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LILLE tit $4.95 Etrc The Newsweekly of Television and Radio Vol. 127 No. 39 66th Year 1997 A Cahners Publication able Watch ABC. Our jobs depend on it. Can Team Bloomberg - Tarses Reclaim Prime Time? -1 *******************5 -DIGIT 591 LlilihhnnllllnnIIJIuJIuihlilnLhlulnl BC075184 AUG98 REG8 1827 JOHN C JOHNSON KTVQ -TV 265 WATERTON WAY BILLINGS, NT 59102 -7755 www.americanradiohistory.com OUCH 2001! wooer RES- OUT OF 11 IN ACCESS! 4 Detroit WWJ -TV Pittsburgh KDKA -TV Miami WFOR -TV S. Lake City KUTV -TV Denver KCNC -TV CO- PRODUCED BY DISTRIBUTED AND CO- PRODUCED BY KINGWDRLD COLUMBIA TRI8TAR TELEVISION 01997 Fing World. All R,gflte Reserved www.americanradiohistory.com { SOLD TO CBS 0&0'S, New York WCBS -TV Philadelphia KYW -TV Los Angeles KCBS -TV San Francisco HPIX -TV Chicago WBBM -TV Boston WBZ -TV www.americanradiohistory.com www.americanradiohistory.com http://www.broadcastingcable.com Must Reading from apariAl Fast lack September 22 1997 TOP OF THE WEEK / 4 `Brooklyn South' moves CBS into uncharted ratings territory Brooklyn South will be the first prime time drama on broadcast television to receive a TV- MA -the strongest label possible under the new content ratings system. / 4 Journalists take on ethics and credibility Credibility was a theme at the annual Radio- Televi- sion News Directors Association convention in New i Orleans last week, along with the identity crisis many newspeople feel the industry is enduring. / 6 ABCs Preston edden. Sinclair s David SmiTh and E..e o's Robert Decherd assure senators tnat they plan to offer some HETV. 13 e Westinghouse/CBS Radio buy ARS Mel Karmazin's group is paying $2.6 billion for 98 stations, bringing its total holdings to 175. / 7 MGM roars into talk Meshach Taylor, best known for featured roles in Designing Women and Dare's World, is getting his own talk show. MGM Domestic Television, which is bringing out the one -hour strip for a fall 1998 debut, is taping the show from the MGM Grand's 660-seat Grand Hol ywood Theater. / 10 CABLE / 56 DBS pushes for local station carriage DBS leaders agree that carriage of local signals is one of many major challenges to DBS growth. Cs'p i ht royalty rates and investor confidence are others. / SBC wireline withdrawal fuels sale rumors COVER STORY: Can Team Bloomberg/Tarses PacTel parent SBC's reclaim prime time for ABC? withdrawal from the ABC's ratings decline over the past few seasons is wireline video arena tUcing its toll on the company's bottom line and has has competitors betting ar.alysts urging clients -o avoid Disney stock. /12 it's not likely to stay in Pbotos by Vince Bocci j Mathew Photographic Services the wireless game for long. / 58 PacBell digital TV is offering wireless catie in Las Angeles., 58 BROADCASTING / 23 Oprah stays, King World breathes a sigh of relief TECHNOLOGY 166 Wecks of speculation ended when talk show superstar DVCPRO continues its European invasion Oprah Winfrey agreed to stay another two years, allowing Panasonic's DVCPRO component digital tape format King World to keep its lucrative time spots and its biggest continues to rack up sales in Europe, with new contracts money- maker. / 23 from Universal Studios, BSkyB and German broadcaster King World, Sony `squared' away MDR. / 66 King World and Sony Pictures settled a three -year legal battle, leading to a partnership to produce a revived Hollywood Squares in fall 1998./23 WebTV, NetChannel square off Dean Valentine succeeds Lucie Saihany at UPN. / 24 NetChannel and Microsoft's WebTV offered new products last week that will continue the convergence of TV and the SPECIAL REPORT: Fox: Ten years after Ten years Internet. 70 ago Rupert Murdoch set out to challenge / ABC, CBS and NBC. He succeeded with a Broadcast Ratings ...30 Closed Circuit I I ^fifth Estater 85 slate of irreverent. offbeat and youth - Cable Ratings 65 Datebook 84 For the Record 82 oriented programming that turned the Big Changing Hands 32 Editorials 90 in Brief 88 Three into the Big Four. / 36 Classified 72 Fates & Fortunes R6 Washington Watch..22 Broadcasting & Cable September 22 1997 3 www.americanradiohistory.com 6MsTQLr831711j & li.dDlO Scenes like these from the first episode of 'Brooklyn South' won't necessarily appear in every episode. CBS says. CBS enters new ratings territory Bochco's 'Brooklyn South' is the first prime time drama with a TV-MA rating By Lynette Rice and subsequent weeks, Moonves said. Paige Albiniak Language lesson "IThe use of the rating is an impor- Brooklyn South's TV -MA rating is not tant first step in restoring the public's t took four days, 100 technicians, 31 based strictly on the show's graphic faith