What I learned from the TV Critics Association Press Tours

How the struggle of an important resource for TV critics threatens coverage of the center of American pop culture

A lot of what I learned about the television industry – over nearly 30 years as a critic and analyst -- came from attending the TV Critics Association’s press tours.

Which is why it is particularly galling to see some people cynically cheering news that the group has canceled its plans for a summer press tour – a move which may make it tougher to bring back the press tours at all.

For those who may not know what I’m blathering about, the TCA press tours are events organized twice a year to attract a mass of TV critics and journalists covering the industry to Los Angeles for a series of press conferences, press parties, screenings and individual interviews aimed at previewing new programs coming over the next few months. (though prices at the host hotel are wonderfully low for TCA members, the whole time I attended, journalists or their employers paid air fare and lodging themselves.)

(Interviewing Andre Braugher during a visit to the set of Brooklyn Nine Nine at a TCA tour event.)

At its height, the TCA press tours spanned two weeks in January and more than three weeks in July or August, hosting hundreds of journalists to sit in press conferences held in large hotel ballrooms featuring major stars and big executives from major broadcasters like ABC, NBC and CBS, cable channel like Fox News, TNT and CNN and even – once upon a time – Netflix.

The pace of the tours was often punishing. Days would begin at 8 or 9 a.m., with back-to-back press conferences lasting about 45 minutes each until 5 or 6 p.m, with a lunch that might also feature a press session. Big outlets like TV Guide and Access Hollywood would set up interview rooms in with cameras where stars and notables would head after the big press conferences for one-on-one interviews.

And after most big press conferences, there would be about 10 to 15 minutes where journalists could walk onstage and interview the panelists one-on-one, asking questions that might be too specific or detailed to unveil during the big presser.

(Handing Ryan Murphy a trophy at the TCA Awards.)

Back in 1997, this allowed a young critic who has just started covering TV for the then-St. Petersburg Times (now known as The Tampa Bay Times) to have in person conversations with network TV presidents, major stars and top producers. Over time, I interviewed then-CBS CEO Les Moonves, Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos, FX president John Landgraf, Fox News Channel founder Roger Ailes, Will Smith, Grey’s Anatomy Shonda Rhimes, Glee/Monster/American Horror Story creator Ryan Murphy, and many many other key figures in TV, film, streaming and media.

Eventually, I visited the sets of shows like ER, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, The Price is Right and Matlock. (yes, the new one – how old do you think I am?) And I also got to talk about TV with experienced and savvy critics like Bill Carter of The New York Times, Robert Bianco of USA Today, Matt Roush of TV Guide, Lorraine Ali of The Los Angeles Times, Melanie McFarland of Salon, current TCA president Jacqueline Cutler and many, many, many more wonderfully talented people.

Still, there are loads of institutions in showbusiness which never liked the level of access this gave reporters from across the country. Trade publications and local news outlets, once used to having all that access to themselves, resented seeing journalists from across the country and outside the U.S. break stories and sharpen their analyses. Some publicists hated how much the tour could cost – hotels charged top dollar to host all the nonjournalists involved, along with stars, producers, executives, makeup and production people and more.

The tour also provided perks for critics who attended which could be tough to defend. Journalists staying in the host hotel would find the participating media companies leaving all kinds of swag in the rooms as promotional items – nice robes, fancy liquors, electronic gear. In one of my first tours many years ago, as journalists left the press conference organizers handed out fancy garment bags with a free cellphone inside (rules at the newspaper where I then worked required me to hand it back to them, which I did).

Eventually, the TCA passed rules disallowing expensive gifts, but swag in the form of books, notepads and things needed to report on the shows still pops up.

And the glare of publicity could be very tough for those struggling with controversy, failure or tough times – creating a tsunami of negative press which could be very difficult to overcome.

(The Bachelor producers who answered — or didn’t answer — questions at the TCA tour: Jason Ehrlich, Claire Freeland and Bennett Graebner.)

One of the last big damaging stories from a recent press tour came last year, when producers of The Bachelor said nothing following my questions about how the show handles race. That moment was covered in scores of news outlets across the world and still gets mentioned in stories about the show more than year later. None of the three producers who fumbled that question still work on the franchise.

But that was the real power of the TV Critics Press Tours – the ability to force the industry to face critical questions about the industry by spotlighting them. Over the years, we managed to focus conversations on the lack of diversity in TV shows, sexism in staffing and production, production deals which led to terrible programming, racism, sexism and homophobia in content, high quality shows worthy of attention and more.

So why is the tour struggling now? A few reasons.

The journalists attending tour have decreased and changed. Back when I started attending, a lot of attendees were from regional newspapers like mine. They all employed at least one person – sometime more than one – to critique TV shows and write news stories about the industry. For journalists from Texas, Wisconsin, North Carolina or Florida, the TCA press tours were close to the only times you might have direct contact with people from the TV industry, and the knowledge you gained was invaluable, guiding your coverage for the rest of the year.

But downsizing at newspapers, magazines and media outlets led to those jobs getting cut; the TV guides, magazines and publications featuring detailed coverage of television also shrank tremendously. In their place, we saw more online writers and influencers who lived locally and didn’t necessarily need the tour as much.

Viewership of TV has changed. The traditional audience which used traditional media to keep up with TV shows has died off or moved on. Younger people are watching broadcast and cable much less, turning to social media and online outlets which have their own ways of ginning up audiences.

Media companies have changed, too. Yes, they’re spending less money and have tighter budgets, particularly in the wake of COVID and recent labor strikes. But big media players like the ABC network, Hulu, Max, CNN and NBC are now all smaller cogs in much larger companies. Decades ago, network presidents and vice presidents of entertainment at TV outlets were the most powerful executives at their companies and had autonomy – they could make decisions about budgets and expenditures and speak publicly about their plans without fear. Now, even the biggest content executives may have levels of corporate honchos above them with different priorities – except at Netflix, which seems intent on controlling every part of the process.

Speaking of COVID…it proved a particularly damaging disruption for an event which was founded on personal contact and gigantic gatherings at press conferences, meals and receptions.

Media companies want more control over the publicity process. A gigantic news conference where anything can happen is fun and advantageous for journalists, but it is hell for publicists who want to ensure a positive message goes out about the stars, shows, executives and platforms. Interviews over Zoom where the company can more tightly control access -- without a body like the TCA helping get tough journalists into the room – may make coverage less interesting. But it also helps keep it from being unexpectedly damaging.

Ultimately, times have changed, TV criticism isn’t as robust an area as it once was, and there are a dozen understandable reasons why the TCA press tours have had a tough time recapturing past glories.

But they also helped a generation of journalists gain the access, experience and networking to better cover an industry which has become the heartbeat of American pop culture.

There should be a way to preserve something that valuable to journalism and the public.