CYNTHIA TURNER’S
Cynopsis

08/08/05

Good morning.  It’s Monday, August 8, 2005, and this is your first early morning briefing. Remember, if you’d rather listen than read, you can sign up for the Cynopsis: In Your Ear podcast available for download each morning by 630a at www.cynopsis.com or via iTunes 4.9, listed in the podcast directory under “News.”

A terribly sad way to begin the week.  Charles Gibson and Diane Sawyer broke the news last night at 11:41pm that Peter Jennings died on Sunday at his New York home following his battle with cancer.  He was 67. Jennings announced just last April he had lung cancer, and would be taking some time off to deal with it, but expected to return to the anchor chair from time to time.  While he was occasionally active with his editorial and news staff at ABC News (most recently having written a piece read by Charles Gibson on the evening news about the terrorist attacks in London on July 7), he never returned  to the air. Jennings was born in Canada where his father Charles was a network news anchor and later head of the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. news division.  Peter’s first on-air job was at the age of 9 when he had his own radio show in Ottawa.  His first job as a news reporter came when he worked for a radio station in Ontario, and shortly thereafter became a news anchor at Canadian Television.  He joined ABC News in 1964, where he had worked ever since. As a foreign correspondent, he opened ABC’s first news bureau in Beirut in 1968, where he stayed for the next seven years. He was at the Munich Summer Olympics during the Israeli hostage crisis in 1972. In 1978 Jennings joined Frank Reynolds and Max Robinson as the third spoke in the ABC World News Tonight anchor team.  In 1983, his new anchoring became a solo job, and in 1986 World News Tonight with Peter Jennings led the evening news ratings, where it remained on top for the next decade. He was on the air for more than 25 straight hours for the 2000 Millennium celebration, and the constant face of ABC News in the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks.  He has been and always will be, deeply missed.

Fox will return with a second season of Hell’s Kitchen (Granada America/A.Smith & Co.) and Chef Gordon Ramsay.  The summer reality series surprised many with its regular time period win on Mondays nights in the coveted A18-49 demo, an accomplishment attributed largely to Ramsay himself.   While Ramsay began the series as a Simon Cowell sound alike, unlike Simon he also showed a humorous and even “nice” side, setting him apart from many of the other apprentice style programs. Naturally, Fox is saying there will be new twists in the next season, tho declined to elaborate.

Fox Reality Channel (FRC) has picked up several unscripted series from New Zealand’s Touchdown Television.  This is a first buy from a New Zealand company for the reality network.  FRC is importing two seasons of Touchdown’s flagship Treasure Island and the action adventure The Bounty Hunters.  In addition, the network acquired the rights to Treasure Island Extreme (first aired on New Zealand’s TV2 network). 

Weekend Box Office Estimates: August 5-7, 2005
Dukes of Hazzard (Warner Bros.)                $30.5 million – opening weekend
Wedding Crashers (New Line)                      $16.5 million – 4 wk total $144.1m
Charlie & the Choc Factory (Warner Bros.)  $10.5 million – 4 wk total $169.0m
Sky High (Buena Vista)                                  $9.0 million – 2 wk total $32.0m
Must Love Dogs (Warner Bros.)                   $7.4 million – 2 wk total $26.3m
March of the Penguins (Warner Ind.)            $7.1 million – 7 wk total $26.4m
Stealth (Sony)                                                $5.8 million – 2 wk total $24.5m
Fantastic Four (Fox)                                      $4.1 million – 4 wk total $143.8m
War of the Worlds (Paramount)                    $3.6 million – 6 wk total $224.6m
The Island (Dreamworks)                              $3.1 million – 3 wk total $30.9m
Source: Box Office Mojo

ESPN:

• Knight School:  A new reality series starring basketball coach Bobby Knight.  ESPN has ordered 6 one-hour episodes.  Knight is currently coaching at Texas Tech.

