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I’m told about angst between Angela Bromstad, the new president of primetime for NBC Entertainment and Universal Media Studios, and her boss Ben Silverman. “Angela and Ben are barely talking already. They’re respectful, but barely speaking,” my insider says. I can’t even begin to count how many people predicted this would happen. Remember, Bromstad was brought in from London in December to replace both Teri Weinberg, the EVP of NBC Entertainment, and Katherine Pope, the Universal Studio Media President.
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Get rid of Ben already! Hasn’t he done enough damage? While you are at it give Zucker the heave ho as well.
I wonder what happened, did she come up with an idea that might put her in contention for Silverman’s job?
Whomever greenlit “The Last Templar” should be fired immediately. That was an absolute embarassment on every level, just cringe-inducing.
They say the true sign of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. As long as NBC is run by fast-talking, self-promoting, proud as peacocks to be creative-hating, bean counting suits with no proven experience whatsoever making good TV coupled with an obvious contempt for the people who actually know how to make great TV then NBC will never succeed. It’s so simple, it’s shocking no one at GE can see it.
Why not put Zucker and Silverman in charge of GE’s locomotive, lightbulb or subsea drilling apparatus divisions, too? Within weeks they’d be bankrupt. The only difference is after the wreckage clears they wouldn’t get to show up on Abscess Hollywood with some sort of key demo/margin managing voodoo that proclaims them a success.
Napoleon and his clones will never return NBC to its former glory. They’re incapable of hanging on to second or third place. Why? Cause it’s a TV network and they don’t know how to create TV shows. I’m no boy genius Harvard grad like Zucker but it’s pretty simple. History has proven it and unfortunately history will keep repeating itself until a MAJOR change is made at the top.
Film@11 is right on…seriously, GE needs to *really* shake up the house there and just get rid of these two jokers. Zucker especially. It’s truly astounding he has somehow weaseled his way to the top despite NBC’s horrible decline under his reign.
I don’t think they’re supposed to be talking, or even that friendly. Angela is there with Paul to run the creative and in case you haven’t noticed, they’re making PILOTS again, going flatly against Zucker’s pledge to get out of that business in favor of straight-to-series orders.
They’re also spending a bit more money than last season. The number of drama scripts alone that they wound up buying this year was pretty huge, and none opf the pilots they picked are going to be cheap to make.
Ben is there to gently, superficially cheerlead, massage the branding, come up with weird, cheap international ways of selectively monetizing the primetime real estate, and add some “buzz” to the joint. He has done all of that to varying degrees of success. He’s staying because NBC’s P&L is healthy, especially relative to the rest of GE. For all we know he’s getting paid a dollar a year plus stock options, Michael Eisner style.
Meanwhile, Angela and Paul simply develop and program new series. The community is well aware of this and playing to these new designations.
A healthy NBC is a healthy broadcast business, and the smart money has already realized that and brought back key talent to the company with new shows. That’s why Jesse Alexander, who got brutally fired from “Heroes” a couple months ago, is back in the fold with a new sci fi hour.
They are genuinely trying to rebuild the network right now. It’s triage, not cotillion.
Now, this mismatched bunch don’t all have to be best pals to pull that reinvention off. It’s actually kind of annoying to do business with a company where all the top dogs are whole-heartedly super-chummy.
Even in the mid-Wright era when NBC was #1 in quality and viewers there were people at the top ranks who hated each other’s frakking guts. It’s just the culture of the place.
Why is this little coke monkey still wreaking havoc? What kind of power does he have over Zucker?
I see that NBC is getting ready to air a reality series hosted by Lisa Kudrow (WTF?) that traces the geneology of celebrities. It’s called “Who Do You Think You Are” are her first two celebrities are Sarah Jessica Parker and Susan Sarandon. Do they think viewers give a rat’s patootie who Sarandon’s uncle or third cousing twice-removed is? At first I thought this was some sort of parody, but Variety is reporting it as fact. NBC is done. Five nights a week of Leno and now this crap. I’d rather get stoned and watch the noise patterns on my TV than the pablum NBC is airing.
