After being called the “worst new show of the season” by USA Today, the Ray Liotta series Smith has come up in first place. Unfortunately, not in the way the show cast, creators and fans would like. Smith is the first new show of the season to be cancelled, after just three episodes.
Smith starred film actor Ray Liotta as Bobby Stevens, a man leading a double life. During the day, Stevens plays a typical suburban family man while at night he’s an expert criminal who pulls off elaborate crimes with a crack team of thieves. Other series stars included Virginia Madsen, Simon Baker, Amy Smart, Johnny Lee Miller, Franky G and Chris Bauer. The series was the brainchild of ER creator Frank Wells.
Though CBS hasn’t “officially” cancelled Smith, the show has been pulled from the Tuesday night line-up and it’s not likely to return (especially as we enter the November sweeps period). The third episode garnered a low 8.4 million viewers, a significant loss from the number of viewers that watched the episode of The Unit that aired before it. Smith garnered a decent 11 million viewers at its debut on September 19, 2006 (nearly tying Boston Legal) but, has been losing viewers each week since. Networks know that when that “slide” starts, it’s unlikely to reverse itself.
For the immediate future, CBS will air a rerun of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation in Smith’s place on Tuesday, October 10, 2006. Repeats of Criminal Minds will take the slots on October 17th and 24th. No word if CBS will “burn off” the four unaired episodes of Smith but at this point, it looks unlikely. All mentions of Smith have been deleted from the CBS homepage (though you can still reach the Smith pages here.).
CBS will debut the new 3 lbs. series in Smith’s old space starting on November 14, 2006. The Stanley Tucci show was supposed to debut as a mid-season replacement series but has been moved up. The House-like show centers on the relationship between a rising-star brain surgeon (played by Mark Feuerstein) and a brilliant but unpredictable surgeon (Tucci). The network is reportedly pleased with how 3 lbs. is looking and has just ordered four additional scripts. 
Allen: I am an actor and Ray Liotta is truly an “actor’s actor”. When I saw that he was going to be on CBS, I couldn’t believe it, I thought “surely, they’re talking about a movie”. Now, I’m not going to be able to see Ray Liotta every week. And then, like any good dream, I wake up and find out it’s not true. I was returned to the humdrum programing and “Numbers”, “Cold Case” and all the other boring CBS programming. Vanessa: We spent all of this time looking for “Smith” and the night we finally find it, CSI:… Read more »
So, CBS, instead of being original and keeping a show that was well-written, intriguing, not to mention well-cast and acted, you fell into the ratings trap set by people with Neilsen boxes who have cable, DVD players, and TEVO(is that right? I can’t afford it so I don’t know) Your ratings come from people who are not watching television with the rest of us on Tuesday nights, they are flipping channels between cable and network playing couch-Ebert and Ropers while the rest of us rely on good programming from the networks because you are all we have. Are you now… Read more »
Thanks CBS. Now I don’t have to choose between watching Smith and Boston Legal.
bring it back, i am going crazy
I can’t believe that CBS has cancelled Smith already. I was beginning to look forward to the new heist that would be shown each week. If CBS doesn’t want to show the remaining episodes maybe another network will pick them up. To the cast and crew of Smith, the show was fantastic!
I was waiting to watch the SMITH show on Tuesday
and just found out that it was cancelled and was bummed that is my favorite show please listen to viewers and give it a chance….
SMITH Show Fan
CBS IS DUMB, DUMB, DUMB!
SMITH WAS AWESOME! I was devastated and so was my wife when we found out it was cancelled. No warning!
I really hate CBS now!
Almost lost my ’24’ ( @ least fox listened to viewers and kept it going as word of mouth made it #1) and Amazing Race.
Problem is CBS is stupid! Late time of 10PM, no lead in and didn’t give it a chance.
Dear CBS:
I think it was an incredibly bad decision to pull Smith. The show had a lot going for it — great acting, edgy scenes, fantastic camera work, etc. You didn’t give it a chance! Remember when JAG changed networks and went on to become a long-running very successful show? Perhaps you could give the rights to FOX, HBO, or NBC and let them have a go with it! Ray Liotta deserves much more respect! As well as the rest of the superb cast!!!
So CBS how are your ratings this week!
I was watching ABC’s Boston Legal which I hadn’t seen since the smith’s 1st aired. Good job!
I’m not sure which TV school you attended but summer and late night are for reruns, not prime time fall.
GET THE SMITH”s back.
Thanks
I hate that cbs cancelled the show smith because of its contents of robbery expert robbing I knew it would be cancelled because of the contents but I really liked the show smith Iliked that each week a different episode but continueing from the last week Iwould have really have liked to see the episode where the wife gets caught folllowing him and would have liked to know why she was telling all that information about his friends and researching them getting more info on them I would love to know why she did those things but nnever got a… Read more »
Dear CBS. You recently pulled a series called SMITH and a lot of people have been left hanging in suspense and feeling very disappointed. You enticed us just enough to get interested and then left us with no resolution just anger! Could CBS not at the very least air the next big heist for SMITH? I miss the show and looked very much forward to seeing the next episode with out any warning of such cancellation to indicate what happened. CBS is showing many other lame and disappointing shows that I turn away from every week. I think that you… Read more »
Well the show should be on HBO. The content was to strong for some people, but I think it would have one heck of an adudience on HBO. I still can’t believe CBS was dumb enough to walk away from it. Somebody at HBO, this one would be a home run!!!!
So, you’ve got NCIS at eight, then The Unit at nine and Smith at ten which pretty much nailed my evenings on Tuesdays. So, who are these pretentious knuckleheads at CBS that cancelled Smith? I mean are you kidding me? What capitalist would cancel a show that put the nail in the coffin in regards to owning the most number of eyes on of all things a friggin Tuesday night?!? We are the customers and we choose what we like in your line up or we just find another channel to watch, duh! By the way, Criminal Minds is weird,… Read more »
What in the world is going on??Why in the hell would CBS cancell as far as I am concerned the hottest new show on tv,We are now forced to watch the various csi’s which are always so easy to predict.C’mon this show was edgy with a twist and the good guy never won.Ray is a gem he is a one of a kind and a pleasure to watch.have we become a culture with a appetite for stupid reality shows??
we need someone to break into cbs’ headquarter and steal those unaired episodes if that’s what it takes to watch them lol. but seriously, they can’t do this…i mean c’mon it’s a great show. cbs shouldn’t do this…