Too Much TV: Your TV Talking Points For Monday, July 17th, 2023
Hollywood journalism's longing for an autocratic, talent-friendly savior.
Here's everything you need to know about the world of television for Monday, July 17th, 2023.
HOLLYWOOD JOURNALISM'S LONGING FOR AN AUTOCRATIC, TALENT-FRIENDLY SAVIOR
I've seen a series of pieces in recent weeks in publications including The Ankler and Puck which make the case that what Hollywood needs right now is some sort of idealized executive savior. Someone who can come into the negotiations between AMPTP, the WGA and SAG-AFTRA and convince them to just all get along and cut a deal.
The idea is absurd on many levels - not the least of which it manages to be both a weird idolization of media company CEO's while simultaneously underselling the seriousness of the problems at the heart of the current labor dispute. But when it comes to awkward Hollywood CEO worship, it'll be difficult to beat this new piece in The Wrap from Sharon Waxman.
"Where Is Our Lew Wasserman When We Need One?" is an impressive collection of ill-advised takes on the current crop of media executives and it manages to both woefully mischaracterize their actions while also subtly reminding the readers that Waxman knows all of these executives:
Back in the day, what Lew said, went. “When Lew said it was time to go back to work it was like the ending of the film ‘On the Waterfront,'” said Howard Suber, professor emeritus for the UCLA School of Film, Theater and Television. “Mr. Big in his fancy suit shows up at the docks and says, ‘All right, go back to work’ and everybody goes back to work. There’s no such person [now].”
Okay, I would just encourage anyone tempted to believe this paragraph to go and read a bit about the 1960 strike. Which was many things. But it certainly wasn't resolved with everyone being told to "get back to work." And then there is this description of Disney CEO Bob Iger:
But that’s clearly not going to be the case here. Iger, whose return to the CEO throne was extended last week by two years, earned the fury of rank and file guild members by calling their demands “not realistic” last week while sitting in the verdant mountains of mogul camp at Sun Valley, private jet at the ready.
This response is somewhat off-brand for Iger, who has considered himself an ally of the creative community and has shown great skill at navigating tricky talent situations (which his predecessor Bob Chapek notably couldn’t do, calling Scarlett Johansson.)
I don't doubt that Iger considers himself an ally of the creative community. But I could find you any number of creatives who were/are as unhappy with Iger as Scarlett Johansson was with Bob Chapek. What Iger is much better at than most media executives is cultivating influential reporters and convincing them he is just a creative at heart who happens to be running a multi-billion collar media company. I'll let you decide if Waxman falls into that category.
On a side note at the very least, creatives at the star level might have a very different take on Iger than those people who have worked in the trenches at Disney.
Of course, there is this awkwardly positive spin on David Zaslav, which seems to imply that he's a great guy who has just inadvertently done a few things that netted him some bad publicity:
It’s also unlikely to be Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav, who despite a warm affect, has won the ire of talent for massive layoffs since taking over the company a year ago, killing movies like “Batgirl” and yanking lots of shows from HBO Max (now Max). He too was among those sunning themselves in Sun Valley last week; he blithely went skeet-shooting as thousands voted to take to the picket lines.
But the truly strange characterization was the one of Paramount Global owner Shari Redstone, which seems to be in the story primarily so Waxman can mention that she showed Redstone a piece from The Wrap (which as a journalist, made me cringe in embarrassment) while hanging out at The Four Seasons:
It’s some kind of sad statement about Hollywood that there isn’t a “Godfather”-style leader who’s willing to step into the ring and draw fire. I ran into Paramount Global owner Shari Redstone at the Four Seasons on Friday and she was in fine, friendly form — even when I showed her that Wrap headline about the moguls basking in Sun Valley.
There is this strain of entertainment media journalism that is built around access and a longing for a time that honestly didn't exist in the way it's remembered now. It just feels out of touch with the moment, although it does fit in with The Wrap's apparent editorial mission to be like one of the Hollywood Trades. Just not owned by Jay Penske. Which isn't much of a differentiator to anyone outside the business, but we shall see.
Regardless, we will eventually come to a resolution of this strike. But I am reasonably sure that it won't involve some mega-executive telling everyone in the room to "get back to work."
Honestly, I thought tech journalism's love of CEOs was uncomfortable. But as the case with nearly every thing it touches, Hollywood manages to take CEO adoration to an entirely new level.
CBS ANNOUNCES ITS FALL SCHEDULE
The three old-school broadcast networks have been slow to roll out their fall schedules, in large part because the possible scenarios were much different depending on whether or not the actors were on strike.
CBS announced its fall schedule today and it's not super-surprising. A mix of broadcast reruns, some Paramount+ shows and reality programming.
One of my first thoughts seeing this lineup is that I'm pleasantly surprised to see the network not expand 48 Hours onto another night. While that makes some strategic sense, it's likely a good idea for CBS's scripted future to not allow the audience to become too accustomed to an unscripted-forward primetime schedule.
