By April 28, 1990, David Lynch and Mark Frost’s Twin Peaks had aired the pilot followed by three episodes. The next one, directed by Tim Hunter and written by Robert “Bob” Engles would debut on May 3. This was right around the time of “Sweeps Week” when television networks aired episodes designed to get viewers to watch a particular show. This week’s issue of “TV Guide” contains only a few nods to the wonderful and strange show that had taken the United States of America by storm.
TWIN PEAKS IN TV GUIDE FROM APRIL 28, 1990
The cover story to Issue #1935 of “TV Guide” (Vol. 38 No. 17) for April 28-May 4, 1990 was about Sweeps Week. This concept dates to 1954 when the Nielsen ratings system collected television viewing diaries from homes in the Eastern United States and then would “sweep” west. Interestingly, Nielsen processed approximately two million paper diaries throughout the U.S. until 2018 during the months of November, February, May and July – the “sweeps” rating periods. These seven-day diaries (which later became eight-day diaries for homes with DVRs) were mailed to homes to track of which shows were watched and by whom in the particular household.
It was during these “sweeps” periods that networks would have “nights of cutthroat counter-programming” wrote Timothy Carlson in his article “The method behind the sweeps madness” (page 4). A big change for May 1990 was the lack of miniseries programming used in previous years to keep viewers’ eyes glued to a certain network. This time, networks debuted a cornucopia of new shows – 20 new series in all – which included Twin Peaks.
“This is unlike other sweeps because the networks are almost deliberately not running regular series and deliberately making on-air tests oof innovative news series,” said Betsy Frank of Saatchi & Saatchi Advertising.
Carlson concludes ABC’s Twin Peaks, CBS’s Bagdad Cafe and NBC’s Carol & Company are “quirky freshman series that would have never been used their the all-important May sweeps in the past.”
ABC Television executives purposely placed Lynch and Frost’s series as a mid-season replacement according to then President of ABC Television Bob Iger at the January 1990 conference of the Television Critics Association.
Iger said spring shows all have “a unique quality to them.” If he has any programming strategy, he said, it is that “you have to try new things. We do not shut our doors to people like David Lynch” who come in with ideas that are not traditional network fare.”
THURSDAY GUIDELINE, PAGE 179
In the “Thursday Guidelines” section on page 179, Twin Peaks is briefly mentioned again.
“Twin Peaks is producing ratings that have the ABC brass doing handsprings. The reasons go beyond the publicity barrage; hypnotic performances and the guarantee that each week something completely unexpected will happen. Tonight, it’s more of the same as Hank faces the parole boards, Leo’s bloody shirt resurfaces, Catherine continues her plotting and Cooper confronts the one-armed man. (9 PM 5, 23, 24, 33).”
THURSDAY EVENING TV LISTINGS, PAGES 180-181
Here is how the television listings appeared for Thursday, May 3, 1990 when Twin Peaks episode 1.004 aired on the ABC Television Network.
TWIN PEAKS ADVERTISEMENT AND SYNOPSIS, PAGE 186-187
Special Agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) appears in a long rectangular advertisement for the show on page 186. Similar to previous TV Guide ads from season one, a synopsis of last week’s episode (1.003) was provided.
Last week –
- Agent Cooper introduced to Secret Society.
- Josie learned someone might kill her to get the mill.
- Laura’s autopsy revealed drugs and sexual foul play.
The image of Agent Cooper is cropped. The image above was supposedly taken on December 12, 1989, but it’s not the same image seen in the TV Guide ad (notice where MacLachlan is holding the doughnut). I haven’t found the original shot yet.
On page 187, the synopsis for episode 1.004 reads:
“As Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) tries to match his dream with Sarah’s vision. Hawk (Michael Horse) tracks down the one-armed man; Hank Jennings (Chris Mulkey) goes before the parole board; Audrey (Sherilyn Fenn) decides to start her own investigation of Laura’s murder, with a little help from Donna (Lara Flynn Boyle); Josie (Joan Chen) spies on Catherine and Benjamin; Shelly and Bobby (Mädchen Amick, Dana Ashbrook) plot against Leo (Eric Da Re), Truman (Michael Ontkean).”
In the U.S., episode 1.004 would be seen by 17.4 million people. In a Los Angeles Times article on May 11, 1990, reporter Howard Rosenberg reported on the Nielsen ratings for the show on May 3.
“In last week’s national Nielsens, ‘Twin Peaks’ ranked only 44th, barley in the top half of the ratings for prime time. If ‘Twin Peaks’ does survive past its initial mini-season – and we ‘Twin Peaks’ maniacs have fingers crossed – then it will do so as a cult series whose relatively small audience is sufficiently young and upscale to excite the advertisers that excite ABC.”
The Twin Peaks journey is long from over but I’m happy to have this “TV Guide” as now part of the permanent living history of my favorite show.
Download high-resolution images from this “TV Guide” on my Flickr account: https://www.flickr.com/photos/aloha75/albums/72177720321353696
