'Big Brother' Is Moving to CBS All Access for a Shorter Season 19
"Big Brother," the longrunning CBS reality staple, is moving to CBS All Access for its 19th season, which will also be shorter than the show's typical run.
Deadline reports that the veteran series, which is already a top performer for CBS's streaming service with its 24/7 live feeds, will have a 10-week run for season 19, which is shorter than the typical 13- to 14-week runs of previous seasons. According to the trade, season 19 "will start shortly (within days) after Season 18 ends on the broadcast network with a 90-minute finale on September 21."
The existing production team will move over to All Access, but it's unclear from Deadline's report if host Julie Chen will also be making the switch. This new fall season will be only the second time in the show's history that "Big Brother" has aired outside of the summer TV season, after season nine premiered on the midseason schedule following the writer's strike of 2007-2008. Season 19 will also make history as the first-ever original competitive reality series to air exclusively on a streaming network.
"Big Brother"'s switch from broadcast to streaming is a big bet for the Eye, which is investing a lot of dough into All Access. Its first original series, Bryan Fuller's new "Star Trek" show, "Star Trek: Discovery," is launching in January, and All Access is also reportedly working on a spinoff of "The Good Wife" centered around Christine Baranski's Diane Lockhart character. CBS All Access plans to launch a new show every quarter after "Discovery"'s debut, per Deadline's report.
[via: Deadline]