There's also an open spot on Mondays and several of the trades today have speculated that Evil (which originally aired on CBS) might return to the network from its run on CBS. My contrarian hunch is that CBS will instead pick up the new NCIS: Sydney, which has yet to premiere anywhere. It's a familiar brand and unless I'm mistaken, much of the cast could do promotion for the show. But either way, I suspect Evil is likely headed to CBS at some point.
It's going to be interesting to see how two of these programming moves play out in the ratings. Picking up episodes of the original UK version of Ghosts isn't a crazy idea. But it is tonally a very different series than the U.S. version. And my guess is that the "classic" reruns of Blue Bloods on Fridays is more about keeping the show in the minds of audiences until it returns with new episodes opposed to an expectation that it will be a good partner for two hours of reality and game programming. As for bringing Yellowstone to broadcast television - well, that was likely the easiest decision of the entire strike-impacted schedule.
The irony of these efforts to rerun shows produced for streaming on broadcast television is that will make the writers and actors more money than they expected when they did the episodes. Because residuals are paid based on the platform where the episodes air - not on where the show was produced. And broadcast residuals are a lot better than any streaming residuals.
ICYMI ON ALLYOURSCREENS
Here's a rundown of some of the coverage from AllYourScreens that posted over the weekend and earlier today:
* There are still plenty of problems with the Watch TCM app.
* The E.W. Scripps Company launched two new FAST channels that are brand extensions of its linear channels. Laff More and Court TV Legendary Tales launched today on a select number of platforms, with more to come.
* Can't keep track of which streaming original shows are releasing episodes on a weekly basis? Here's a good place to start.
* A former X-Factor UK contestant is calling for the establishment of a Reality TV Mental Health Fund after revealing she had been raped by a hotel worker following a production party.
* National Deputy Director of SAG-AFTRA Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, the chief negotiator for the Guild, appeared on Friday evening's MSNBC's primetime news program All In With Chris Hayes.
THE CONTINUING SAGA OF THE BROKEN WATCH TCM APP
I have been writing about the problems with the Watch TCM app since the beginning of July and at one point it appeared that things might have been fixed. But as I noted over the weekend, the problems seem to be worse and I have probably received a hundred or more frustrated emails about the problems in the past couple of days:
"The Watch TCM app is completely broken! On Roku, most of the movies will not play. The animated logo displays over & over but the movies won't load. On Amazon Fire TV Fire Stick, the TCM app won't even load at all. Please help!
I reached out once again to TCM and received this statement, although to be honest, it left me with more questions than answers:
"There was a server error that has been inhibiting films being added to Watch TCM (and several other WBD apps) over the past couple of weeks. They are working diligently to fix it."
No timeline on a fix. But just as importantly, what other WBD apps have been affected?
ODDS AND SODS
* Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 3 is coming to Disney+ on August 2nd.
* Netflix has renewed the Brazilian comedy Back To 15 for a third season.
I'M NOT SURE IF THIS SHOULD MAKE ME LAUGH OR CRY
There is a really fascinating piece in New York Magazine's Curbed that dissects the brutal reevaluation process going on right now by the owners of large - and increasingly empty - office buildings. Imagine owning a million square-feet of prime near Times Square space that nobody wants?
I wouldn't normally bring the story up here, but this paragraph buried in the middle of the story hits a bit too close to home for me:
Many large property owners are now performing triage, trying to determine which buildings are still worth anything like what they paid for them. In Rechler’s case, this reassessment has taken the form of a process he calls “Project Kodak,” after the once mighty film-and-camera company. He classifies buildings that are worth saving as “digital.” The duds he deems “film.”
Ouch.
Although if you read further, there is a streaming business component to the story after all:
Take 5 Times Square, which Rechler purchased with partners for $1.5 billion in 2014. After its original anchor tenant, an accounting firm, announced it was leaving for Hudson Yards, Rechler spent $300 million to upgrade the building with new amenities, including common areas designed by David Rockwell. Rechler said the costly renovations make 5 Times Square a digital building, and last year, a digital tenant, the streaming-video company Roku, agreed to lease 240,000 square feet at a reported rate of around $90 a foot. “That was a big indicator of tenant demand, which played into our view,” Rechler said. In April, however, Roku sought to sublease some of the space, having reported losses and laid off employees. Aside from the sublet space, 5 Times Square currently has 23 of 33 of its office floors empty and available for lease.
TWEET OF THE DAY
WHAT'S NEW FOR MONDAY AND TUESDAY:
MONDAY, JULY 17TH:
* Almost Paradise Season Two Premiere (Freevee)
* Below Deck: Down Under Season Premiere (Bravo)
* Unknown: Cave Of Bones (Netflix)
TUESDAY, JULY 18TH:
* Dark Side Of The 2000's (Vice)
* Down To Earth With Zac Efron Series Broadcast Premiere (The CW)
* Fantastic Friends Series Premiere (The CW)
* I Wanna Rock: The 80s Metal Dream (Paramount+)
* Justified: City Primeval Series Premiere (FX)
* Love Island USA Season Premiere (Peacock)
* Silent Witness (Britbox)
* Southern Storytellers Series Premiere (PBS)
* Surf Girls Hawaii Series Premiere (Prime Video)
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.