Jonathan Storm | Putting on summer duds

It's enough to make a critic - or anybody else who makes less than $1 million a year - cry.

Big-bucks TV programmers are proving themselves to be stupider than the average-Joe viewer. Dumb phony reality shows clutter the airwaves, and, in most cases, nobody's watching.

I'm crying more than you, though, because you're simply turning off 90 percent of the "new" garbage that's hitting the screens this summer. I'm supposed to sit there and watch it.

Tuesday, ABC sends Shaquille O'Neal out to exploit overweight kids in one of the most unentertaining shows ever. Last week, NBC's Age of Love, pitting women in their 40s against a lineup of twentysomethings in a contest for the love of a washed-up tennis pro, sent shivers of disgust up my spine.

Bravo, once a culture club, now a depository of depraved reality, tackles another canard, going inside the life of half-baked celebrity Paula Abdul, beginning Thursday at 10. Even in the heightened phoniness of reality TV, one character trait squirms out above all others: She's insipid.

Last night's Style Network lineup included the premiere of the second season of Split Ends, following the age-old phony reality trading-places blueprint. High-end stylists from swanky cities (L.A. last night) swap into downscale joints in the boondocks, while the rubes try to make it in the big time. In a fine example of TV's tunnel vision, Las Vegas got to represent small-town America.

Phony reality shows have been a cable staple, and they still are. But this summer, cable and the big networks are turning things upside down. Selected scripted comedies and dramas on cable are actually drawing more viewers than the schlock on the broadcast networks. TBS, TNT, USA and Lifetime are scoring some of their biggest numbers ever, and overall the big networks' share of the pie has never been smaller.

In the week ended last Sunday, which provides the most recent Nielsen ratings numbers available, fewer than one-third of TV users watched the five English-language broadcast networks.

And that was before the season premiere of The Closer Monday on TNT. Viewed in 6.3 million households, it would have finished in the Top 10 among all TV shows in the previous week, and was the highest-rated series episode on ad-supported cable ever. TBS's House of Payne premiered June 6 with the highest sitcom ratings in ad-cable history. Army Wives is the highest-rated series in Lifetime's history. The Starter Wife was USA's highest-rated original drama in three years.