Layoffs have ravaged the channel, with its biggest hits now airing on MTV, its digital footprint fading and its schedule filled with reruns of “Mama’s Family.”
The channel’s once-strong push for original programming fizzled out ages ago, and layoffs have devastated Paramount’s LGBTQ channel, which has “almost no full-time employees,” an insider told TheWrap and two others with knowledge of the matter. People confirmed.
The dilapidated state of the logo, which was once promoted by its parent company as a pioneering effort to cater to a diverse and underserved audience, illustrates the difficult choices that media companies face as linear TV continues to decline. Paramount has promised Wall Street it will reduce its streaming losses over the next year, leaving little room to invest in second-tier cable channels.
As MTV picked up “Drag Race” and “The Real Friends of WeHo,” shows that are a natural fit for the logo, the mainstreaming of LGBTQ content is just another factor working against the channel. But most of Logo’s prior slate of original shows, which ranged from “Noah’s Ark” to “Finding Prince Charming” to “The Big Gay Sketch Show,” didn’t make the jump to MTV or Paramount+’s large audiences.
In a final digital brush-off, Paramount shut down Logo’s mobile app in November, leaving logotv.com the only way to stream Logo’s collection.
TheWrap spoke to three former Logo executives and other insiders, all on condition of anonymity, to learn the internal and external pressures that led to the logo’s current state. Paramount declined to comment.
How technology made — and ruined — the logo
A technological advance helped birth the logo nearly two decades ago: eager to fill the field offered by then-new digital cable providers, the MTV Networks digital suite offered 13 channels ranging from Nicktoons to MTV and VH1 spinoffs. Did. One of them, VH1 Mega Hits, died so that the logo could live on.
For a time, channel explosion worked as viewers shifted from broadcast networks. In 2009, many basic cable channels saw double-digit viewership growth. Reached over 10 million homes at launch 46 million by 2010,
For a time, “Drag Race” proved transformative for the logo, giving the channel the kind of tentpole program it still needs to set a network apart today. But its reach was limited, as not all cable providers included the logo in basic cable packages—a legacy of its birth as a digital-cable addition.
As streaming began eroding core cable viewers, the logo faced a tough road ahead. In 2017, Paramount – then known as Viacom – moved “Drag Race” to VH1. This boosted the ratings for the show along with the wider reach of the network and helped the show win string of emmys, The move also pleased its star, RuPaul, who previously hosted a lucrative, pioneering talk show on VH1 in the 1990s.
A former Logo executive told TheWrap, “I knew Paramount thought Logo was dead and the writing was on the wall”.
The channel’s current programming consists of encore episodes of “Drag Race” and a few seasonal digital-first series such as “Spill”. But most of its hours are filled with blocks of sitcom marathons. Marathons of “The Nanny,” “Will & Grace” and “Bewitched” aren’t exactly the kind of programming the logo had when it first launched, but they’re cheaper than paying for original programs that probably cost Paramount But membership will not move the needle.
“Beyond simply the evolution of the media landscape that paved the way for the rise of streaming and the loss of cable subscriptions, Leap challenged Logos as it had a range of approximately 40 million subscribers and also to capture the vast numbers of gays and lesbians was available. Subscribers were never going to be enough to sustain the channel,” said the former executive.
a rocky birth
Some insiders believe the logo was cursed from the start. The 2004 controversy over Janet Jackson’s nipple-exposing “wardrobe malfunction” on CBS left its parent company nervous about launching a network whose content would by definition test boundaries. Yet there was a yearning for representation: Republican President George W. Bush had just won re-election by supporting a constitutional ban on gay marriage. The launch of the logo created buzz.
The pitch for the cable network was bold and progressive in principle and intent, but internally Logo’s culture was beset by a reluctance from high-ups to push the envelope.
Another former Logo executive explained, “The executives chosen to launch the channel shared one thing in common: They were all gay or lesbian, but strategically they were not aligned on some of the most important decisions that would ultimately make or break the channel.” Will give.” TheWrap. “But what happened behind the scenes and in Logo’s offices was far more interesting than anything else.”
During its early years, the logo was too small and new to receive a formal rating, but officials gleaned from discussion and online feedback that “Noah’s Ark”, which some fans saw as a black, male “Sex and the City” logo As told, was an early hit. , A spin-off film, “Noah’s Ark: Jumping the Broom”, attracted surprisingly strong per-screen box office In a limited release.
As it struggled to find more hits, the logo faced repeated identity crises. In 2012, a programming slate without any gay leads inspired the LGBTQ culture site Qwerty. ask if the network “Going straight.”
In 2015, then-logo chief Chris McCarthy, who now oversees all entertainment and youth brands for Paramount Media Networks, told TheWrap that it was a mistake: “I’m happy to say that we’re in that place today. And that’s where we should be.” A pair of gay-themed series scheduled for “Cucumber” and “Banana” that year punctuated that point.
Yet that revival, a decade in the life of the logo, and the growing success of “RuPaul’s Drag Race” could be a high point for the network.
Logos’ attempt at a gay “Bachelor” series, “Finding Prince Charming,” debuted in 2016. It was initially renewed for a second season after receiving strong ratings with “Drag Race: All Stars” as the lead-in. A second season never materialized, however, after the first season’s lead, Robert Sepulveda, Jr., was revealed to be working as a male escort. The contestants tell TheWrap that they believe the producers were aware of Sepulveda’s background.
Whatever the reason, by 2017, Logo had lost “Drag Race” and “Finding Prince Charming.” In 2018, “All Stars” also moved to VH1. Paramount is taking good care of RuPaul, though: Out of drag, he appears on CBS, hosting the game show “Lingo.”
the streaming future of logo
Without mobile or smart TV apps, people don’t have much stake in the rapidly changing media landscape. It no longer rates a mention on the Paramount web page Listing the company’s “Global Brand”. Viacom, once important enough to Wall Street for Logos to become part of the breakaway reporting unit found only one mention In Paramount’s 2022 annual report. Perhaps most damaging, as reports swirl about BET and VH1’s packaged sales, no one is talking about spinning off or selling the logo.
There is one place where Logo’s original vision seems to come alive, a strange corner of the streaming universe. Paramount’s Pluto TV, a free, ad-supported streaming television service, It has its own mirror-universe version Logo’s On cable, Fran and her mother argue over a fur coat as another “Nanny” episode airs. On the Internet, Naomi Smalls and Trinity “The Tuck” Taylor strut the runway in a rerun of “RuPaul’s Drag Race: All Stars.”
If one day the carriage contract expires and Paramount decides to pull the digital-cable plug, it will probably continue to carry some version of the early 2000s and early 2000s, accurate advertising targeting logos possible with Fast Network. Until then, viewers are left with this weird, in-between-peak media creature from the cable era: not quite alive, not quite dead and a little embarrassing for everyone involved.
Editor’s Note: TheWrap’s editor-at-large Joseph Capps freelanced for the logo in 2006.