Angela has not “developed” one script. (Ever. But I digress.) Every pilot being picked up was in the pipeline before her arrival. Even Jesse Alexander’s. It’s not she that “saved” Jesse after being “brutally fired”. She is working off the product that the former team (not including Teri who didn’t do anything) worked on. And ultimately if there is success it’s on the backs of those who are unemployed now.
Listen it’s not just NBC in deep trouble its parent corporation GE has been taking some heavy hits. As for NBC how long can it survive in this type of envoriment?
The Last Templar was really bad…really really bad, I couldn’t watch it anymore it was a joke!
Anyone know what the buzz is on KINGS, the new NBC series set to take over the ER timeslot in March?
Hate to break it to you, Curious George, but NBC pulled “Kings” out of the post-ER Thursday night spot in favor of the new John Well’s LA cop show, “Southland.” Instead, “Kings” will now air on Sunday nights at 8, before “Celebrity Apprentice,” starting in March. I think “Kings” would have a better shot if they moved it to 10 PM, after “Apprentice”, but I guess we will see what happens soon enough. In a somewhat contradictory sign, NBC seems to be putting a lot of effort into the marketing materials (website, web ads, tv ads, etc.) for “Kings”… somewhat akin to the effort they made prior to the premier of “Heroes.”
If NBC is lucky, “The Last Templar” will be the last time they inflict one of Halmi’s wretched creations on the public.
Why doesn’t GE give executive VP Jack Donaghy a chance to run the net.
He couldn’t do worse than little Jeffy!
Injun,
That Kudrow show is the USA version of a pretty good BBC series. (How good the USA version may be is another story…)
Entertainment Weekly trashed “Kings” but the review is not on the site.
ZUCKER SWILLS FROM STUPIDITY’S CUP.
WITH BEN IS HIS LOYAL SNOW PUP.
THEIR DECISIONS ARE ZANY,
NOT SINCE BUSH AND DICK CHENEY.
HAVE WE SEEN TWO LEADERS SO FUCKED UP.
“The Last Templar” is an atrocity. It is an abomination. There isn’t condemnation strong enough for it.
I sometimes forget that NBC is still on the air because I haven’t watched a single program on that network in years.
It’s really odd that most of the people who run these networks are so full of themselves, and yet they seem to be some of the most incompetant individuals in America.
Listen ben is an ass, I should know i have been at the other end of the couch from him back in his not so long ago reveille days on the NBC lot, oh by the way what a shitty office space they had. Look, he’s not creative, he’s an ass, he’s not a smart bizman, he’s an ass and to be honest he is exactly where he belongs. He will be terminated by his own doings and he will just fade away like mike ovitz, not exactly the same story but how the once mighty fall so fast, dont you see the similarities, it’s just another bad NBC rerun and they will be having many with BEN,bc. That what we call him, BEN,bc it’s funny come on!
Remember he will meet the same people on his way down as he did on his way up, thats why mike is no longer around, people just dont forget, it’s like a high school crush that just went bad.
THE SAME IDIOTS THAT FIRED A GREAT SHOW RUNNER ON BIONICWOMAN AND TURNED IT INTO A BAD FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS
Ben refuses to get along with anyone that he feels is a threat. That’s why he had Teri under him – she was incompetent at that job and therefore no threat. It’s a classic Hwood Syndrome: kiss ass and fall before those with more power (i.e. Zucker) and treat everyone else like crap (i.e. those under U directly and those perceived to be under U – I guess in this case, agents, talent, and the TV-viewing public).
Ben and Zucker are only a part of the problem. This fish stinks from the head. As a GE shareholder I have watched the company go from one of the most respected and best run companies in the world to a circus under the (lack of) leadership and incompetence of Jeff Immelt. That’s the one who has to go. Once he gets the heave whoever replaces him will take care of Silverman and Zucker very quickly. It is really sad to see how bad behaviour and poor performance is so highly rewarded in this industry.