Best Time Ever with Neil Patrick Harris: NBC Boss Talks Cancellation

Back in December, NBC cancelled its new Best Time Ever with Neil Patrick Harris TV series, starring Harris, Nathaniel Motulsky, and Nicole Scherzinger. The first and only season included celebrity guests, skits, pranks, musical numbers, and more. The show was inspired by ITV’s Ant & Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway program.

NBC Entertainment Chair, Bob Greenblatt, talked with Adweek about the cancelled show. Adweek asked if the fate of Best Time Ever with Neil Patrick Harris had NBC rethinking its recent turn toward adding more live programming.

From Adweek:

The Wiz Live! was a hit, but you won’t be bringing back Best Time Ever with Neil Patrick Harris. Did the mixed reception to your live shows this fall change your thinking about live programming?

Not really. The live thing shouldn’t be the tail that wags the dog. If that’s the best way to do it, then it should be live. Best Time Ever did relatively well, but we just decided that the format wasn’t the best format as it developed. I love Neil and he was such a trouper. We could have done that show not live, and probably put together a better show that was cleaner and crisper, but he really wanted to do the high-wire act of live. And we thought, OK, that’s how they do it in the U.K.

In December, not long after the cancellation of Best Time Ever with Neil Patrick Harris, the host tweeted about doing live TV and that he still likes the variety show format. Check it out, here.

Best Time Ever with Neil Patrick Harris ran its full eight episodes, Tuesday nights on NBC. By the end of its first and only season, the show’s average ratings were a 1.49 in the 18 to 49 year old view demographic, with a total average audience size of 5.184 million viewers.

Where you a fan of the Best Time Ever with Neil Patrick Harris TV show? Do you think it deserved to be cancelled, or had you been hoping it would be renewed? Sound off, in the comments.