A Pox On Both Your Houses

BECAUSE THEY HAVE made worms' meat of us...

Seal up the mouth of outrage for a while,
Till we can clear these ambiguities,
And know their spring, their head, their
true descent;
And then will I be general of your woes,
And lead you even to death: meantime forbear,
And let mischance be slave to patience.
Bring forth the parties of suspicion.

-WM. Shakespeare, Romeo & Juliet, V, iii

Capulets. 

Montagues.

And I for winking at your discords too
Have lost a brace of kinsmen: all are punish'd.

Romeo & Juliet, V, iii

By I, I mean anybody working in Canadian TV.  And by all are punish'd I mean, stay tuned, bub. Stay tuned.

In Cameras and LaLas: Variety's Take on Canada's Branch Plant TV Industry

NORMALLY IT'S MY policy now on this blog not to link to Variety, since their shilling for the AMPTP during the last WGA Strike proved how biased they were. (And Nikki Finke gets the good stuff first anyway,) but a new story is pretty instructive in cutting through the whole domestic TV debate -- since it cuts through the redacted thrill of the CRTC and shows you what an outside perspective has to say.

Here's Variety's take on Canadians coming to the L.A. screenings.

A few key passages:

The Canadians are traditionally the biggest international spenders during the L.A. Screenings, but there is a good chance they’ll be shelling out less this year.

That point -- that Canada spends WAY more than any other country at the L.A. screenings, never came up at the "in camera" network sessions at the CRTC, so far as I saw. Though the spin from the networks seems to be that Canada's creative unions don't understand how their purchase of U.S. shows subsidizes homegrown Canadian production, that's just not true.  How the networks work here might have been news to Konrad, but isn't news to any of us. Nor is it the point.

The reason WHY Canada spends more than anybody else at the U.S. screenings is because they are the only country whose business model is based on running every show they possibly can at the same time as the U.S. nets, to take care of simultaneous substitution.

Other countries can't make any money running a three-ep flop that gets quickly canceled by the parent U.S. network, which is why they wait and buy CSI when they know it's a hit. Yes, when they make that deal, they often have to buy another show or package of shows to close the deal, but it's nowhere near as ginned as the Canadian buy. 

When I was in my twenties, I worked in production inside a media company that's since been swallowed in rounds of Canadian corporate media consolidation.  Though I had nothing to do with buying or selling the product offered each year at the L.A. screenings, I was friendly enough with the people who did to know in rough terms how the bidding and buying worked.   

But based on what we read in the redacted in-camera comments Jim Henshaw wrote about the other day, we're supposed to believe that the Chairman of the CRTC was completely taken aback and surprised by the way Canadian networks buy shows. So in other words, this guy, who's in charge of all our fates, didn't know as much as I did just hanging around a TV station for a few years?  After months of lobbying by the networks?  I tend not to buy it, because the Chairman seems to me to be an intelligent guy.  If it's true, whoa, we're in more trouble than I thought.

By not acknowledging the huge, skewing effect SimSub has on the business of buying and making TV in this country,  you're in effect discussing the effects of melanoma and how to control it and leaving out the fact that the patient also has Stage IV Lung and Pancreatic Cancer.

Understand -- I'm not counselling an end to SimSub. (Well, not really.  To do so I feel would be as cynical as the Broadcasters current "Save Local TV" campaign, as if that, and not their poor decisions and over-reliance on one faded idea wasn't the problem.)  I'm just saying that it's the gravitational change that distorts things so much, that compensatory attention to protecting homegrown production is necessary. If you are supporting one side of the business, it's only fair to support the other.  

The difference, of course, is that the creative unions only get to make that point for 15 minutes, once every hearing, while the networks get private lobbying sessions and in camera sessions to make their point known. Good to know that we live in a democracy, aint it?

Konrad, if the jobs of Canwest and CTV Executives and Salespeople and Buyers are deemed more valuable than those of Canada's Grips, Writers, Actors, Set Builders, Production Designers, Directors and Editors, etc, just say so.  And while we're at it, you might want to have a word with the hundreds of people that these companies have shed over the last few years -- starting when they were flush and bragging about their record profit margins.  (You know, the long ago days of, like, 2007.)   And if that's the case, Konrad, there are several hundred thousand people who'd like to have a word with you. In Camera, if you like.  Maybe we can also have that discussion about what Michel's watching on TV -- since it won't be "on the record," you know.

