Fox’s Glee is a hit, again.

Tuesday night’s return of the singing and dancing series scored its best ratings ever, pulling in 13.7 million viewers, which is a vast improvement over its series premiere numbers last year (9.6 million).

News of a ratings smash should come as no surprise to the millions of dedicated fans, otherwise known as “gleeks.” Social networks are constantly abuzz about the Fox series and watch parties are popping up all over the country.

Perhaps the most obvious fan base is the Broadway community — last year the New York Times mentioned that the teenage cast of Bye Bye Birdie gathered after their show was over to watchGlee. Similar gatherings are still taking place, including amongst college students, as happened last night at an outdoor screening of the show on Columbia University’s main campus.

Who knew that a show that followed a dysfunctional high school glee club, complete with stereotypical characters straight out of a John Hughes script, would turn into a major phenomenon, one that spawned CDs, a national concert tour and a performance at the White House? Certainly not the show’s co-creators, Brad Falchuck and Ian Brennan.

“I thought that it would kind of be like a niche hit that was good and people liked,” Brennan said. “But, somehow it just struck a chord with people, and that is a real, real pleasant surprise.”
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There was a time when Broadway melodies would play on radio stations across the country, a time when showtunes were part of a crooner’s nightly set list at the club. Those were the days of musical heavyweights like Oscar Hammerstein II, George Gershwin, Leonard Bernstein and Irving Berlin. When one of these musical masterminds crafted a song, chances are, people around the country wanted to hear it.

It was called the Golden Age of Broadway — a period of time between the 1940s and 1960s that is often recalled by theatrical historians and Broadway devotees. Sadly, nostalgia does not pay the bills, nor does the current exposure Broadway musicals have been getting these past few years.

While the average twenty-something isn’t dying for another Gershwin-like hit, innovative musicals have been offering up songs that could strike a chord with the iTunes and YouTube generation. If only someone in the marketing community would hurry up and figure out a way to reach these unaware future fans.

The musical ‘Next to Normal’ uses a contemporary sound to deal with themes of depression and emotional crisis — dark themes reminiscent of Emo rock. ‘In the Heights,’ another currently running show, takes soft-rap music and combines it with Latin flair, making it an easy fit for contemporary hit radio playlists. And the soon-to-open ‘American Idiot’ is, well, full of music by the already hit mainstream band Green Day.

It is the latter musical, ‘American Idiot,’ that’s making the biggest strides in Broadway marketing, thanks in major part to Green Day’s lead singer Billie Joe Armstrong and his push to get the Broadway actors on stage at this year’s Grammy Awards telecast. Musicians joining Broadway shows as producers isn’t a new concept, and this season has a few big names joining the crowd, including ‘Fela,’ which boasts an affiliation with Jay-Z. It’s time to take advantage of that relationship.

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Reality television guru, Mark Burnett, recently talked with The Hollywood Reporter’s James Hibberd about his upcoming series Shark Tank, set to premiere this Fall on ABC. Throughout the chat, Burnett touted his TV offerings as “high-quality” programming, going so far as to say his new show “belongs up there with great dramas.” Judging by Hollywood’s grand gestures – giving reality TV shows Emmy Awards and honoring Burnett with a star on the Walk of Fame – the producer has every reason to believe he is crafting “great dramas.”

Then again, those in the industry, working below-the-line, might beg to differ with the British import. In case network television executives haven’t noticed, California is flat broke. With Sacramento scrambling to fix its $26.3 billion hole in the budget, and banks refusing to accept the state’s I.O.U.s, networks should be ashamed of themselves for shunning local production, opting instead for unscripted programming, year after year.

FilmL.A., the office behind film permits for the city, reported last month that the number of prime-time TV pilots shot in Los Angeles is down nearly 42 percent. The organization estimates that pilot production spending in the L.A. region is down more than $100 million this year, compared to 2005.

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Word of early renewals came down the pipeline this week as the CW delivered golden tickets to shows including “90210,” “Smallville,” “Gossip Girl” and “America’s Next Top Model.”

Kudos to the casts and crews. But instead of thanking CW exec Dawn Ostroff, these shows should consider giving a big hug to an advertiser’s greatest nemesis — the DVR.

After “90210’s” much anticipated debut late last year, which ranked as the highest-rated premiere in the CW’s history (as short lived as that might be), the following week things became grim.

Tanked might be a more accurate description. Ratings were down 30 percent for the second episode. Ouch. While traditional ratings have continued to remain on the low side, earlier this month it saw a slight increase amongst females … and myself.

However, an interesting development occurred shortly after the “90210″ premiere, as the CW began reporting that their last hope (rumor had it that if the show flopped, so would the network) posted the biggest increase of any scripted series on television when factoring in “Live+7” ratings.

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It’s not easy being an independent in the corporate jungle. Just ask the Hallmark Channel or its parent company, Crown Media Holdings Inc. A year ago, Crown began looking for a buyer for the network it had turned into a formidable basic cable force; since its debut in 2001, Hallmark Channel had grown to reach 73 million households, consistently landing among the top 10 in the ratings with its steady offering of family-friendly original movies and off-network series.

The thinking was that an entertainment conglomerate such as the Walt Disney Co. or News Corp. would scoop up the stand-alone service to bolster an existing roster of cable networks. But while offers were made, Crown’s owners deemed them too low based on the roughly $11 per share at which the company was then trading on the NASDAQ exchange, and in April, Hallmark was taken off the block.

Now, as Los Angeles-based Hallmark Channel celebrates its fifth anniversary, management seems to be opting for Plan B: investing in new programming and cleaning up the balance sheet to make the company more attractive. While no longer officially for sale, it’s common knowledge that the current owners, which include Liberty Media International Inc. and JPMorgan Chase, would be happy to entertain serious proposals.

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