Source:  NTI, Galaxy Explorer, 4/25-5/1/05, HH Cov Rtg. Movies=TC, Series=Trackage.  Dukes=M-F 7p, Pure Country=Sat 7:30p, also tie Top 20 Countdown.

CYNTHIA TURNER’S
Cynopsis

05/10/05

Good morning.  It’s Tuesday, May 10, 2005, and this is your first early morning briefing.

By the time someone yelled “Play Ball” last night at the NY Mets vs. Chicago Cubs game, Fox Sports Net was back on the air in metropolitan NY and further upstate as Time Warner Cable and the networks of MSG and Cablevision came to terms.  The two sparring partners signed off on a multi-year carriage deal that includes MSG Network, Fox Sports Net NY, and three Fox Sports digital networks.  You’ll recall the disagreement between the two came to a head last July when Time Warner pulled the networks off its system.  Come August, they agreed to put the networks back on the air as their negotiations continued.  At issue was an 18% requested Cablevision rate hike. Time Warner wasn’t as keen on the rate increase, particularly since it knew the NY Mets deal with Fox expired at the end of next season.  They’d been through that before when they lost the Yankees.

Alleging that Disney shareholders were intentionally led astray, Roy E. Disney and Stanley P. Gold, former members of Disney’s Board of Directors, filed a lawsuit in Delaware Chancery Court yesterday against the Disney company and select Board members, stating that the company, “…used Company resources to promote Iger’s candidacy and did not in good faith seriously consider any other candidate.”  Disney and Gold claim that  the Disney Board conducted “its CEO search in order to induce shareholders to vote for the incumbent Board at the 2005 meeting and to induce Messrs. Disney and Gold not to run an alternate slate of directors at that meeting.”  Disney and Gold also filed suit against Robert A. Iger, Michael D. Eisner, Judith L. Estrin, John S. Chen, Aylwin B. Lewis, Monica C. Lozano, George J. Mitchell and Leo J. O’Donovan, S.J., for “fraud and breach of the duty of disclosure in connection with the Board’s public statements about the search for a replacement for outgoing CEO Michael Eisner.”  Disney and Gold have petitioned the court to “void the 2005 election of Disney Company directors and to compel the Company to hold another election for directors after full and fair disclosure of all material facts about the CEO selection process. Messrs. Disney and Gold are also asking the Court to enjoin the Company and the Board from changing either Eisner’s or Iger’s compensation or employment contracts.”

Tonight’s Finale:
CBS:  The Amazing Race at 9p

King of Queens star Kevin James has signed to remain with the show for an additional season, which seems to indicate the show is a shoe-in for next season’s CBS primetime lineup. And yet, as the deal also includes a feature film component with Sony Pictures, so you can’t rely 100% on the indicators. But with Raymond off the schedule next year, I’d take the bet.

20th Television has signed a two year development deal with the guys behind American Dad, Mike Barker and Matt Weitzman. The deal calls for them to continue their work with American Dad, and develop new comedies for Fox studio.

Sundance Channel, Grey Goose Entertainment, and Condè Nast Media Group announced their new 6-episode series called Iconoclasts.  The program is scheduled to debut on Sundance in November. Each episode will bring together two leading creative innovators from different fields including film and television, architecture and design, fashion, food, music, and sports. One will act as a guide into the world of the other to explore their creative process, their inspirations and their passions. In the process, the audience will be immersed in the life and work of a rule-breaking creative visionary, from the perspective of an admirer.

WorldNow and the ABC Owned Station Division have announced will create Local Media Network, an aggregated online advertising network that they promise will be one of the largest news and information networks in the United States. It will launch with 147 local TV websites, which believe they will be able to compete head to head in news with the likes of Yahoo!, MSN, AOL and Google for ad dollars, and adding the extra component of being able to target advertising by market or region.  LMN will offer advertisers a variety of ways to reach their target audiences from online video to behavioral targeting, from audience dayparting to contextual advertising. 

Nielsen Media Research and UPN are working together to figure out how to balance out the differences between Nielsen’s African-American women viewing samples for the network’s Monday primetime comedy block, according to Variety.  Since last year, Nielsen’s audience sampling has undergone changes that are now creating confusion with an apparent 19% decrease in viewing with the use of the Local People Meters.  It seems that African American women were over-represented in the 2003-4 season by 3 percentage points in Local People Meter markets and may be slightly under-represented in the samplings now by a 1 percentage point.  Nielsen and UPN corrected the figures which then showed only a small drop for this particular part of the population and a Monday night W18-34 average performance of 2.1 from 8-10p.  The time slot in question includes UPN’s One on One, Cuts, Girlfriends and Half & Half. 

