CYNTHIA TURNER’S
CYNOPSIS

01/21/04

Good morning. It’s Wednesday, January 21, 2004, and this is your first early morning briefing.

Fox cleaned everyone’s clock on Monday night with a massive demo haul thanks to the corrosive Simon Cowell, and one Big Fat Obnoxious Fiance.  For the evening, Fox delivered 24.7 million viewers on Monday evening, an A18-49 rating of 11.2/26 according to fast affiliate ratings from Nielsen Media Research.  NBC was second for the night with a 5.6/13, followed by CBS 4.3/10, ABC 2.2/5, WB 1.8/4, UPN 1.0/2.  At 8pm and airing until 9:07pm, American Idol premiered with 12.5/30 A18-49 rating, with 28.2 million viewers, and across the demo board a 15.4/39 demo rating for W18-34, 14.4/22 among W18-49 and a 14.2/29 among W25-54.  Female Teens managed a 4 share, male teens a 26 share.  NBC’s double double twin power on Fear Factor airing from 8-10po and perhaps hoping to derail Fox just a bit, had little effect, tho ranked #2 for the time frame posting a 5.6/13 A18-49.  Beginning at 9:07 and airing until 10p, Fox premiered its reality series My Big Fat Obnoxious Fiance delivered a 9.9/22 A18-49 with 21.3 million viewers.  At 10p, with Fox primetime now off the air, CBS and NBC duked it out, each posting a 5.6/13 for CSI Miami and Average Joe Hawaii, respectively.

Award winning journalist Jerry Nachman, 57 and MSNBC VP/Editor-in-Chief, died on Tuesday night at his home in New Jersey.  He had been battling cancer for the past year. Jerry had a long and varied career – News Director for WNBC/New York; VP/News, WCBS/New York and Editor-in-Chief for the New York Post.  He was also a radio and television reporter for WCBS, as well as a columnist for the Post.  His career included being the VP/GM of WRC Radio and Television, both NBC properties in Washington DC.   In 2001, Jerry was a primetime drama staff writer on UC:Undercover as well as staff writer on Bill Maher’s Politically Incorrect.  His last assignment for MSNBC was reporting on the Michael Jackson case out of California.  He co-anchored the PBS KCET series Life and Times Tonight and he wrote a short film for the American Film Institute that won the 1999 Oscar in the student competition.  He has also been the recipient of the Peabody Award, an Edward R. Murrow Award presented by the RTNDA, and an Emmy Award. A memorial service will be held on Thursday, January 29th at 11:45am at the Riverside Chapel, 331 Amsterdam at 76th Street, in Manhattan. In lieu of flowers, his family has requested that donations be made in Jerry’s name to the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center online or by mail: Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, PO Box 27106, New York, NY 10087-7106.

The Hallmark Channel has created an new ad sales unit designed to work with advertisers in showcasing their message within the programming content.  The Sponsorship Solutions Unit will utilize the Hallmark branded movies, presented with less commercial time with the intent of increasing the enjoyment of the movie, and offer the net’s advertisers an opportunity to position its brand and message within the movies.   According to Bill Abbott, EVP/National Ad Sales for Hallmark Channel, the network “is providing new and creative answers to our clients’ changing needs, helping them stand-out in a cluttered advertising landscape.  The opportunities that we are creating will help them capture the viewers’ attention which is their ultimate goal.”

The X Games are coming! The X Games are coming!  ESPN and ABC will air the Winter X Games beginning January 24-27, with coverage on ABC Sports, ESPN and ESPN2, both with live programming during the daytime and in prime. The games will be held  at Buttermilk, an Aspen/Snowmass are mountain, where they will air each year through 2007 according to a new agreement with the Aspen Skiing Company.  Last January, the games drew more than 48,000 spectators (12,000 more than 2002).

According to a report by Television Week, Larry Elder, reported in chats for a potential talk show with Warner Bros., is more specifically chatting with Telepictures, and Telepictures is in turn in the midst of serious negotiations with the CBS O&O group.  That would fill the void in the event King World decides not to go forward with Living It Up with Ali & Jack for its second season (tho nothing official whatsoever from King World on that question).  Additionally Steve Harvey and Telepictures are reportedly talking with the folks at Tribune for a group launch deal for his talk show.   Nothing mind you has been said officially about any of these little nuggets.

Couple of quick post-NATPE stats for you:

• Paramount has cleared The Insider in 90% of the country
• New Line Television‘s The Twilight Zone is also cleared on New York’s WPIX, Los Angeles’ KCAL/KCBS, and WGN Superstation, bring the total for this show up to more than 91% of the country
• 20th‘s Ambush Makeover has now cleared in 70% of the US, Stations with these recently signed on:  NBC O&O stations in San Francisco (KNTV) and Miami (WTVJ), Tribune-owned WXIN in Indianapolis, Sinclair-owned WPGH vin Pittsburgh and Bay Cities-owned XETV in San Diego. Other recent clearances include Green Bay’s WGBA, Wichita’s KAKE and Ft. Myers’ WINK.

