VH1 GM Tom Calderone Explodes Traditional Models

Originally Published: January 22, 2007

VH1's General Manager Tom Calderone, who has headed the network since May 2005, is a dedicated alternative rock fan who introduced the genre to the Buffalo, New York community when he stripped Top 40 off the college radio station at Buffalo State and replaced it with Clash, Pearl Jam, U2 and other previously black-listed programming. "Why play what everybody else was playing," he explained over lunch with Ed Martin and me at Michael's Restaurant in New York. "None of the local stations were playing alternative or urban, so we played alternative every weekday and urban on weekends. Suddenly, our little college station was beating some of the big AM stations."

Tom follows the same philosophy at VH1, and although reality programming has become ubiquitous across the TV landscape, he has forged ahead with VH1's unique brand of celebrity-focused reality, known as celeb-reality, that he expects will continue to be a foundation of VH1's programming for several seasons ahead. But, he notes, "We want VH1 to be nimble and not to be famous for just one thing. We want those big moments like the season finale of Flavor of Love but we need to balance them with steady performers."

VH1's ratings have reached record highs since the network expanded its focus on celeb-reality programming. Such series as The Surreal Life, Flavor of Love, Hogan Knows Best, I Love New York, My Fair Brady and Celebrity Fit Club are defining the VH1 brand and attracting loyal new viewers. Among the top sixty broadcast and cable TV networks, VH1 ranks sixth among women 18 to 24 for overall emotional connections of viewers to the network according to research conducted by Jack Myers Media Business Report.

"We're combining music and pop culture with observational reality and celebrity reality, and balancing the outrageous with good family shows and aspirational series," Tom says. "There's a lot more balance than our critics give us credit for. We don't want to be exploitative and we want audiences to understand the consequences of celebrity." Toward that end, the network has produced two acclaimed observational series that explore the dark side of celebrity. The current Shooting Sizemore chronicles the efforts of actor Tom Sizemore to regain his credibility and re-ignite his career in Hollywood following a prolonged period of significant personal problems. "He's burned a lot of bridges in the past but now he's being cooperative," Tom says. Similarly, the recently concluded Breaking Bonaduce followed former child star Danny Bonaduce as he struggled with his personal demons, ultimately bottoming out and attempting suicide while the series was being shot, and then set about putting his life back together.

Tom is also excited about a new music reality series titled Band of Men, featuring four former members of boy bands — Chris Kirkpatrick (N*SYNC), Jeff Timmons (98 Degrees), Rich Cronin (LFO) and Bryan Abrams (Color Me Badd) — who come together to form a new group. The network is also developing several documentaries on issues relevant to its core 28-34 target demographic.

Tom believes networks need to break down the traditional models of advertising and plans to introduce new approaches that he expects both marketers and audiences will embrace. "We're planning to introduce 'pop-up' commercials, giving the pop-up video treatment to commercials that air on VH1," he says. "We'll also run a small logo on the screen during commercials that tell viewers what commercial is coming up next and how long before we return to programming." He is also considering a viewer game that will invite viewers to text message the name of a tune with the answer appearing during the commercial break. "We're taking a user friendly approach to seamless integration of advertising breaks with programming and testing different ways to get audiences to stay tuned. We're open to embedding advertising in content but we can't do it for the sake of doing it. It needs to make sense to the audience. It needs to be environmentally relevant and not intrusive."

While VH1 is on a roll with record-setting ratings, Tom admits it's a struggle to stay in touch with audiences. "The business is so complicated and turbulent we can't know what's going to happen in six months, let alone next year. We need to stay nimble and flexible and just stay in close touch with our audiences." The network's digital strategy allows Tom to be experimental and determine how far audiences will give them license to go. "Broadband is a big deal to us," he says. "We can create mini-networks and test audience appeal."

To contact Tom Calderone, send an e-mail to contact@mediavillage.com.