Cynopsis

06/27/08

Good morning. It’s Friday, June 27, 2008, and this is your first early morning briefing. 

CBS unveiled its 2008-2009 premiere dates for new and returning series:

September 18: Survivor: Gabon at 8p

September 22: The Big Bang Theory at 8p; How I Met Your Mother at 830p; Two and a Half Men at 9p; Worst Week at 9:30p; CSI: Miami at 10p

September 23: NCIS at 8p; The Mentalist at 9p; Without a Trace at 10p

September 24: The New Adventures of Old Christine at 8p; Project Gary at 830p; Criminal Minds at 9p; CSI: NY at 10p

September 27: Crimetime Saturday at 8p and 9p; 48 Hours Mystery at 10p

September 28: 60 Minutes at 7p; The Amazing Race at 8p; Cold Case at 9p; The Unit at 10p

October 3: Ghost Whisperer at 8p; The Ex List at 9p; Numb3rs at 10p

October 9: CSI: Crime Scene Investigation at 9p; Eleventh Hour at 10p

(Updated Fall Primetime Broadcast Schedule available to download on the Cynopsis.com website home page, or click here for excel, and here for PDF format.)

Tonight’s Premieres:
ABC: Dance Machine at 8p; Duel at 9p

Sunday’s Premieres:
TLC: The Singing Office at 9p
Spike TV: The Factory at 10p

NBC programming note: The Baby Borrowers will transition to 9p on Wednesdays starting July 2 with encores from previous week airing at 8p.

Bravo moves its “Real Housewives” franchise to another city as The Real Housewives of Atlanta offers up seven episodes surrounding the real lives of five socially elite southern belles. A 30m preview of the new series will air July 30 at 12a. True Entertainment, a division of Endemol produces the series for Bravo.

USA Network picked up the cable network rights to air The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian from Disney ABC Domestic TV for approximately $15 million, per Variety. The terms of the deal also allow USA to air some runs of the movie on its sister network, SCI FI Channel. Following the premium pay cable run on Starz next summer, USA’s four and a half year contract for the movie begins September 2010. DADT will also have an opportunity to sell the film to another network within USA’s contract period.

The Africa Channel, the U.S.-based network that highlights Africa and African culture, will launch in Los Angeles July 29 via Time Warner Cable (TWC). This launch is an extension of the national affiliation pact made between The Africa Channel and TWC last November.

CBS Corporation will finalize its tender offer for all remaining shares of common stock of CNET Networks, Inc. The deal will be complete in the next several business days and in the end, CBS will own about 78% of the outstanding shares of CNET common stock.

Little Rock-based Equity Media Holdings, which revealed its financial difficulties in April, sold Retro Television Network to Luken Communications for $18.5 million. Henry Luken III is Equity’s largest shareholder and, according to terms of the agreement, Equity can buy back the network at any time in the next six months based on a formula price.

Both Aidan Quinn and Rutger Hauer will join the ensemble cast of ABC’s drama pilot Prince of Motor City produced by ABC Studios, according to THR. The soap storyline based on Hamlet is about Billy Hamilton, a young Harvard philosophy prof who returns to Detroit to run his family’s auto company following his father’s death. Aidan will play Billy’s uncle Charlie Hamilton and Rutger will play the father who appears to his son as a ghost.

Jeff Goldblum will next co-star on USA Network’s Law & Order: Criminal Intent replacing Chris Noth who leaves the series after three seasons. The series recently moved to USA from NBC and was renewed by the cable network for an eighth season with 16 new episodes. The series, produced by Wolf Films/NBCU Cable Studio, gets a repeat window on NBC.

Comedian Katt Williams is expected to sign a deal with Comedy Central for a sketch comedy series pilot and a special, reports Variety. Katt’s current comedy tour, “It’s Pimpin’ Pimpin’ will conclude July 4 in Las Vegas, and the special was shot during the Washington, D.C. tour stop.