A tradition that seems to have gone on for decades is ABC‘s airing of The Ten Commandments on Easter Sunday.  Maybe its just the length of the Charleton Heston film that makes this tradition seem so steep.  In any case, ABC and Hallmark Entertainment are teaming up to produce a new Ten Commandments miniseries with a cast that will include Omar Sharif, Dougray Scott (as Moses), Mia Maestro and Naveen Andrews, among others.  Production is scheduled to being in about 2 weeks in Morocco, and the finished version is on the schedule for next year.  Robert Halmi, Sr., is on board as exec prod, with Robert Dornhelm directing the epic written by Ron Hutchinson.

National Lampoon has developed an innovative idea to cast the short-term hosts of its upcoming National Lampoon’s Reality Bar Crawl by auctioning off two guest host spots on eBay.  Managed by online auction agency Kompolt, the auction will run May 9-19, and the two guest spots will be listed separately (must be over 21).  One high bidder will travel through Michigan and the other thru North Carolina, each making at least three club appearances in three different cities and joined by at least two participants from popular reality series including Real World, SI: Swimsuit Model Search and/or Road Rules.  10% of the winning bids will go to charity.  For more information, check out www.ebay.com/nationallampoon.

USA Network will launch a rebranding campaign next month with the tagline: Characters Welcome, shining the light on their programs’ cast of characters and creating an overall lighter tone to the net.  The tagline will be used as the network highlights its programming slate – including WWE (starting in October), The 4400, Monk, Deadzone and off-net L&O: SVU.

The Country Music Awards is changing venues come November 2006, switching from longtime broadcast partner CBS (since 1972) to ABC.  CBS had been paying a fee of $9 million for the awards fest, and according to Variey, ABC picked it up enough notches to turn CMA’s head.

VH1 returns in July with Celebrity Fit Club and participants for this go-around will include:  Wendy Kaufman (aka the Snapple Lady), Willie Aames (Charles In Charge), Jani Lane (frontman of rock group Warrant), Phil Margera (Viva La Bam), Victoria Jackson (Saturday Night Live), Tocarra (America’s Next Top Model), Gary Busey and Jackée Harry.

The Untitled Carlos Mencia Project for Comedy Central now has a real name and real premiere date — The Mind of Mencia kicks off on July 7.  The sieres is based on Mencia’s POV of the world, current events and just plain goofing on people.

Lifetime will debut its newest reality series You’re Not the Man I Married in early June.

ABC News’ Good Morning America has upped Robin Roberts to full time co-anchor along side Diane Sawyer and Charles Gibson.  She will continue her news anchor job while adding her new anchor responsibilities. No word if a full time news anchor will be added. Robin joined GMA in 1995 as a contributor, being named News Anchor in 2002. She’s also been working with ESPN since 1990 and as recently as last season participated in several Sunday morning SportsCenters, though that will come to an end with her new upping.

Beth Coleman has been named VP, Spike TV Ad Sales Research.  The announcement was made by Laura E. Wendt, SVP/Research for Nickelodeon Networks, to whom she will report. In her new position, Beth will be responsible for overseeing the Spike TV ad sales research team, which supports sales efforts with research and sales marketing data.  Additionally, she will be in charge of projecting both long-term and short-term audiences. 

World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc. has hired Brett Wingate as VP/Creative Services reporting to Kurt Schneider, EVP/Marketing. Brett is charged with overseeing the WWE Creative department and providing direction, from concept through execution, of all creative materials to support the WWE brand and its marketing initiatives in print and online campaigns.

After 30 years in the network news business, Bob McNamara has set his retirement date from CBS News for the end of June.  He will be 61.  He says his plan is to try longform TV journalism, compiling stories that last longer than the usual primetime network length of a max of three minutes.

Sunday – A18-49 Analysis- May Sweep Day #11:  Sunday was a barn burner for ABC delivering a solid 7.1/20 A18-49, according to fast affiliate ratings from Nielsen Media Research.  Fox led the rest of the group with a 3.5/10, followed by CBS 3.2/9, NBC 3.0/8, WB 0.9/3.  At 7p CBS, NBC and Fox were all in a dead tie, each posting an 8 share; ABC was behind with a 7 share, and WB a 2 share.  The difference begins at 8p when ABC begins to pull away from the pack, posting a 6.0/17 for Extreme Makeover Home Edition, above Fox’s 4.2/12 for its hour of The Simpsons.  Desperate Housewives easily won at 9p with an 11.4/27, while Fox’s combo of Family Guy and American Dad posted a 4.1/10.   Grey’s Anatomy held more than 80% of its lead-in, delivering an 8.7/22 for ABC.  CBS’ part one of its CBS Movie Elvis (9-11p) drew a 3.9/9, #2(T) for the 2-hour block behind ABC, and tied with NBC.