The edifice supported by SimSub is crumbling anyway.  Borders and exclusive broadcast rights (my problems seeing the Blue Jays game in St. John's notwithstanding) are looking like a pretty tarnished prom queen in a ripped dress right about now.

And here's something nobody ever points out: even the SimSub thing used to be a better deal for Canadian viewers. Once upon a time, when they bought shows from the U.S. nets, Canadian channels, if they couldn't run it at the same time and block out the U.S. net's signal, would often pre-release the show. They'd negotiate it so that, say, CTV or Global would run that show a day earlier. Sometimes two.  So for a long time, into the 80's and early 1990's, Canadians would sometimes get to see U.S. network shows first.  In the days before PVR's it was pretty convenient. You had a couple of chances to catch a show.  That's stopped now, of course. Since the moment a show airs, it's torrented, U.S. nets don't allow Canadians to go first anymore.  Yup. That edifice shure is healthy -- and great for viewers! What choice! Do I watch Law & Order on CTV or NBC? Gawrsh!

Anyway, I'm sure all of this will come up when the CRTC has their in-camera private meetings with the WGC.   Cause I'm sure that's coming, right? 

Right?

Bueller?

To continue with the Variety article:

One studio source familiar with past Canadian negotiations said prices will be “firm and more cautious than in year’s past.” Among the new shows expected to generate some heat among overseas buyers are CBS’ remake of “Melrose Place” and Disney’s sci-fi thriller “Flash Forward.”

That can’t be good news to the studios, which count heavily on Canadian coin and the bidding wars that often take place. Canucks don’t have time to watch, go home and decide what’s worth buying. With their upfronts set for the first week in June, they need to have their lineups — with new American product — set to show off to potential advertisers.

The Canuck broadcasters are breathing a sigh of relief this week because broadcast regulator the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) last week backed away from a proposed plan to curtail the networks’ spending in Hollywood.

Earlier this year, the CRTC had said it was warming up to the idea of forcing the Canadian nets to bring in a one-to-one ratio between its Canadian and American programming expenditures. But the broadcasters protested, and the regulator agreed to drop the idea, at least for this year. Such a rule would have likely radically reduced the amount of Canadian spending in L.A.

It's interesting to see how the Americans view it, huh?  From that position of self-interest?

The amazing thing is that our broadcast regulator, charged with protecting the airwaves for Canadians, doesn't act the same way.  Would that they actually paid attention more to what other countries do to handle the challenge of American signal hegemony, instead of floating timid trial balloons they then quickly back down from.  (And I know they say that the one-to-one spend idea isn't dead, but come on, based on history, do you really want to hold your breath?)

In all this, again, I feel it's important to say that I feel it's important that CTV and Global be allowed to thrive. But they've been addicted to the crack pipe of easy U.S. Simsub for so long, that they know nothing else but to ask for more free money, while at the same time whining about having to make any committment to spend that money on local or indigenous programming.  That's just wrong.

And let's say it plain, too. That "spending spree" in recent years by Global and CTV? It's the same pissing contest that we see every week when they release their duelling press releases.   It was as much about corporate ego and money as business reality and every single person outside of that Gatineau meeting room knows it.  It's pathetic that nobody has the balls to say it. Well, nobody but crazy Uncle Jim.  And me, I guess.  Shit, I can't believe I'm doing this again. 

I have been trying for a little while to lay off the CRTC...but the degree of paternalism and dismissiveness displayed in those documents of the in camera sessions just leaves too bad a taste in my mouth.  That relationship is just too cozy. And Konrad, if I see you at Banff, I'll be more than happy to say that to your face.

Save Local TV? Or Save Huge Media Companies?

BY NOW YOU'VE started to see all the "Save Local TV Ads" on your screens. (Wow, what do you think would happen if just once they had promoted a Canadian homegrown show that much?) For a different perspective, I direct you to this very interesting post by an admitted representative of several small cable companies.

Consider this. CTV and Canwest are publicly traded, for-profit companies. The first question is why should they be rescued at all? Should Canadians put money into their shareholders pockets? Should we permit a massive transfer of wealth from one set of for-profit companies to another just because one group yelled long enough?

Note that the main reason that the CRTC chose not to mandate these fees is that the conventional stations would not commit to ANY improvement or increase to local programming if they got the money (about $350 million this year).

The next question is, why should cable and satellite companies bail them out of financial difficulties that cable and satellite did not cause? If fragmentation of audience is the problem, why should cable pay to fix it?

