Musings & Meanderings

The following vignettes are contributed by my beloved husband, whose favorite stories include ones in what he terms the HOW IT ACTUALLY HAPPENED category.
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Brandon Tartikoff was the head of programming for NBC. He held periodic “pitch” meetings with various producers, during which the producers would pitch their ideas for new television series. Tartikoff was famous for having ideas of his own which, most times were quite superior to the ideas of the producers.

During one such pitch meeting with Stephen J. Cannell, Tartikoff reached for a piece of paper and his pen and started scribbling. Cannell, thinking Tartikoff was making notes about the concept he was describing, started to really get into it. When he finally wound it up, Cannell asked Tartikoff what he thought of the idea. Tartikoff handed him the piece of paper.

Written on that paper was:

Mission Impossible
The Dirty Dozen
“And Mr. T Drives The Truck”

From this little note sprung …The A-Team.

At another such meeting, with another producer, Tartikoff handed over a piece of paper that read:

MTV Cops

This became …Miami Vice.

The classic pitch meeting that produced a show was held between Aaron Spelling and his partner at the time, Douglas S. Cramer, and executives from ABC, at Spelling’s luxurious digs. Spelling and Cramer spent over 7 hours pitching one idea after another, only to have the ABC guys shoot them all down.

Finally, in total exasperation, Cramer got to his feet and said, “You know, the only thing that will suit you guys is a show about some island somewhere where a guy can go and get all the booze and broads he wants!”

Almost in unison, the ABC guys said, “Yeah, yeah, that’s it!”

And this developed into …..Fantasy Island.

As an aside, the original Fantasy Island was to star Orson Welles, and his assistant was to be a beautiful young girl. Unfortunately, Welles died before the pilot was ready to be shot. It was then that Ricardo Montalban was brought in to play the lead character.

When Montalban assumed the role of Mr. Roarke, the beautiful assistant was dropped. In her stead, as everyone knows, Roarke’s assistant became the midget Tattoo (Herve Villachez).

ABC was not happy. “What happened to the beautiful girl assistant?” the execs wanted to know.

To which Doug Cramer replied, “Ricardo Montalban is beautiful enough by himself.”

From my oracle, OMO:

The 3 major tv networks have been conning program producers for decades (over 5 decades, in fact). Early on the networks convinced the producers that they should make series programs for the networks and accept a “license fee” for each show that was well below what it actually cost to make each show, i.e., a license fee of $100,000. for a show that actually cost $500,000. to produce.

The producers were told that “all they had to do” was remain on the air long enough to accumulate 100 episodes, and then they could put those 100 shows into “syndication” to the independent stations all around the country, and charge the indies exorbitant rates per show. In this way, they (the producers) would make back all the losses incurred when making the shows originally, plus huge profits.

They never mentioned that, of the hundreds of shows that were produced, only a handful ever reached the 100 episode level. Further, the losses involved were not only actual dollars spent in production budgets, but also the cost of money borrowed from banks to make programs at a loss for 5 years minimum. All the shows that lost money weekly, but never reached the “syndication” level, outnumbered the successful ones 20-1.

The networks, of course, paid their pittance of “license fees,” and then sold advertising in the millions of dollars per episode, per week. The producers never saw any of that money, they were busy waiting for the “pot-of-gold” at the end of the rainbow.

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Do we see any parallels to the production of web content?

My oracle’s comment on Fox’s plan to debut new television show episodes on the web, as reported yesterday by TechCrunch:

TV networks are one trick ponies. Advertising is sold by guaranteeing a rating. If the show doesn’t get the rating the network has to “make good” by giving additional advertising. They see the internet as nothing more than additional eyeballs. Someone put one over on the advertising agencies to allow the network to “make good” with internet eyeballs. Fox shows do so badly that they all have to “make good.” If not for the internet “make goods” Fox would have nothing left to sell after “making good” on all the “make goods.”

Bill Paley’s father and uncle were millionaire cigar makers and distributors in Philadelphia. Paley received one million dollars from his father to go into business. The business failed and he lost all the money.

He went to his father a second time for another one million dollars to go into another business. That business also failed, and he lost all the money again.

He went to his father a third time, for another one million dollars to become a partner in the CBS radio network, a dinky little network owned by someone he met at synagogue. His father told him he would give him the million dollars, but if he lost the money again he would have to go into the cigar business with his father and uncle.

Paley tried to sell advertising on CBS radio, but there were no buyers. Again, he went to his father and this time asked him to buy advertising for La Paloma cigars. The elder Paley decided to purchase some advertising. Sales of La Paloma cigars went up.

Bill Paley’s partner used the La Paloma ad campaign to sell time to additional advertisers.

Later, Bill Paley bought out his partner, and took credit for founding the network and making it a success. Thus the legend was born.

Bill Paley also went to great pains to erase all vestiges of his Jewish heritage, passing himself off as a WASP.

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This story is given to me by my husband, after a conversation we had trading stories about successful entrepreneurs in which he was illustrating his abiding interest in how they really got their start.