in a voluntary ratings system," actors and that many more extras- violence. BROADCASTING & CABLE kept said House Telecommunications Sub- all at a cost of $400.000. score of what some might consider comittee Chairman Billy Tauzin. "I But nine minutes in tonight's pre- objectionable language: think it shows that the television indus- miere of Steven Bochco's Brooklyn Word or # of try is being responsive to the concerns South on CBS will be remembered for phrase occurrences of American parents by providing them more than the cost and effort that went Ass 2 with more information about the con - into producing it. Asshole 3 tent of programming. The fact that con - The opening episode is the first Piece of ass 2 tent is being rated appropriately is all prime time drama on broadcast televi- Sons of bitches /son of a bitch 3 I'm concerned about." sion to receive a TV -MA -the strong- Bastard 2 "In the years leading up to the ratings est label possible under the new con- Hell 2 system, the networks insisted there tent ratings system. Filmed on Brook- Also heard in the program: dicky were no shows that should be rated lyn's Flatbush Avenue, the sequence waver (in reference to a flasher), MA." said an aide to Representative depicts a drugged -out perpetrator on a prick, balls and ball breaker, screw, Edward Markey (D- Mass). "They made shooting spree outside the police sta- crap, piss and scumbag. the appropriate -but extraordinary - tion, while a sniper launches a rooftop exception for 'Schindler's List.' Now massacre. The flashpoint comes when 10 p.m., some worry that a few chil- we have a weekly series with MA in it. one cop is hit in the head -the viewing dren will be up late to see it. The "I think from parents' point of view, audience will be able to see the effects episode also earned the letters L, S and this is a welcome concession that there of the blow, albeit barely. V for language, sex and violence. is a great deal of material in nightly "This is the first time [the rating) "CBS is walking the line [by airing television that routinely crosses over was legitimately appropriate for a one- Brookhw South]. There are kids that are into the graphic and appalling. It indi- hour drama." said Leslie Moonves, still up at that time," said Jeff McIntyre, cates, in fact. that rather than [the MA president, CBS Television. "As I have legislative and federal affairs officer at rating] being useless, it is going to be said over and over, we're not hiding the the American Psychological Associa- used much more often than the net - fact this is a very violent piece of film. tion. "This is a difficult time, because works led people to believe." It's violent for a reason. By no means we have a ratings system but we don't The buzz over the episode hasn't does it celebrate violence; it shows have a V -chip to block those shows. boosted business for the show, media how grotesque violence is. Every adult That's a little problematic." buyers say, which is generating rough - should know this is an very accurate Still, Washington has been largely ly $160,000 per 30- second spot. But portrayal of what goes on." supportive of CBS, which, together advertisers aren't necessarily losing Concern still exists that the networks with Bochco, has been active in ex- sleep over the ramifications of the first will use the stiffer ratings to their plaining how the premiere episode sets TV -MA rating. advantage- airing especially intense up a specific story line. "People who bought Brooklyn South programs to generate publicity. The graphic violence in the first are not expecting it to be Mary Poppins," And though Brooklyn South airs at hour won't necessarily be mirrored in says media buyer Paul Schulman. 4 September 22 1997 Broadcasting & Cable www.americanradiohistory.com Everyone loves 'The View' "Cheers to a promising newcomer on the daytime scene" -TV Guide Nations + 63% amcng women 18-49 +63% +25% +,3% I_ week two week three week tk r Weekly ac>ngs growth K premiere week carn NY +33% LA +57% Otago +50% SF +100X 'The View'. 4 women, lots of opinions & BarDara Walters. Weekdays. Q. s- Daytime San WV .M O.w+ny.t, A4 ),16'9] - 8,9i .!p r.ieN ) n M1V) - Mt qualm Oho .t share Y.rlccnere 11e figure of G3: Ge,O a .woven IBA* en ange ...don, rat, )r the eeU ne 9/I 5 MI www.americanradiohistory.com op of the Wee effort is in response to criticism that CBS News reacted too slowly in the first Journalists look inward hours after the death of Princess Diana. Ethics nntch Heyward also said a correspondent and credibility on the minds of RTNDA would be on duty during weekend By Steve McClellan ates to begin paying for NewsEdge in overnight hours from now on, which April 1998.