Too Much TV: Your TV Talking Points For Monday, November 13th, 2023

Some SAG-AFTRA members continue to push to see the full deal document, a move that has been resisted by union leadership.

Here's everything you need to know about the world of television for Monday, November 13th, 2023. 

WHAT IS GOING ON WITH SAG-AFTRA?
On Saturday, I wrote an exclusive piece reporting that just 36 hours after the SAG-AFTRA national board unanimously approved the tentative agreement for the 2023 TV/Theatrical Contracts reached with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), a number of union members were complaining about a lack of transparency and clarity when it comes to the specific details of the deal:

Several SAG-AFTRA members have told me that the union membership had been promised a detailed look at the agreement reached with Hollywood's major studios after the national board had voted on Friday. Members are now being told that the detailed breakdown won't be available until after the ratification vote. But a summary of the terms will be distributed on Monday.

Even more troubling for some members I spoke with Saturday evening is that several members of SAG-AFTRA's national board have admitted they were working from just a summary of the deal document when they voted on Friday and that they had only been given a few minutes to examine the document before voting.

And those complaints didn't lessen on Monday. The union released a summary of the agreement to members and began walking members through the terms of the deal. But for whatever reason, SAG-AFTRA leadership are still declining to release the full terms document.

It's not clear why leadership has taken this stance. Speaking with various union members and negotiating committee participants today, I've heard various theories. From a suspicion that there are terms in the full deal that will upset SAG-AFTRA members before they vote to a theory that some of the terms of the deal are still being hammered out by union leadership and the studios. But that both sides feel comfortable moving forward with a vote.

But I have no definitive official answer. I reached out to a SAG-AFTRA communications person late Saturday and they responded by asking about the timing of my deadline. But no follow-ups to my response, so I can only assume the union has opted for the carefully doled-out leaks approach.

There was one thing Monday afternoon that was a bit strange. Puck's Jonathan Handel posted a story in which he claimed he had read the entire term document. My initial assumption was that he had obtained it from someone on the studio side, given his experience reporting on the business side of Hollywood. But then SAG-AFTRA head Fran Drescher tweeted this:

Which seems like an odd reaction to a story in which the reporter is claiming to have a document that you haven't released to your own negotiating committee or union members. I'm not sure whether that indicates that someone gave the full agreement to Handel on Drescher's behalf, or she was just taking advantage of his take in hopes of calming some of her more vocal internal critics. But it was an odd response.

And then there was Drescher's response in a Monday morning Zoom call with SAG-AFTRA members in which she berated critics of her approach:

“Sadly there have been some naysayers who have exploited this momentum of ours,” Drescher said, appearing in a jungle-print bathrobe from her home. She said that throughout the negotiation, some people have “tried to tear down what was being done in the negotiating committee.”

Drescher urged the membership to listen carefully to the details, “if you haven’t yet been poisoned by contrarians.”

Justine Bateman has been a vocal critic of some of the deal's AI provisions and her position has been strengthened by the fact that she has seen the full deal document. She has argued the current deal throws actors "under the bus" and that phrasing apparently irritated Drescher quite a bit:

Drescher appeared to respond to that comment — though without mentioning Bateman by name — during the Zoom.

“I just want you to know that nobody was thrown under the bus,” Drescher said. “If you read things like that, it’s very inflammatory and unfortunate, because it’s using social media and chat rooms to advance someone’s personal agenda.”

And in fact, Drescher was at time fairly dismissive of complaints, even though the biggest complaint has been that union members haven't been able to see the full deal document:

Drescher said she would not “name names,” but said she felt compelled to “refute some of the low-level people who are buzzing in almost a way that I feel is detrimental to the greater good and kind of propagandize certain events in a way that’s unhealthy for the whole.”

To be clear, I expect the agreement will eventually be ratified, barring some insanely bad deal point that surfaces before the vote. But this process has been a lot messier than it needed to be and it hasn't been helped by some clumsy PR movies from the union's management and its communications department.

CBS RELEASES ITS SPRING FALL PRIMETIME SCHEDULE
CBS is the first broadcast network to announce its scripted primetime schedule, now that the industry's writers and actors are back at work. No big surprises, but it's nice to see the broadcast networks finally coming back to life.

