Disney Reveals Eisner, Iger Compensation; Roy Disney Urges Eisner’s Ouster Walt Disney Co. Chairman and CEO Michael Eisner took home 20 percent more in fiscal year 2003 than he did the previous year, with his stock-based bonus going up by…
Our Annual List of the Doers, Dealmakers, Players and Playmakers We Believe Will Make News in 2004
Universal Television Group had a banner 2003, especially considering that its chairman, Michael Jackson, spent the year preparing the company to be acquired and then smoothing out details of its upcoming merger with NBC. Mr. Jackson stayed focused throughout the…
ABC recently aired a one-hour prime-time special, “Jesus, Mary and Da Vinci,” “investigating” a novelist’s claim that Jesus Christ fathered a child before ascending to heaven. What’s more offensive than a myth with no biblical basis (in fact no first…
With the entertainment awards season under way, broadcasters can expect a little more suspense than usual. No, it’s not about who will win the awards, which are likely to be distributed according to predictable formulas. This year the real drama…
In a NATPE panel session titled “Brand Integration,” reality show producer Mark Burnett said he was breaking new product placement ground in scripted series by writing characters that serve the plot while promoting advertisers. For his upcoming NBC series, “Eden,”…
Twentieth Television surprised several Tribune station executives during the National Association Television Program Executives conference with makeovers from the crew of “Ambush Makeover” and it appears to have paid off. The company has now nabbed clearances for the reality strip…
Not even optimistic syndicators could have guessed the intensity of the business being done at NATPE this year, but in the end, amid speculation on deals for almost every major station group, the real news may be what didn’t happen…
Anne Sweeney’s official ABC Cable Networks Group biography reads like a parody of executive overachievement. She directly oversees Disney Channel, Toon Disney, SoapNet and the Walt Disney Television Animation production company, and manages Disney’s interest in Lifetime, A&E, E! Networks…
Catchy theme music and the lyric “Get ready for `Good Day Colorado”’ are the centerpiece of a promotional campaign introduced earlier this month for Fox-owned Denver station KDVR-TV’s new morning show, slated for a March launch.