The Television Critics Association (TCA) is a group of approximately 200

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

and

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

critics, journalists and

columnist A columnist is a person who writes for publication in a series, creating an article that usually offers commentary and opinions. Column (newspaper), Columns appear in newspapers, magazines and other publications, including blogs. They take the fo ...

s who cover television programming for

newspaper A newspaper is a periodical publication containing written information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as politics, business, sports a ...

magazine A magazine is a periodical publication, generally published on a regular schedule (often weekly or monthly), containing a variety of content. They are generally financed by advertising, purchase price, prepaid subscriptions, or by a combinatio ...

s and web publications. The TCA accepts applications and selects members twice per year in March and September. Once selected, all members meet at The Langham Huntington Hotel and Spa in

Pasadena, California Pasadena ( ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is the most populous city and the primary cultural center of the San Gabriel Valley. Old Pasadena is the city's original commercial district. I ...

in January for the winter press tour, and at the Beverly Hilton in

Beverly Hills Beverly Hills is a city located in Los Angeles County, California. A notable and historic suburb of Greater Los Angeles, it is in a wealthy area immediately southwest of the Hollywood Hills, approximately northwest of downtown Los Angeles. Bev ...

in July for the summer press tour. Winter press tour usually covers network midseason replacements, programs from

streaming services An over-the-top media service is a streaming media service offered directly to viewers via the Internet. OTT bypasses cable, broadcast, and satellite television platforms, the companies that traditionally act as a controller or distributors of s ...

and cable series which start in January, while the summer tour covers the new fall season for broadcast, streaming, and cable programming.

Press tours

The tour allows the major

television network A television network or television broadcaster is a telecommunications network for distribution of television program content, where a central operation provides programming to many television stations or multichannel video programming distributo ...

s, cable networks, online streaming services and

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...

to present their slate of upcoming programs to a large group of press writers from different outlets all at once through panels and interviews, along with 'state of the network' speeches and presentations; for instance, FX executive

John Landgraf John Phillip Landgraf (born May 20, 1962) is the Chairman of FX Networks. He is also a member of the Peabody Awards board of directors, which is presented by the University of Georgia's Henry W. Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication. ...

uses his network's winter session to present data and analytical information from his network's research department, including the number of series carried across all American networks and streaming services in a year to compare with FX's slate of original programming. This is also the only time the general television media has rare access '' en masse'' to network executives. These biannual conferences involve registered TCA members staying at a chosen Los Angeles venue for two to three weeks, and each network is assigned a series of days to showcase their programming. In the past, these interviews with program casts and creative staff (usually the show's primary

showrunner A showrunner (or colloquially a helmer) is the top-level executive producer of a television series production who has creative and management authority through combining the responsibilities of employer and, in comedy or dramas, typically also th ...

, producers, and writers) were mainly used to compile stories over a six-month period which could be posted over that period as columns, Q&A responses to reader mail questions timed to a program/film/special's release, or within their weekly television listings supplements, mainly in newspapers or magazines for critics and columnists outside of large metropolitan areas. However, with the rise of the

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

and

social media Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social medi ...

, these sessions now function to build buzz for programming within an immediate period, and only a few columnists for smaller publications and listing supplements maintain the former format of story release. The January 2008 tour was canceled in December 2007 because of the 2007-08 Writers Guild of America strike and the uncertainty of its settlement. At the start of May 2020, the organization cancelled their summer 2020 tour and delayed the TCA Awards to a time to be determined in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic making any large gathering over two weeks impossible, along with the uncertainty over the 2020-21 television season, including the conversion of network

upfront ''UpFront'' is a current affairs discussion, debate and analysis programme on Al Jazeera English. The show premiered on 4 September 2015 shortly after Al Jazeera moved into their new Washington D.C. hub. The show has a politics focus although othe ...

presentations to videotelephony platforms and the ability to produce programming.

TCA Awards

The organization sponsors the TCA Awards, honoring television excellence in 11 categories, which are presented at the end of the summer press tour. The Awards began in 1985 at the Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles, California. The 2017 Awards were hosted by Kristin Chenoweth. The awards given in 2017 included; Program of the Year, Best New Program, Best Drama Series, Individual Achievement in Drama, Best Comedy Series, Individual Achievement in Comedy, Best Reality Programming, Best Youth Programming, & Best News and Information. In addition to these awards, each year the TCA grants the Heritage Award, given to a long-standing program that has culturally influenced society. In 2018, the

34th TCA Awards The TCA Awards held their 34th awards ceremony on August 4, 2018, in a ceremony hosted by Robin Thede at The Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, California. The nominees were announced by the Television Critics Association The Television Critics Ass ...

were hosted by

Robin Thede Robin Thede ( ) is an American comedian, actress and writer. Raised in Iowa, she has also worked as an entertainment correspondent, host, and radio personality. In 2015, she became the first African-American woman to be head writer for a late-n ...

References

External links

Official website ~ TVcritics.org

TCA Awards page ~ TVcritics.
* Television Critics Association – The TCA welcomes you. (2017). Retrieved November 9, 2017, from http://tvcritics.org/ * Rodman, S. (2017). “The Handmaid”s Tale,’ “Atlanta,” Carrie Coon big winners at the Television Critics Assn. awards - LA Times. Retrieved from http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/la-et-entertainment-news-updates-august-the-handmaid-s-tale-atlanta-1502038279-htmlstory.html {{Authority control American television awards Canadian television awards Entertainment industry societies Television organizations in Canada Television organizations in the United States Events in Los Angeles January events July events