Fast Affiliate Ratings:   Sunday, May 8, 2005, for all Networks – time period averages.  Source: Nielsen Media Research. 

ABC     10.1/17  AFV 4.4/9, EM: Home Edition 8.5/15, Desperate Housewives 15.6/24, Grey’s Anatomy 11.9/20

CBS     8.7/15   60 Minutes 7.3/15, Cold Case 9.5/16, CBS Movie: Elvis (part 1) 9.0/14

NBC     5.7/10   Dateline 4.0/8, The Contender 3.8/7, L&O: Criminal Intent 7.3/11, Crossing Jordan 7.5/12

FOX     4.6/8    King/Hill 3.0/6, Malcolm 3.1/6, Simpsons 5.2/9, Simpsons 5.8/10, Family Guy 5.5/8, American Dad 4.8/7

WB      1.5/3    Charmed [r] 1.0/2, Charmed 2.0/3, Steve Harvey’s Big Time 1.4/2

A18-49                ABC 7.1/20, Fox 3.5/10, CBS 3.2/9, NBC 3.0/8, WB 0.9/3

A CYNOPSIS MESSAGE FROM COURT TV

The History Channel presents This Day in History:
1994 – After suffering years as a political prisoner in the struggle against apartheid, Nelson Mandela is inaugurated as the first black president of South Africa.

Answer to Yesterday’s trivia question:  Drawn by cartoon Bob McKay on the sitcom Bob starring Bob Newhart, this veterinarian superhero was the centerpiece of Bob’s comic book world.  What was this character’s name?  MAD DOG.  Kudos to: Christina Owen-Millenia 3 Comm/Atlanta; Anne Marie Whyte-Cedar Point/Sandusky; John Giaccio Telerep/NY; Matt Willience ITN Networks, NY; Stephanie Reed-KJTL/Wichita Falls; Bret Calvert-KSAT/San Antonio; Ken Mueller-Comcast Spotlight/Dallas; Les Stipp-GSD&M/Chicago; Tom Killgallon-KTTV KCOP/LA; Dave Sikula-Yahoo/Sunnyvale; Len Klatt-Premier Radio Networks/LA; Ken Dubow-Modern Ent/Amsterdam

A CYNOPSIS MESSAGE FROM COURT TV

Today’s trivia question:  During upfront week nearly a decade ago when UPN and the WB was just starting out, there was a sitcom starring Flex and Darryl M. Bell.  Their sci-fi sitcom also starred Rhona L. Barrett as the sassy-computer generated personality.  What was this short lived series and what was Barrett’s character’s name? (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.)

A CYNOPSIS MESSAGE FROM SUPERSTATION WGN

Later — Cyn
05.10.05  5:17am
Cynopsis Ad Sales – Barbara Shapiro – 203-583-1224 /

Classified Ad Sales – Cynthia Turner – 203.381-9096 /

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JOB OPENING:  EXEC ASST-Authentic Ent./LA.  Entry level to assist in dev/prod. Org., creative, skilled w/graphics, editing, and writing a +.  More co. info: www.authentictv.com. Resumes:
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JOB OPENING: SENIOR AD SALES RESEARCH ANALYST/Discovery Nets-NY: Min 4 yrs research exp. & proficiency in Nielsen systems required. Strong communication/computer skills. Resume/salary req. to
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JOB OPENING:  RESEARCH ANALYST/Comcast Spotlight-Atlanta. 2+ yrs sales/mktg research exp. Exc comm & computer skills. Knwldg of industry res tools/sftwr; able to teach res concepts, sftwr/apps. Apply Online: www.Comcast.com EOE  (5/13)

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JOB OPENING:  PBS wants a KIDS BRAND & PROMO DIRECTOR with 6-8 yrs leadership exp in brand mgmt and promotions esp. with kids and parent brands; media background preferred. For more info and to apply, visit www.pbs.org/jobs. EOE  (5/11)

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WHAT’S ON TONIGHT:  TUESDAY, MAY 10, 2005

ABC              My Wife & Kids, George Lopez, According to Jim , Blind Justice
CBS              NCIS, Amazing Race [finale]
FOX              American Idol, House
NBC              Most Outrageous Game Show Moments [r], Scrubs, Will & Grace, Law & Order: SVU
PAX              Lie Detector, Cold Turkey, Diagnosis Murder
UPN              All of Us, Eve, Veronica Mars
WB               Gilmore Girls, One Tree Hill
TELE             Amarte Asi (7p), Los Platedos, Deciones
UNIV             Apuesta por un Amor, La Madrastra, Casos de la Vida Real