The next question is, if cable and satellite customers are to be charged an extra few dollars on the monthly bill (which is, in all probability, where the money will come from) why should ONLY cable and satellite customers pay to save an over-the-air broadcasting system designed to push signals to the remaing 8% of Canadians who do not pay for TV at all?

If the system truly needs fixing, isn't that something that ALL Canadians should decide and then pay for? Isn't that a matter for Parliamentary debate and, then, amendment to our cultural and taxation policies?

And a final note: do not think for a moment that this is a one-time payout. First, the fees would be charged monthly, forever. Second, if the conventional broadcasters succeed in getting fees authorized, the next step will be incessant requests for increases to those mandated fees. Customer pays!

So now my "blather button" is really pushed. Honestly, the more I think about this, the angrier I get, as a cable representative, as a cable customer and as a Canadian television viewer.


Part 2 – Digital Conversion

As you may know, the US broadcasting system, by legislation, must go digital on June 12. That means that all over the conventional stations in the US must build digital transmitters (studio facilities and towers) for their signals.

As you can imagine, the US broadcasters balked at the cost of doing that. However, after some struggles, most, if not all, of the US conventional stations have now spent the money, gotten the job done and are broadcasting digital signals. On June 12, the analog over-the-air signals will shut down. Basically, the US is ready and it shouldn't be a huge issue.

In Canada, the digital cut-over is scheduled for August 2011. Under existing CRTC regulation -- that is, the law -- the Canadian conventional television stations MUST have digital transmission facilities built and ready for the cut-over at that time. The main point of the regulation here is that the CRTC does not want Canadians who presently get their signals only by antenna to lose TV service altogether when the analog transmission is shut down.

However, pleading poverty, the conventional broadcasters are now saying, regardless of their regulatory obligations, that they simply ARE NOT GOING TO DO IT.

So, at this time, the digital transition in Canada is pretty much up in the air. The conventional broadcasters will not divulge whether or where they intend to build any digital transmitters. Instead, they want the cable and satellite companies to solve their problem by distributing their signals for them, both to existing customers and to those Canadians who, today, do not subscribe to cable or satellite but take signals only by antenna.

However, despite the fact that they will again save hundreds of millions of dollars by avoiding their existing regulatory obligations, the broadcasters refuse to contribute ANY funding to solving the serious problem that antenna-only viewers will face when analog transmission shuts down or, for that matter, even to commit to delivering their signals at their own cost to the cable and satellite companies for onward distribution to Canadians.

Canada is beginning to lag the US seriously with respect to digitization of its broadcasting system. The conventional broadcasters are not helping us to catch up. Meeting the CRTC's August 2011 cut-over deadline appears less and less likely.

The whole thing is really worth a read.

Me and Mister C

TODAY WE'VE GOT something different. A guest post -- a little about writing, a little about television, and a little about life, courtesy of my friend Robert Sheridan, comedy writer extraordinaire. (Corner Gas, Little Mosque on the Prairie, Red Green) Enjoy.

So Denis is busy in Newfoundland and looking for a guest post, and it just so happens that I’m in the middle of writing a script and looking for a way to procrastinate. Isn’t it nice when agendas collide?

I’ve been resisting doing this because I don’t really have any hot button issue to rant about right now. On the other hand, I do like telling stupid stories that don’t really go anywhere, especially ones that involve me and someone even marginally famous. So here’s one.

I didn’t start writing TV until I was 30. Based on my earliest credits you would think that would make me 38 by now, but you’d be wrong. I’m 32. So shut your face.

Anyway, before I started writing, I did a variety of things, one of which was working as a publicist for the now-defunct Livent out of Toronto. The one run by, you know… that guy.

I knew nothing about publicity and even less about musical theatre, but for whatever reason someone snatched me out of the mailroom one day and said “here, do this.” So I did it, for nearly four years, as my twenties quietly slipped away from me without my really noticing. Note to twentysomethings: Pay attention.

It wasn’t really a bad gig, though. I got to travel around the U.S. with the touring companies of the various shows and set up media interviews with the actors in each market. Sometimes it was a real A-list town like Boston, but usually it was places like St. Louis, Indianapolis, Hartford, Cleveland... cities you might not otherwise find yourself in, but were often more fun than you’d think. And sometimes not.

The lead actors in these shows tended to be people with some background in musical theatre, but were primarily known from television, and often sitcoms, hence the marquee value. Cloris Leachman. Betty Buckley. Pat Harrington. Yes, for a brief moment in time, I called Schneider from “One Day at a Time” a friend.