CBS:

• NCIS (Paramount Network Television):  Lauren Holly joins the cast as the new love interest for Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs played by Mark Harmon.  Holly will play Jenny Shepard, the new head of the naval investigation unit, and Gibbs’ new boss.

UPN:

• South Beach (Nyuorican Prods/Flame TV/Paramount Network TV) has added Odette Yustman as one of the three key characters in this midseason drama.  Yustman will play Ariel, a role portrayed by Sara Foster in the pilot. 

Bravo:

• Being Bobby Brown (B2 Entertainment/Brownhouze Ent) has been extended by two episodes, bring the full ep count up to 10. That news pushes back the finale date to August 25.

In development at Sony Pictures Television:

• Cooked:  A comedy starring stand up comic Dane Cook and his ensemble of friends including Liz Vassey and Joel David Moore.  Production begins next week.

NBC Universal Television Studio and Wolf Films has signed Rick Eid to a 2-year, 7 figure deal, to produce and develop Dick Wolf’s new project about a group of young D.A.s in NYC.  As yet untitled, the show is scheduled to begin production early this fall.  Eid has been with Wolf as co-exec producer on Law & Order, as well as on the now defunct Law & Order: Trial by Jury.

Casting Call:  It’s being called a Pod-Casting Call.  That is CBS News is looking for an amateur DJ to interview CBS stars and talk about the new falls season shows in a CBS produced podcast.  The DJ will join the CBS Radio Junket next month in LA.  The podcast will ultimately be made available to listeners at CBS.com and Infinity Broadcasting’s KYOURRADIO, a podcast radio station.  If you think you got hte stuff, and uploading a 3-minute mock interview isn’t too daunting, check out this link for more information: http://www.cbs.com/info/user_services/podcasting.shtml

Heidi Diamond, President/Television for Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia is stepping down. She will continue however as a consultant on new business development.  Among many of Heidi’s responsibilities with MSLO, she oversaw the Martha Stewart Living television series as well as Petkeeping with Marc Morrone.  She also developed the business plan for the new syndicated series Martha with NBC Universal Distribution.

Brian Roberts has re-signed with Comcast for an additional four year term as Chairman/CEO.

Executive search firm Spencer Stuart has added George H. Jamison III to the firm’s Stamford office, where he will focus on the recruitment of senior corporate communications executives.  George makes the move to Spencer Stuart from United Technologies Corporation, where he was VP/Communications.  Welcome back to Connecticut, George!

Discovery Networks has upped Joseph Czarkowski to VP/NSM for Discovery Health Channel and BBC AMERICA. Joe reports to Adam Stewart, SVP/NSM for Discovery Networks, U.S. Joe serves as the main advertising sales liaison to various divisions within the company and leads the development and execution of advertising strategies and opportunities for clients on behalf of Discovery Health Channel and BBC AMERICA.  In addition, he manages inventory control, pricing and network positioning in the marketplace.  

The National Geographic Channel (NGC) has announced a new hire in its research department, as well as a promotion and new hire in business and legal affairs.  David Friedlander has been named Director/Research, Banafsheh Parsee has been advanced to Senior Manager/Rights and Distribution and Terri Leftwich has been named Manager/Business and Legal Affairs. David will focus on primary and secondary research, including consumer marketing and programming, as well as Nielsen Media Research and syndicated studies and will report to Brad Dancer, VP/Research and On-Demand.  Banafsheh will spearhead and develop a central system to track, review, archive, manage and distribute all program and marketing assets for NGC’s internal and external clients.  Terri will manage NGC’s contract process, including negotiating programming contracts, and be responsible for all of NGC’s legal matters. Both Banafsheh and Terri will report to Micheal Beller, SVP/Business and Legal Affairs.

Kimberly Fitzgerald has been promoted to SVP/Business Affairs & Legal, for Paramount Domestic Television, reporting to Bruce Pottash, EVP/Business Affairs & Legal.  Kimberly will continue to supervise all business affairs and legal issues for the Division’s syndication and cable sales force, finance and licensing of domestic and off-network series. She will also assist in related matters pertaining to the upcoming split of the Viacom companies.
 

