Docudramas Come On Strong at TLC

Cheerleaders, Little People, Ice Skaters on Tap for 2006 Debuts

The new shows chronicle the lives of professional figure skaters, Texas cheerleaders and a family of little people. All the shows were originally conceived as full-hour programs, but due to the relative success of half-hour series such as "Tuckerville," at least one of the three is being reconfigured to fit a half-hour slot and several other half-hours are in the works.

"The half-hour format is something we've had success with on a couple [of] shows, so now we're experimenting with a new pace and freshness for an audience that craves a different, more compressed rhythm on the schedule," said TLC Executive VP and General Manager David Abraham.

To that end, the network has ordered 20 half-hour episodes of "Little People, Big Dreams" (Gay Rosenthal Productions), about a pair of little people who are parents of a mix of small and average-size children. The series debuts in March.

"It's an intelligent and interesting take on a family that are very average on one level, and on another are quite extraordinary," Mr. Abraham said.

Another new order is six hours of "Ice Diaries," a behind-the-scenes look at professional figure skaters (produced by TWI-IMG) debuting next month. The third new docudrama consists of 10 one-hour episodes of "Texas Cheerleaders" (High Noon Entertainment), and debuts early next year.

"There's still very much the learning element that will come through [with the new shows], but there's the human aspect as well," Mr. Abraham said. "We focused on having a lot of flair and style with these shows, an attractive and warm presentation."

Over the past two years TLC experienced one of the most dramatic ratings drops in recent cable history after the bottom fell out of the makeover-reality genre. With shows such as "Trading Spaces" and "While You Were Out" populating a large percentage of the network's schedule, TLC's audience fell sharply from 2003 to 2005.

Last April Mr. Abraham was brought from Discovery UK to take over programming leadership at TLC and shake up the schedule. TLC's projects in development, Mr. Abraham said, were increased from 20 to about 100. Of the first four shows he put on the air (but did not develop)-"Miami Ink," "Tuckerville," "Ballroom Bootcamp" and "The Adam Carolla Project"-"Ink" and "Tuckerville" performed above average for the network.

The network is set to renew "Ink" for a second season, with no final decision yet on "Tuckerville."

For the fourth quarter to date, TLC is still down 12 percent among total viewers compared with fourth quarter 2004 to 710,000 viewers. The network is down 13 percent among 18 to 49 to 400,000 viewers. While double-digit percentage drops are generally considered significant, this quarter's losses are not as dramatic as some recent quarters for the network.

"It's a slippery slope when you start to go down, particularly when you depend on younger viewers," said Lifetime head of research Tim Brooks. "TLC was extremely rich in young-adult upscale viewers, but they're also the viewers 'Desperate Housewives,' 'Lost' and everybody else is targeting."

Mr. Abraham said that stopping the ratings drain while simultaneously replacing 64 percent of his network's prime-time schedule with nonmakeover programming has been very tricky. Beginning with the previously announced bull riding docudrama "On the Bull" as well as "Ice Diaries," Mr. Abraham's own shows will finally start to be televised next month.

"For now, we're not going to look brilliant," he said. "But I've had six months, and looking month-to-month we're now slightly holding. What you're going to see in January is us hitting the next gear."

Living on Tucker time

TV reality show takes viewers into Delta Dawn's personal space

By KEN BECK
Staff Writer

 

Don't call it a comeback.

Cable channel TLC's promotional material for new reality show Tuckerville says Tanya Tucker is launching one. The country singer begs to differ.

I think that was a mistake, a total mistake. I don't think I need much revival. My attitude is to carry on and carry through and do what I need to do to put clothes on my kids' back and shoes on their feet. . . . I'm in the music and that's my life, and I'm always looking for that next hit song," said Tucker.

Country music's "bad girl," childhood country star and single mom lets it all hang out with the celebrity reality show that trots out the first of 26 episodes at 9 p.m. Saturday on TLC.