One slight variation was the time we had Dean Jones in a show. Dean was a Disney star in the early 70s and had been the original dude in “Herbie the Love Bug.” Very nice man.

One night Dean Jones and I are in the back of a limo trying to get to a television station way out in the sticks. Big snowstorm. Traffic’s just crawling. And Dean’s telling me about the height of his career, and it sounded pretty great. Lots of parties and women. Lots and lots of women. And I’m really enjoying the stories and feeling kind of envious until it all culminates in Dean having a moment of clarity in a hotel room late one night. At this point in his story he turns to me and says “Rob. Have you accepted Christ into your life?”

And so a long drive suddenly got a lot longer.

But I digress. The actual story I wanted to tell was about Tom Bosley, Mr. Cunningham from “Happy Days.” Tom was playing Cap’n Andy in one of the touring companies of and before his career in television, he too had been a musical theatre star, most notably in the tile role of “Show Boat,”“Fiorello!” back in the 50s.

When I first met him in Detroit several months earlier I had heard that he could be a little crusty at first, and I guess he was. But at some point not long thereafter I had taken the time to tell him that I had been a huge fan of “Happy Days” as a kid.

That in and of itself was unremarkable – Bosley heard this sort of thing a hundred times a day. But I also happened to mention, genuinely, that my favourite seasons of the show were the first two.

In case you’ve forgotten, during the first two seasons (the ones with the “Rock Around the Clock” opening instead of the other one) Happy Days was actually a single camera show. There was a laugh track, but no studio audience. The humour was a little smaller and more subtle, the cast didn’t have to play to the back row, and Fonzie was not yet a superhero. He was there, but more of the stories revolved around small stuff between Richie and Potsie, and Richie and his Dad. Most of these episodes are really kind of terrific, if you get a chance to check them out on DVD.

Anyway, I got the sense that Tom Bosley especially liked those shows as well because we got along like a house on fire after that. Couldn’t have been nicer.

So one day we were driving around San Francisco, visiting a bunch of local TV and radio stations for various interviews. Ron Howard also happened to be in town, shooting “Ed TV.” I had, in fact, seen Ron Howard putting mustard on his hot dog at a Giants game just the day before, but I was alone at the time and hadn’t found the courage to go up and say hi. That was already eating at me by the time Tom and I had our media day.

Then, out of nowhere, Tom turns to me over lunch and says, “Oh, you know… Ronny is shooting his movie around the corner. Do you wanna go visit the set and say hi?”

I told Tom I thought that would be a little bit of all right, and so we did.

There was the usual amount of security surrounding the perimeter of the set, but the funny thing was that we didn’t have to show or do anything to get on. Tom just smiled at one of the guards and said “I’m here to see my son” and the guy smiled wide and shook his hand and removed the barrier. It was kind of awesome.

Then, we march right up to Ron Howard, who is between set-ups, and for like, ten minutes, I just stood there talking to Richie and Mr. C. Well, mostly I just stood there slack-jawed, saying squat. But it was, as any other TV-baby like me might imagine, one of the highlights of my life.

The amazing thing is that not once, not even for a second, while I’m standing there with one of the biggest directors in the world, who is himself standing there talking to his TV-Dad, who also happens to be starring in the expensive live musical that I am in town to publicize, not once does it occur to me to tell someone to grab a fucking camera.

The point is: I was a really, really shitty publicist.

Wait. That wasn’t supposed to be the point of this story.

Oh, right, now I remember. So the Ron Howard encounter behind us, we returned to the business of the day, which was ferreting Tom around to all these TV and radio stations. And it was then that I noticed that every single person we came into contact with throughout the day had the exact same reaction as that security guard on the set. The second, and I mean the second, Tom Bosley walked into a room, there wasn’t a twenty, thirty or fortysomething person who didn’t immediately smile wide and, with almost childish enthusiasm, step forward to shake his hand.

It was like their own father had gone out for a pack of smokes 20 years ago, disappeared, and had magically returned. These people were positively giddy, I tells you.

At some point, at one of the TV stations, maybe the local NBC affiliate, the woman who booked the show comes up to me and says “You know, we’ve had a lot of big stars come through here.” And she rattles off a list of names I’ve mostly forgotten, but they were all big, A-list movie stars and rock stars. Springsteen, Cruise, Hoffman. This sort of thing. Then she says: “But I have never, ever seen the staff more excited about a guest coming in. It’s Mr. Cunningham.”

I got what she meant completely.