Casting Call: FOX’s American Idol has set auditions for the eighth season of the competition reality series. Men and women 16-28 years old as of July 15, 2008 and eligible to work in the U.S. can apply. There are some restrictions; visit americanidol.com for specific details and more information on the following audition cities and dates: July 17: San Francisco; July 21: Louisville; July 25: Phoenix; July 29: Salt Lake City; August 2: San Juan, Puerto Rico; August 8: Kansas City; August 13: Jacksonville; August 19: East Rutherford, NJ.

CYNOPSIS DIGITAL – TODAY’S TOP STORY:  With Yahoo squarely in its review mirror Microsoft is out spending like a drunken sailor. The company agreed to buy both Portuguese mobile software creator MobiComp and (according to VentureBeat) Silicon Valley-based semantic search engine Powerset on Thursday. (No purchase prices were announced.) MobiComp designs contact and calendar suites for handsets as well as social networking plug-ins for sites such as Facebook. Powerset has developed an algorithm that gleans meaning from phrases or partial sentences. One of Powerset’s most popular tools so far is an iPhone app that speeds information retrieval from Wikipedia.  Full edition: CYN DIGITAL.

CYNOPSIS KIDS – TODAY’S TOP STORY: DQ Entertainment Plc. enters into a $100 million multi-year co-production agreement with MoonScoop Group.  Under the deal DQ and MoonScoop plan to co-produce five TV series and two feature films for global release, with either a TV series or movie bowing each year of the agreement.  At least one of the co-productions could be based on Indian mythology.  The two already work together on the animated TV series Casper’s Scare School, a co-production with Classic Media and is set to bow in 2009, and Fantastic Four.  Furthermore, DQ and Moonscoop will also direct efforts towards new media development, in keeping with MoonScoop’s kid-centric VOD and broadband efforts Kabillion (US) and Taffy Kids (Europe).   Full edition: CYN KIDS.

CYNOPSIS INTERNATIONAL – TODAY’S TOP STORY: Show me the money seems to be the saying of the day for London’s ITV Worldwide after the company tripled its development and acquisitions investment fund.  The money will mainly be used to grow its collaborations with indie producers.  In the indie production bend, it already has a 25% stake in Mammoth Screen, exclusive first look deals with Zig Zag and Quickfire Media and distribution deals with U.K., Canadian and Australian producers.  Full edition: CYN INTERNATIONAL.

Wednesday – A18-49 Analysis:  FOX led a toe-tapping win Wednesday night with 3.1/10 A18-49, according to final national ratings from Nielsen Media Research. FOX’s So You Think You Can Dance beat the competition at 8p with 2.9/10 and again at 9p with a 3.3/10. During 9p, NBC premiered the new reality series Baby Borrowers which finished second at 2.9/9. Then at 10p, NBC’s Celebrity Circus won by a skosh at 2.0/6 over the debut of ABC’s Primetime: Crime at 1.9/6. 

Live + Same Day Household Ratings: Wednesday, June 25, 2008 time period averages. Source: NTI Galaxy, as dated. Live+SD.

FOX: 5.1/9         So You Think You Can Dance 5.1/9

CBS: 4.9/9          Price Is Right Primetime [r] 4.1/8, Criminal Minds [r] 5.4/9, CSI: NY [r] 5.2/9

NBC: 4.2/7          Deal or No Deal 4.4/8, Baby Borrowers [p] 4.9/8, Celebrity Circus 3.4/6

ABC: 3.6/6          Wife Swap 3.0/6, SuperNanny 2.8/5, Primetime: Crime [p] 4.8/8

UNIV: 2.2/4         Al Diablo con los Guapos 2.4/4, Fuego en la Sangre 2.3/4, Don Francisco Presenta 1.9/3

CW: 1.2/2           America’s Next Top Model [r] 0.8/1, Farmer Wants A Wife 1.6/3

MNT: 0.7/1          Under One Roof [r] 0.8/1, Whacked Out Videos [r] 0.6/1, Impossible Magic [r] 0.7/1

TELE: 0.6/1         La Traicion 0.5/1, Victoria 0.7/1, Sin Senos No Hay Paraiso 0.7/1