TV Guide Channel is getting into the original program arena with the debut of What’s On with host Leslie Ann Machado will be a guide to a viewer’s options to each hour of primetime viewing.  Airing Sunday through Friday at 7pm, as well as an updated show at 8pm and 9pm, the show will make various recommendations as to what is worth watching in the upcoming hour. Other original programming will include weekly programs such as TV Guide Close-Up (up close and personal on television’s hottest properties) which airs on Saturdays at 7pm; and TV Talk with celebs talking TV, airs on Saturdays at 8pm.TV Guide will launch on DirecTV on Friday, January 23, which brings TVG very close to the 70 million mark.  Additional carriage deal was also struck with Mediacom LLC and Mediacom Broadband LLC, for a multi-year deal, as well as carriage agreements with Insight Communications, RCN, Cox Communications and Cebridge Connection systems.

With the above programming and carriage announcements from TV Guide Channel, come the appointments of several new staff members in the Programming and Production Division.  Scott Woodward has been named VP/Production; Mark Phillips, Exec Prod; Eddie Delbridge, Supervising Prod; and Natalia Garcia, Supervising Prod., along with Paul Adler, Anita Devi McConnell, and Jan Landis were all promoted to Supervisor Prod.  They will also report to Danila Koverman, TV Guide Channel’s SVP/Programming and Production, located in LA.

Anthony White, Ph.D. has been named SVP/Futures Director, Western Region for Initiative Los Angeles. Anthony will be responsible for overseeing media research and analysis for Initiative’s western region. He will serve as a primary research contact for many Initiative clients and will manage important custom research projects.  Anthony reports to David Ernst, EVP/Director, Futures and Technologies. 

Monday, January 19, 2004. Fast Affiliate Ratings for all Networks. Fast affiliate numbers which reflect time period data, not program data, and can change slightly once the finals come in, particularly for LIVE programming (i.e. Football). Source Nielsen Media Research. Time Period Averages Only. [p] = Premiere; [o] = Original; [r] = Repeat

Fox     14.0/20 American Idol [p] 15.5/23, My Big Fat Obnoxious Fiance [p] 12.4/18

CBS     8.3/12  Yes Dear 5.3/8, Still Standing 6.0/9, Raymond 8.6/12, Two and a Half Men 8.6/12, CSI Miami 10.6/17

NBC     7.1/11  Fear Factor (2 hrs) 7.1/10, Average Joe: Hawaii 4.3/7

ABC     4.6/7   ABC Monday Night Movie: Meet the Parents 4.7/7, InStyle Celebrity Weddings (OTO)        4.3/7

WB      3.7/5   7th Heaven 3.6/5, Everwood 3.8/5

UPN     1.8/3   The Parkers1.6/2, Eve 1.6/2, Girlfriends 2.0/3, Half & Half 1.9/3

A18-49  Fox 11.2/26, NBC 5.6/13, CBS 4.3/10, ABC 2.2/5, WB 1.8/4, UPN 1.0/2

A MESSAGE FROM WARNER BROS. DOMESTIC CABLE DISTRIBUTION

The History Channel presents This Day in History:
1990 – MTV’s “Unplugged” made its debut with Squeeze as the first performers

Answer to Yesterday’s Trivia Question: Who was primetime television’s first character to get a face lift? “and then there’s MAUDE!”  Kudos to: Audrey Davis-Lippin Group/NY; Susan LaMacchia-Sony Pictures Television/NY; Pauline Derosier-Landon Media Group/NY; Eric Stone-WBNX/Cleveland; Barb Throm-Smart Media/St. Louis; Tom Boyd-WGN/Chicago; Tiffany Clark-KHOU/Houston; Tamera Mellish-Mindshare; Debbi Gourley-Olympic Promotions/Sacramento; David Klein-TNS Research/LA; David Primuth-GSN/LA; Donna Perris-KABC/LA; Cynthia Kennedy-A&E/London.

Today’s Trivia Question:   Who worked at the New York Chronicle?    (click here to respond to the trivia question and please be sure to include with your answer your name, company, city and time zone. Only the second four correct responses from each time zone will be listed in tomorrow’s kudo list.)

Later — Cyn

Cynthia Turner’s Cynopsis
01/21/04   1:13am ET
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WHAT’S ON TONIGHT:  WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 21, 2004

COURT TV:       I, Detective, Forensic Files, North Mission Road, Dominick Dunne
ABC             My Wife & Kids, It’s All Relative, The Bachelorette, Celebrity Mole: Yucatan
CBS             60 Minutes, King of Queens [r], Becker, 48 Hours
FOX             American Idol, The O.C.
NBC             The Apprentice, West Wing [r], Law & Order [r]
PAX             AFV, Early Edition, Diagnosis Murder
UPN             Star Trek Enterprise, Top Model [r]
WB              Smallville, Angel
TELE            Amor Descardo, El Alma Herida, Mujeres Apasionadas
UNIV            Velo de Novia, Te Amare en Silencio, Don Francisco Presenta