Ziskin, Networks Stand Up to Cancer

By Josef Adalian

Don’t expect a lot of dark lighting and somber music during next month’s “Stand Up to Cancer” multinetwork event.

According to producer Laura Ziskin, the Sept. 5 fundraiser—to be held at the Kodak Theater in Hollywood—will feel very different from the efforts mounted in the wake of 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina.

“I want the tone to be empowering,” Ms. Ziskin said last week of the event, which was announced back in May. “We want the public to feel that they can take a stand against this disease. … We want to move and educate and inspire people to recognize that they have a stake in this issue.”

Ms. Ziskin cited the Al Gore documentary “An Inconvenient Truth” as an inspiration for the special, and for the Stand Up campaign as a whole.

“That movie tipped the conversation on global warming,” she said. “I hope we can do no less.”
Ms. Ziskin plans to pack a lot into the commercial-free hour ABC, CBS and NBC gave her and the recently formed Stand Up to Cancer organization. Among the celebrities who signed on last week to appear on the show: Jennifer Aniston, Lance Armstrong, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, America Ferrera, Sally Field, Neil Patrick Harris, Scarlett Johansson, Meryl Streep, Hillary Swank and Charlize Theron.

News anchors Katie Couric, Brian Williams and Charles Gibson—who have been on board since the start—will host the hour. Ms. Couric, along with Ms. Ziskin, is one of the founding members of the brain trust that put Stand Up to Cancer together.

Look for more celebrity announcements in the next few weeks, including the names of three or four musical acts that will perform during the hour. Ms. Ziskin—best known for the “Spider-Man” movies, among other projects—also plans to inject a healthy dose of laughs into the show, including what she calls a “hilarious” taped bit from Homer and Marge Simpson.

“Everyone who’s been through cancer knows you can’t get through it without laughter,” she said.
Appropriately for a cross-network special, one of the themes of the night will be collaboration. A chief goal of the Stand Up organization is breaking down barriers between various cancer researchers and fundraising operations. Indeed, Stand Up was born after several separate planned cancer benefits merged into one.

“We said, ‘Let’s all join forces and do it together,’” Ms. Ziskin said.

Toward that end, ABC, CBS and NBC have told Ms. Ziskin that she can offer the Sept. 5 special to any broadcast or cable network that wants to air it, as long as they agree to run it sans commercials. Plans are under way to stream the hour online, also without ads.

Fox was offered the chance to carry the simulcast but instead opted to air the season premiere of “Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?” The network said it’s focusing “on the global reach of ‘Idol Gives Back,’” but that it would air PSAs for the cancer event.

Some of those PSAs already are airing on the Internet and on thousands of movie screens across the country. Directed by David Fincher (“Fight Club,” “Panic Room”), the haunting spots feature the likes of Jodie Foster, Tobey Maguire, Susan Sarandon and New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg literally standing up as the Eddie Veder song “Rise” plays in the background.

“We had one week to put the spot together,” Ms. Ziskin said. Janet Champ, the ad copywriter known for Nike’s female empowerment advertising campaign of the 1990s, wrote the ad.

While much effort is being poured into the Sept. 5 fundraiser, Ms. Ziskin made it clear that Stand Up’s efforts will continue well beyond that.

“We will be continuing with additional fundraising efforts,” she said, hinting that music from the Sept. 5 broadcast might be available for download. The organization’s Web site, SU2C.org, will continue to host original content from the likes of “The Daily Show” and FunnyorDie.com, along with frequent reports on how money raised is being spent.

“We have to beat this terrorist,” said Ms. Ziskin, herself a cancer survivor. “If anything else attacked this country and killed 1,500 people a day, we wouldn’t rest for one minute.

“Cancer is a really, really hard problem,” she adds. “But we’ve tackled tough problems in this country before. The zeitgeist is right for this.”