Aborted Renewal
Before production was slated to resume, however, in June 2008 Merv Griffin Entertainment and Program Partners announced that production of the series would be halted until at least early 2009, with the cited reason being high production costs (although the general response to this statement was that nothing done or given away on the show could have caused such a thing). Three-quarters of carrying affiliates had been ready to pick up Season 2.
In the markets that aired Crosswords (plus some that did not carry the series, including West Palm Beach, Florida CBS affiliate WPEC; sister station WFLX had carried Season 1), stations were given a choice of three programs to air as part of a Program Partners "Daytime Plus" package. One was a package of reruns from the first season titled The Best of Crosswords. The other two choices were reruns of Style By Jury, a Canadian makeover series, and Inside the Box, a pop-culture based game show that had run for one season in 2006.
Most of the stations carrying Crosswords immediately dropped the series after the hiatus was announced, including the two largest markets of New York and Los Angeles. Neither of those two markets picked up the rerun package, and most of the rest did not opt for either of the other "Daytime Plus" options (although WNBC in New York, which had aired Crosswords, added both) and instead opted for other new syndicated programming – either game shows such as Trivial Pursuit: America Plays or talk shows such as The Bonnie Hunt Show. Stations that chose to air the "Best Of" package began with an episode from the "alternate" format, although viewers quickly noticed that nothing was added ("Best Of" logo, production slate, episode number, recording date, original airdate, etc.) to distinguish this set of repeats from Season 1; this had the side effect of causing stations that aired Season 1 to show continuous repeats since the first-run episodes ended. Crosswords was officially considered cancelled in February 2009, and around the same time the "Daytime Plus" experiment ended when Program Partners pulled Inside the Box from its affiliates.
On August 2, 2009, FamilyNet, a Christian-based family network, began airing Crosswords repeats on a daily basis in a two-hour afternoon block, plus an additional one-hour block in late-night. The reruns continue to air on FamilyNet and sister network American Life Network to this day.
Syndicated repeats under the "Best Of" label ceased on September 4, 2009.
Read more about this topic: Merv Griffin's Crosswords, Broadcast History
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