Yesterday, CBS aired the highly anticipated Billy Joel: The 100th – Live at Madison Square Garden. However, the Masters ran late, and that caused the concert to start late. Therefore, the local news would also be starting later.
However, the local news started earlier than expected and cut the Piano Man off during his final song Piano Man.
Needless to say, the fans were pissed, as they should be.
So, today, CBS released this statement, “A network programming timing error ended last night’s Billy Joel special approximately two minutes early in the Eastern and Central Time Zones. We apologize to Mr. Joel, his fans, our affiliated stations, and our audience whose viewing experience was interrupted during the last song. Due to the overwhelming demand from his legion of fans, BILLY JOEL: THE 100TH – LIVE AT MADISON SQUARE GARDEN will be rebroadcast in its entirety on CBS on April 19th at 9:00PM ET/PT.”
I am surprised this happened again after the Heidi incident in 1968. That was when NBC cut off the NY Jets vs the Oakland Raiders and switched to the movie Heidi during the game. Fans missed the Raiders coming from behind in the final few minutes. And they went nuts. Can you blame them?
Since then, the networks have tried never to do that again. But yesterday, it happened, and CBS felt the Pressure to make it up to the fans.
So they will re-air it on Friday instead of repeats of Fire Country and Blue Bloods.
If you cannot wait until then, you can watch it on Paramount+.
