godson Demosthenakis feeding everything he could get his hands on to the GIANT gold fish and turtles who live in the lake.)

Outside the Boathouse were a bride and groom posing under a blossoming cherry tree, and sunbathers and artists galore on the banks of the lake as rowboats sailed past. On to my favorite spot—Bethesda Fountain, watched over by the Angel of the Waters. (Those are healing waters-- you may remember the important role of the Angel in the TV version of "Angels in America".)

For forty-five years Central Park has been part of my life. Back when I was single, I was at a press party at Tavern on the Green when the first great New York Blackout hit. As we sat by candlelight, Nick, who lived nearby, came to rescue me. (That was the good black-out when everyone behaved valiantly. The second blackout—the bad one, when there was looting—was in July 1977 when I was married to Nick and in New York Hospital with a new-born Marina. The only lights visible in the city were in the hospitals, with their own generators.)

My kids grew up with the Carousel and the pony rides and the Children’s Zoo—I was there with other mourners when they closed the Zoo for its makeover.

Just last summer I stood in line for hours one summer morning at the DellaCorte Theater to score FREE tickets to a wonderful outdoor performance of the rock musical Hair—forty years after I saw it for the first time. The revival was magical. Now it’s on Broadway. And definitely not free!

They call Central Park the lungs of the city but to me it’s always been its heart.

In two days—photos and a celebration of Athens.