• by Wayne Friedman , January 16, 2015

Although NBC still leads the broadcast prime-time season in key viewing metrics, some key areas need to be addressed — particularly Thursday night.

Long a major night for NBC in the 1990s — especially with comedies, with its “must-see” marketing theme — the network chose a major revamp on the night. Now, its big-rated drama “The Blacklist” is on at 9 p.m., surrounded with two new serial dramas: “Allegiance” (10 p.m.) and “The Slap” (8 p.m.)

“It’s a very desirable night for advertisers,” says Robert Greenblatt, chairman of NBC entertainment, speaking to the Television Critics Association here. “It is certainly risky [to move the show]. But it is the only real way to jump-start that night.”

“The Blacklist” will move from Monday at 10 p.m. to Thursdays at 9 p.m. Greenblatt isn’t concerned that viewers will not move with the show — considering its already heavy time-shifting among key fans.

“Sixty percent of the ‘Blacklist’ viewers don’t watch at Monday at 10,” he says. “Hopefully, it’ll be a big enough live number (on Thursday).”

Separately, NBC will continue to pursue more single programming “events,” especially with live musicals — shows that will have broad family appeal.

NBC has the rights to “The Music Man” and “The Wiz,” and Greenblatt says one of those will be the next holiday musical. NBC had big success with “The Sound of Music” in 2013, less so with “Peter Pan” in 2014.

NBC has signed Dolly Parton to develop a slate of two-hour TV movies based on her songs, stories and life.

Through the fourth quarter, NBC still leads all broadcast networks in the key commercial ratings plus three days of time-shifting (C3) metric with 3.29 million viewers, down 10% from a year ago. CBS is in second place -- up 2% versus a year ago to 2.58 million 18-49 viewers.