Thursday — A18-49 Analysis:   CBS won Thursday night with an overall 3.5/11 A18-49, according to final numbers from Nielsen Media Research. Following closely clustered were ABC 1.9/6, Fox 1.7/6, UPN 1.6/5, NBC 1.5/5, WB .6/2.  At 8p the elimination episode of Big Brother drew a 2.8/10, with Fox its closest competitor with a 2.0/7 for the hour of back-to-back sitcoms. At 9p a repeat of CSI delivered a 4.4/13.  ABC and NBC both had original fare at 9p – ABC News: Hooking Up drew a 1.7/5 and The Law Firm on NBC a 1.4/4.  At 10p a repeat of Without A Trace out-distanced ABC and NBC, earning a 3.4/10, just two share points ahead of 20/20 on ABC.

FINAL HOUSEHOLD RATINGS: Thursday, August 4,  2005, for all Networks – program averages. Source: Nielsen Media Research. 

CBS     7.7/14          Big Brother 5.3/10, CSI [r] 9.5/16, Without A Trace [r]  8.2/15

ABC     3.7/7           Extreme Makeover [r] 3.2/6, ABC News: Hooking Up 3.0/5, Primetime Live 5.0/9

UPN     2.9/5           WWE Smackdown 2.9/5

NBC     2.8/5    Joey [r] 3.1/6, Will & Grace [r] 2.9/5, The Law Firm 2.8/5,  ER [r] 2.6/5

FOX     2.4/4    That 70’s Show [r] 2.8/6, That 70’s show [r] 2.9/5, The O.C. [r] 2.0/3

WB      1.1/2    Smallville [r] 1.3/3, Everwood [r] .9/1

A18-49            CBS 3.5/11, ABC 1.9/6, Fox 1.7/6, UPN 1.6/5, NBC 1.5/5, WB .6/2

The History Channel presents This Day in History:
1974-Following the Watergate Scandal, President Richard M. Nixon announces that he will be the first President in United States history to resign the nation’s highest office.  A saddened Nixon admirably stated, “By taking this action, I hope that I will have hastened the start of the process of healing which is so desperately needed in America.”

Answer to Friday’s Trivia Question:   In the 1972 Box Office Hit the Poseidon Adventure, just before the ship is struck by a 90′ rogue wave, what song was band singer Nonnie (Carol Lynley) singing?   THE MORNING AFTER     Kudos to:  Lisa Zurawicki-WNYT/Albany; Brian Ricco-BOXTV/NY; Larry Kahn-The Golf Channel/Orlando; Felicia Barlow-Carousel Productions/Annapolis MD; Joanne Stevenson-KOLO TV/Reno; Dale Warshaw-KWBA TV /Tucson; Joan Lee-WB News & Weather/Tucson; Paul Gendreau-PGPR/Studio City CA; Linda Jofery-Sony Pictures Television Research/Culver City CA; Dennis Aimino-KABC/LA; Heidi Flydal-KFMB/San Diego.

A CYNOPSIS MESSAGE FROM COURT TV

Today’s Trivia Question in salute to Peter Jennings:  What happened to Peter Jennings on February 1, 1965 at the age of 26? (click here 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
08.08.05  – 5:08am
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WHAT’S ON TONIGHT:  Monday, August 8, 2005

ABC              Monday Night ABC Football Preseason Special: Hall of Fame Game
CBS              King of Queens [r], Raymond [r], 2-1/2 Men [r], 2-1/2Men, CSI: Miami [r]
FOX              Renovate My Family
NBC              Fear Factor [r], Miss Teen USA
PAX              Doc, Diagnosis Murder, Early Edition
UPN              One on One [r], All of Us [r], Girlfriends [r], Half & Half [r]
WB               7th Heaven [r], Summerland [r]
TELE             El Cuerpo del Deseo, Los Plateados, El Principe Azul
UNIV             Apuesta por un Amor, La Madrasta, Cristina