I am going to make a really wild guess, but maybe ... a one hour TV show might possibly be ONE HOUR? It's more like 52 minutes of actual drama as the rest of the time is commercials and channel ID's etc It depends whether it is a cable or a premium cable show. Cable shows (say, 24, for instance) tend to be around ~45 minutes long (24 is about 43min/ep), with about 15 min or so for commercials. Premium cable shows (like Dexter), tend to be closer to an hour.