Granted, there will be a number of changes, many of which don't have anything directly due to do with the strikes. Multiple CBS shows are returning with smaller casts or casts in which the majority of the cast has moved from regular to recurring members. Some writers rooms are smaller and budgets in general are tighter. Despite all of the bluster, the gold days of broadcast television are over and even networks such as CBS which have managed to do reasonably well navigating the changes creatively are struggling to manage the financial challenges.

CBS also decided to push the premieres of two new shows that had previously been ordered for this season into next fall: the reboot of Matlock and the new comedy Poppa's House.

Here is the new schedule:

Sunday, February 11th:
Tracker (New Series)

Monday, February 12th:
The Neighborhood (season six premiere)
Bob Hearts Abishola (season five premiere)
NCIS (season twenty-one premiere)
NCIS: Hawai'i (season three premiere)

Tuesday, February 13th:
FBI (season six premiere)
FBI: International (season three premiere)
FBI: Most Wanted (season five premiere)

Thursday, February 15th:
Young Sheldon (season seven premiere)
Ghosts (season three premiere)
So Help Me Todd (season two premiere)

Friday, February 16th:
S.W.A.T. (season seven premiere)
Fire Country (season two premiere)
Blue Bloods (season fourteen premiere)

Sunday, February 18th:
The Equalizer (season four premiere)
CSI: Vegas (season three premiere)

Wednesday, February 28th:
Survivor (season forty-six premiere)

Thursday, February 29th:
Elsbeth (series premiere)

Wednesday, March 13th:
The Amazing Race (season thirty-six premiere)

STREAMER ARPU IS WHY SO-CALLED 'BUNDLING' ISN'T THE ANSWER
The Wrap has a piece that compares the average revenue per user (ARPU) of the major streamers and while I don't think that there any great insights, this infographic does a nice job visualizing the range of revenue and it highlights the challenges for anyone who isn't Netflix:

Companies such as Warner Bros. Discovery continue to tout the importance of what they call the "soft bundle." Essentially, it's allowing a third party to bundle your streaming service into their subscription-based offering, with the streamer generally providing the service to the bundler for a mich-discounted price. Think Paramount+ as part of Walmart+, various streamers being offered to free as part of cellphone packages, etc.

While those deals are a fairly painless way to build a streamer's subscriber base, there are a couple of definite downsides. The lowered revenue per subscriber lessens the ARPU for the service. And since the billing is handled by the third party, the streamer doesn't have a direct connection with the subscriber. They don't have credit card info, they might not receive much more than an email address and name. So when the bundling deal is over, the third party can simply email the customer and say "hey, your free Max subscription will be up next month. We're no longer offering Max, but would you like a free year of Peacock instead?" And there is nothing the streamer can do about it.

WHAT'S NEW TODAY AND TOMORROW:

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 13TH:
* A Town Called Victoria (PBS)
* Barmageddon Season Premiere (USA)
* Blackberry (AMC)
* Hidden Assets (Acorn TV)
* Love Has Won (HBO)
* The Bermuda Triangle: Into Cursed Waters (History)
* The Chase (Acorn TV)
* The Lady Bird Diaries (Hulu)

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 14TH, 2023:
* A Murder At The End Of The World (Hulu)
* Chopped: Julia Child's Kitchen (Food)
* Criminal Code Series Premiere (Netflix)
* How To Become A Mob Boss (Netflix)
* JFK: What The Doctors Saw (Paramount+)
* How We Get Free (HBO)
* Inspector Rex Season Eight Premiere (MHz Choice)
* Jay-Z And Gayle King: Brooklyn's Own (CBS)
* JFK: What The Doctors Saw (Paramount+)
* Life Below Zero Season Premiere (NatGeo)
* Love Has Won (HBO)
* NCIS Sydney Series Premiere (CBS)
* Polish Murder Secrets Series Premiere (Viaplay)
* Real Time Crime Season Premiere (Investigation Discovery)
* Suburræterna Series Premiere (Netflix)
* The Bermuda Triangle: Into Cursed Waters (History)
* The Netflix Cup: Swing To Survive (Netflix)
* Trevor Wallace: Pterodactyl (Prime Video)
* Welcome To Wrexham Season Two Finale (Hulu)
* Whose Line Is It Anyway? Season Twelve Premiere (The CW)

Click Here to see the list of all of the upcoming premiere dates for the next few months.

SEE YOU TUESDAY!

If you have any feedback, send it along to Rick@AllYourScreens.com and follow me on Twitter @aysrick.