Why is there no chess on TV?
Cinematically, you're forced either into a very limited perspective of
the board-- you can show the person thinking, you can show the board,
you can't show both at the same time. You can use a diagram instead of
the actual board-- but that's plain boring.
Second, are the games themselves. It is hard for proper analysis to be
made on the spot, a grandmaster could do it, but they tend to be kind
of kooky, which does not make for good color commentary, since the
game must be humanized and made accessible to a non-chess player.
Unlike golf, concentration has no time to relent. This means the live
audience cannot get excited without distracting the players. Sure, the
crowd is just as quiet for Tiger Woods, but they get to roar when he
sinks an amazing putt. There is no such catharsis or acknowledgement
in chess.
The games also involve the moves and the time required to cover the
game. The game can end at any time, but usually doesn't, making it
impossible to schedule a proper block of time to cover the game live.
Plus, a flurry of moves would render meaningful play by play
meaningless. Every move must be accounted for the game to make sense,
but there is not enough time to analyze all positions. And when to
insert the commercial breaks?
Finally, what helps is a phenomenon. Chess' heyday had the cold war
rivalry of one man (Bobby Fischer) standing up against the Soviet
Union's best. Both him and Woods got a lot of early media attention.
Poker had that everyman aspect set. Poker had folks like Chris
Moneymaker who got lucky on the Internet raking in big bucks in the
World Series, not to mention putting them up against a livewire
personality like Phil Hellmuth.
Is this to say that chess can't become TV friendly? No, but you would
need a Bobby Fischer who would actually show up to games. You'd need
to eliminate the bickering over minor details that amount to whining.
You'd need the splashy intros and outros used in sports that would
feel below the intelligence level of a true chess afficionado. You
would probably have to start by creating the game in post-production,
which involves more intensive editing. But I think that High
Definition would help, since not only does dew on grass look amazing
on HD, but the 16:9 aspect ratio means that both opponents could be
seen squaring off with the chess diagram in the middle. That
simultaneously suggests confrontation, while offering clarification
and analysis of position. Remember, the biggest secret to the success
of poker was the ability to see the hole cards. With more information
about the game offered to home viewers than is available to the
players, dramatic irony was infused into reality television. When you
can have the guy at home yelling, "Don't go there!", chess will have
something.
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