By Lisa de Moraes
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
For those of you who think that what the world needs is fewer "Cavemen" episodes: You're in luck!
Hollywood writers of scripted TV series and movies went on strike yesterday after the studios and other production houses refused to give them a bigger piece of DVD profits and of revenue from distribution of TV series and films via so-called new media -- the Internet, etc.
That's right, within a relatively short time -- about eight more episodes on "Cavemen" -- the networks will run out of original episodes of their scripted series, leaving them with a prime-time landscape pocked with reality series, newsmagazines and reruns.
But, sadly, the imminent purging of "Cavemen" from the prime-time firmament comes at a cost -- your beloved live-ish late-night talk shows are all shuttered -- effective immediately.
Letterman, Leno, Stewart, Colbert, Conan, Ferguson, Kimmel -- all dark for the first day of the strike.
But unlike the last time the writers struck, nearly 20 years ago, when the late-night shows stayed dark for months, this time around, industry sources with knowledge of the situation say, they're expected to stay out for only a week or two. While the late-night stars want to show support for their writers, they also feel allegiance to the production staffers, who do not get paid if they do not work. That said, many of the talkers are continuing to pay their staff for the next couple of weeks, even if no show is produced. Should the shows return during the strike, it will be with formats that have been tinkered with to varying degrees, depending on how much the show relies on writers. Expect no scripted bits, but lots more celebrity interviews. Oh goody.
"We will go into repeats tonight," a spokesman for "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart" told The TV Column yesterday. "We're going to wait and see how the strike plays out," he said, which was pretty much the line we got from them all.
CBS and Comedy Central both notified the media that David Letterman's and Craig Ferguson's talk shows, as well as "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report" would be in repeats all week.
NBC and ABC, on the other hand, played their hands more cautiously. They confirmed only that the Jay Leno, Conan O'Brien and Jimmy Kimmel shows would air repeats last night.
Meanwhile, the Reporters Who Cover Television were chockablock with late-night celebrity sightings at picket lines on both coasts.
Trade paper the Hollywood Reporter, um, reported that picketers outside NBC's headquarters at 30 Rock in New York included "Saturday Night Live" star Seth Meyers and "Daily Show" faux correspondent John Oliver, who said Jon Stewart himself might show up on the picket line soon. ("SNL" exec producer Lorne Michaels told The Post's Tom Shales that "my turn will come" in re: picket duty at 30 Rock.) The Los Angeles Times spotted Jay Leno, in black leather jacket and blue jeans, outside NBC's West Coast headquarters in Burbank, delivering three boxes of Krispy Kreme doughnuts, which he proclaimed "writers' food."
Pretty much everyone sighted Tina Fey, who writes NBC's prime-time sitcom about a faux late-night series, picketing at 30 Rock near a giant inflatable rat.
TV Week had the heartbreaking story of a Canadian couple who had waited two years for their tickets to "The Late Show With David Letterman" and planned a trip to the Big Apple around the date, but instead all they got to see was a notice on the door to Letterman's theater informing them the "box office is closed until further notice."
Appropriately, the strike's first casualty was the head writer of a late-night series -- Tom Johnson, of Fox's weekly "Talkshow With Spike Feresten." During a confrontation at Sunset Gower Studios, Johnson was hit by someone in a Honda Element who announced his intention of running over picketers who did not get out of his way, according to news reports citing witnesses. The local ABC station had video, including a shot of the vehicle, with Johnson's shoe still under the tire.
"The guy basically said, 'Get the [expletive] out of the way,' and then hit the gas and just plowed into this guy," said writer Linda Berston, who witnessed the incident, according to KABC-TV. "The group was just walking across the driveway, and the guy basically started running him over without giving him a chance to move out of the way," Berston said.
Knowing they likely would be out on strike this week, late-night hosts put in their two-cents' worth on the subject last week.
"You may have noticed tonight that I was using a lot of words -- it's because there may or may not be a writers' strike next week so I was trying to get in as many words as I could before something like that happened," Stewart said at the close of his final show last week, on Thursday.
Letterman that night called the producers against whom the writers are striking "cowards, cutthroats and weasels."
Bill Maher weighed in on his HBO talk show on Friday, saying "it's a shame they couldn't work out some sort of agreement because without the writers, who will put those poetic words into the mouth of Tila Tequila?"
Maher told viewers he is a member of the Writers Guild and so can't do any writing on his show, "but I can still perform my duties as a producer. So my guests should not worry -- I can still get you high after the show."
And NBC News anchor Brian Williams stayed well away from the "Weekend Update" sketch during his hosting duties on "Saturday Night Live" over the weekend -- maybe because a large swath of it was devoted to the writers' strike, in the form of a commentary from faux studio executive Roger A. Trivanta (RAT), who explained the studios' hard stance on DVD and Internet residuals:
RAT: You know what it costs to make a DVD? 60 cents. You know how much we charge? $29. The writers now want a bigger piece of the profit. What profit? We asked our accountants to figure out what $29 minus 60 cents is. You know what they came up with?
Faux Weekend Update Anchor Amy Poehler: $28.40?
RAT: Negative $13. It's even worse on the Internet! We post movies and television for free.
Poehler: Don't you collect ad revenue from your Web site?
RAT: Amy, how many times do I have to explain this! Does a magazine collect revenue for putting ads in their magazine? It's irrelevant! No one's making any money, Amy. No one! If we were, trust me, the writers would be the first people to get a check.
* * *
You think media critic Howard Kurtz got knicker-knotted over NBC News anchor Brian Williams hosting "Saturday Night Live"? Wait till he gets word Rosie O'Donnell is in talks about headlining a show on NBC's cable news channel MSNBC.
Yes, O'Donnell is in some serious negotiations to anchor a prime-time show on MSNBC, possibly going mano a mano with CNN's "Larry King Live," according to an NBC exec who asked not to be named because the deal has not been announced. O'Donnell tossed out hints about the new show Sunday night at a book-signing in Miami; the comments were then posted on the Web site Lyingonthebeach.com. That site reported, citing Rosie as its source, the show was a done deal and an announcement would be made next week. It also reported Rosie played coy with the audience, telling them the show would be in the same time slot as "the guy with the suspenders and the long, long face."
The NBC exec, on the other hand, said the two parties remain far apart on some important points.
NBC has been trying to snap up Rosie since she exited ABC's daytime talker "The View" last spring; they've reportedly pitched the idea of her hosting a game show, and NBC Universal's Co-Chairman Ben Silverman told reporters in July that Donald Trump asked him to invite Rosie onto the next edition of "The Apprentice."
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