A18-49: FOX 3.1/10, NBC 2.2/7, ABC 1.7/5, UNIV 1.7/5, CBS 1.6/5, CW 0.7/2, MNT 0.4/1, TELE 0.4/1

ESPN promoted Rosa Gatti to SVP/Communications Counsel and Corporate Outreach and Chris LaPlaca to SVP/Corporate Communications. Both have worked at ESPN since 1980. Rosa will concentrate on ESPN’s burgeoning V Foundation and various outreach efforts and offer counsel on communications issues. Chris will manage the network’s external and internal communications activities and will be a main contact with The Walt Disney Company’s Corporate Communications and Investor Relations groups. Chris will now report to George Bodenheimer, President, ESPN.

Brent Haynes joined MTV in the new position as SVP/Series Development, East Coast, reporting directly to Liz Gateley, SVP/Series Development. Brent will focus on development and production projects generated by the east coast office, including reality series. He will also be involved with scripted series projects that complement those coming from the west coast office. In addition, Brent will manage the development staff based on the east coast.

SCI FI Channel recruited Tim Krubsack as VP/Alternative Programming where he will supervise the network’s development slate for unscripted reality programming. Tim will report to Mark Stern, SVP/Original Programming.

Kevin Cordero and Sharon Gensler recently launched a new post-production consulting company called The Reformatting Group based in New York City. The duo has more than 40 years of television program reformatting experience and their new enterprise can handle the reformatting of new acquisitions, formatting hi-def replacements for current programming and re-versioning library programming for digital channels on behalf of cable operators.  Go Kevin & Sharon!

Platform A appointed Russ Stein as Category Sales Director/Finance. Previously, Russ was with BBC World as Regional Director of the Americas.

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Friday Fun Fact: Crocodiles swallow stones, which act as a ballast, to help them dive deeper.

This day in History: 2005 – In Alaska’s Denali National Park, a dinosaur track from a three-toed Cretaceous period dinosaur was discovered. It was reported to be roughly 70-million years old.

Answer to Yesterday’s Trivia Question: Feets Too Big, written and performed by Leon Redbone was the theme song for what early ’90s TV series?  ? HARRY AND THE HENDERSONS Kudos to: Sean Fassett-AMC/NY; David Stern-BARD Entertainment/NY; Synda Kollman-Charter Marketing Group/Boca Raton, FL; Greg Scordato/NY; Hal Pontious-Showplace Television Syndication/Chicago; Eric Merrill-MFI Austin/Austin, TX; Karen Frost-Signature Media Group/Chicago; Lilian Lemer-MyMac Productions/LA; Dan Matson-20th Television/MyNetwork TV/LA; Susan Nessanbaum-Goldberg- M and S Entertainment/LA; Coleen Raymann-Disney-ABC/Burbank

Today’s Trivia Question:  What reality series uses the song Livin’ on the Edge (Aerosmith) as its theme song?   (Email
with your answer and be sure to include your name, company, city and time zone. Unofficial rules: Only the second four correct answers from each time zone will be mentioned; and once you’ve been mentioned in any of the Cynopsis editions, you can’t be mentioned again that calendar week.)

Later — Cyn
06.27.08

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WHAT’S ON TONIGHT – Friday, June 27, 2008

ABC: Dance Machine [p ], Duel, 20/20
AZTECA: Viernes Espectacular: The Lost Boys, Historias Engarzadas, Bellezas Indomables
CBS: Ghost Whisperer [r], Numb3rs [r], Numb3rs [r]
CW: Friday Night Smackdown!
FOX: Movie: Triple X: State of the Union
ION: Movie: A Storm in Summer [7p], Movie: The Long Way Home
MNT: My Friday Night Movie: Say It Isn’t So
NBC: Most Outrageous Moments [r], Most Outrageous Moments [r], Dateline
PBS: Washington Week, Now on PBS, Bill Moyers’ Journal, Churchill (Conclusion)[r]
TELE: La Traicion, Victoria, Sin Senos No Hay Paraiso
UNIV: Al Diablo con los Guapos, Fuego on la Sangre, Fabrica de Risas

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