Viewers will get a look inside her home, which includes her 7,000-square-foot wardrobe closet, nicknamed Opryland, with enough garments, boots, hats and belts to fill a Goodwill store. Tucker also opens the door to her life as a mother of three, as a professional singer, as a businesswoman and as a cowgirl.

You might call her lifestyle harried, intense or chaotic, but the word she and family often toss out is "crazy."

"I just wanted America to know the other side of Tanya Tucker and my family, and hopefully they'll fall in love with us. They've only heard about the wild and crazy side and the business side but don't really know the personal side. Maybe they'll understand when they see what transpires and understand and know why I did some of the things I used to do,'' Tucker said.

The courtship

The pitch for Tuckerville wasn't Tucker's first reality check.

"The last couple of years has been intense,'' Tucker said. "A lot of different people, just about anybody who would come over here, would say, 'You ever thought of doing a reality show?' . . . Off and on, people would come in and want to do it, and I kept putting everybody off. Finally, we started."

Tuckerville is being produced by GRB Entertainment (Growing Up Gotti and Intervention on A&E) out of Los Angeles, which beat out a couple of other production companies bidding to do the show.

"It's the same folks behind that show with the guy from Star Trek (William Shatner and Invasion Iowa). They showed it to me, and that cracked me up. I thought it was the funniest show I'd ever seen, but I fell asleep after about 15 minutes," laughed Tucker.

The show's supervising producer, Tiff Winton, visited Tucker last November and December to get to know her.

"We shared similar backgrounds. I explained to her what kind of show it would be, and a couple of months later we had a deal," Winton said. "Tanya is really a down-to-earth person. She went with her gut and who she really trusted.

"Her personality, her lifestyle is kind of crazy and fun and unpredictable, yet she has a lot of heart. It's altogether the recipe for a great reality show. Tanya has a knack for reaching people. We don't feel like outsiders. It's very comfortable to be here with her. She's really accessible, not a diva in any way.

"Then there's the Tucker time element; she's famous for being late. She runs on her own clock. Either people wait for her or they don't. We've learned to roll with it."

The union

The production crew has been at Deer Park Ranch, Tucker's 500-acre ranch, and in her 35,000-square-foot house in Williamson County since the end of June and will continue filming until Christmas. The cameras are rolling 10-12 hours a day, three or four days a week. Of the crew of two dozen, about 14 are from Nashville.

Tucker, who knocked the socks off country music fans when she was 13 with Delta Dawn, agreed to let the big eye of the camera pry into her family life without conferring with her children: Presley, 16; Grayson, 14; and Layla, 6.

"I just made the decision. They're with me. There are times when they get tired of filming and they say, 'That's it.' . . . They can get by with it, I don't," Tucker said.

"You just don't see many good celebrity kids. They seem to be the biggest brats and have lots of problems. You see the kids, like the Gottis, ah, so disrespectful. If anything in the world, I get more compliments on my kids than I do on my talent. That's the greatest compliment in the world to me. I want to show that celebrities can raise pretty good kids."

While Tucker's house is filled with noise, music and seven dogs, not to mention all the folks in the production company, one thing that isn't there is a father. (The two older children have the same father, the youngest has a different dad.)

"I think to a point we're missing out on some things, but I think we make up for it," said Tucker, who has never married. "They see their father quite often. My daughter's dad, we still have our problems from time to time. I think it best we're not together because we argue and fight."

Tucker's temper has rarely flared up in dealing with all the filming going on around her, but she confesses there have been two or three times she has had to tell the camera person to shut it off.

"One time in Kentucky, they had the crew on the bus and one kid was crying. I went ballistic. 'Get them off this bus, all of you!' '' Tucker said.

"They wanted to stop at a flea market in Renfro Valley. We stopped, and before I could get off the bus, the bus was swarmed with people. Finally, I got into the flea market and was surrounded and couldn't enjoy myself. One of the producers said, 'Man, I knew you were popular, but not that popular.' You just don't do that in Kentucky with Tanya Tucker. . . . I sign every (darn) autograph, because that let's me go shopping, those fans.

"There were two other times I said, 'Hey, cut the camera off.' When my mother was rushed to the hospital and my daughter's birthday party. I had a special surprise for her 16th birthday and wanted to bring in the world champion barrel racer. . . . She didn't get to come and I was very upset about it. I said, 'Get those cameras out of my face!' I was so angry. It may sound like a small thing now, but it was a big thing then."

Cast of characters

Horses are a big part of Tucker's life.

"Horses are very important to me and Presley. We're horse freaks," said Tucker, who loves the sport of cutting horses, which involves training horses to cut cattle out of a herd. "I think I'm getting the horse I've been wanting for 15 years for my birthday."

The singer of 29 top-10 hits held a big birthday bash at her ranch last weekend as she notched her 47th year on Oct. 10. She invited dozens of friends, lots of them horse enthusiasts, and the big event of the fest was a rodeo at the corral a mile behind her house. At rodeo time, at 4:30 in the afternoon, the horses were saddled and rearing to go, but there were no cattle to cut.

"We can't even plan our own party," said Grayson to his mom while everybody asked anybody who looked like a cowboy, "Do you know where we can get some cattle?"

Horses are Tucker's path to peace. She has 15. To get away from music-business stress, she simply gets on horseback and rides around the ranch, though she also finds time to hit the asphalt on her pink Harley-Davidson.

"Today, I'm in a matter of settling down and loving it. I have a 500-acre ranch and it's so beautiful here. It's hard to get me off the ranch. I really enjoy my life out there. We have everything we need.''

Besides immediate family, one of the leading characters of Tuckerville will be Annie Carroll, Tucker's right-hand woman for the past 16 years.

"I am her house manager, her personal assistant. I'm her stylist. I take care of hiring staff and take care of property inside the house," said Carroll, who always wears a cowboy hat. "I love the TV show. It's been fun. It's taken a little time getting used to it. I begged not to be in it. She told me I had to be in it. They're good people. They're not your typical L.A. people."

One of Carroll's prime responsibilities is managing Tucker's wardrobe, a major task. The 7,000-square-foot third floor of the house is nicknamed Opryland. Here are rack after rack of garments, dozens of belts, lots of rhinestone belts, cowboy hats, slacks, dresses, shoes, dozens of boots.

"She's a Texas tornado. She's a nightmare waiting to happen up in the wardrobe," said Carroll of her boss and pal, also confessing that she's quit the job a few times and been fired once.

"We're on Tucker time, not Eastern Standard or Central time. It's Tucker time — when she gets ready to go. She wants to oblige everyone. She's got the biggest heart of anybody in the whole world. She's not the person that everyone says she is — a wild and crazy person. I don't know that side. The things people say about her, it's ludicrous, it's a lie. She's not on drugs, she don't drink, she's a great mother," said Carroll.

Tucker told all about her earlier, wilder days in her 1997 autobiography, Nickel Dreams, which she co-authored with her close pal of 20 years, Patsi Bale Cox. The pair teamed up again for 101 Ways To Beat the Blues, which was released recently.

"Tanya is one of the very best-hearted people I've ever known in my life. She is absolutely real, absolutely upfront and absolutely one of the good guys in the business of country music," said Cox.

"I believe that Tanya is one of the great natural song stylists in any genre that we have in this business, and that is something that a lot of people forget."

Producer Winton promises Tuckerville will be a real trip with plenty of musical guests. At this time, she can only name Trick Pony, the Warren Brothers, Erika Jo and Travis Tritt. The crew takes three road trips on the bus with Tucker, plus at least one visit to Wal-Mart.

"She's nowhere near the end of her career," Winton said. "It's going real strong. I think there will be more albums, more hits.

"She thrives living in chaos. At any moment, you don't know who might walk through that front door."

Tucker sums up her very real reality show:

"It's just about us and the way we get through our lives. Life is all about the journey. Getting there is nowhere. It's the journey that's everywhere, and it's so beautiful. I wish it would slow down. It goes by so fast. They have a five-year option on this show. No way." •