Now, I’m not saying this was the exact moment I decided I wanted to write for television (I’ll leave that for Chapter Two of my upcoming autobiography “Rob, We Hardly Knew Ye”) but it made a big impact on me nevertheless. I think in some way every television writer kind of quietly yearns to be writing for the movies. There’s a romance to that, and you know, it would be pretty cool.

The thing is, and I realize this has been said before by people a lot smarter than me, there really is something about the primacy and intimacy of that little box being right there, in your home, every single day, that establishes an emotional connection we’re simply never gonna have with Tom Cruise. That’s the magic of the medium. And while we’re all working on those desk drawer feature screenplays with visions of glowing marquees and opening night klieg lights dancing in our heads, I like to remind myself from time to time what a privilege it is to work in television, even if I never make 1/1000^th the impact of a cultural touchstone like Mr. C.

That was my point. I’m sorry it took me so long to get there.

Anyway, as luck would have it, San Francisco was, I think, the last time I ever worked with Tom. Livent basically imploded at the end of the year, and that was that. But I remember lying in my hotel room that night and feeling kind of privileged to have had that experience, and then doing a little math and realizing that it was entirely possible that there were periods in my childhood when I spent more time with Mr. C. than I did with my own Dad.

This says absolutely nothing about my father, by the way, who was a wonderful guy. Only that I was horribly, horribly addicted to television. It was a real problem.

Still is.

I Hope Ted is Spinning

DEAR ROGERS,

You suck.

You completely, totally, utterly suck.

It was bad enough last summer, when it took about nineteen phone calls and two visits just to get my parents' big screen HD TV set up.

But here I sit in St. John's NL. I bought your super sports pack. All I want to do is watch the Blue Jays Boston game in the BG as I write. But I can't. Because after a stupid corporate fight, you've made your stupid, childish corporate deal to get TSN2 on the air --everywhere BUT in Newfoundland. And the Super Sports Pack blocks out the game, because TSN2 has the rights. Even though they're not actually showing it.

So I can't watch it. Even with the box, even with the package. Even though you OWN THE GODDAMN TEAM.

You know, when Canadians complain about Toronto, and not being included, and people having their heads up their asses, this is the kind of thing they're talking about. Just, FYI. You have terrible, legendarily terrible customer service. Every customer interaction with you is a nightmare. Last night, technical support cut me off four times. Customer service had no answers. They never do.

Oh, and while we're at it, you completely fucked up CityTV when you bought it too. So congratulations. Enjoy your money, enjoy your subscribers and tax breaks and regional monopolies.

But know this: you completely, totally fucking suck. I hope your wires corrode and your executives all quit and go to greener pastures. I hope your every future business venture collapses and burns. I hope that somewhere, one of your top managers suffers torment for every hour I have spent on the phone with you in the last 25 years, trying to straighten some stupid thing out because your evil, stupid, boneheaded corporation sucks so very hard.

My parents, when they go to Florida, get their cable through a company called Bright House Networks. They always answer the phone. They fix things right. They don't send out subcontractors who don't know what they're doing. They don't transfer you and cut you off. They don't sell you high speed bullshit and then throttle your connection. The mobile section doesn't not know what the tv section is doing. It doesn't take four phone calls to get your bill consolidated. Your Mom who's been paying the cable bill since 1977 doesn't get told she's not authorized on the account, and "you should get your husband to phone in and change that." Your HUSBAND. In 2008.

No, it takes a special kind of fucked-up, Enron-level degree of fucktardery to so completely, utterly, and totally frustrate and alienate your customer base.

Fuck you, Rogers. You suck Donkey Balls.



Hey there Bell Canada, what the @$%* do you think you're smirking at?

Flashpoint Renewed

NEW EPISODES will air Summer 2010.

(via Twitter @EWAusielloFiles)

UPDATE: what's unclear at this point is what "renewed" means. There's some question that the "third season" they're talking about might just be CBS holding back nine episodes from the current order that's being shot right now in Toronto.

CBS previously "held back" 4 episodes from FP's original order and ran them when the show returned in Feb. So there's discrepancy between what the Production considers a "season" and what the network does.

It's not clear that they've actually ordered any ADDITIONAL eps to the ones already in the hopper. The same thing happened with the U.S. sale of Blood Ties, which they marketed as two "seasons" when really, from production's standpoint, it was one 22 episode season.

In The Thick of It

WELL, I'VE TRIED, chickens. I've tried to line up guest posts. Those writers, they shant be wrangled unless there's a paycheque attached, it seems.

And after a weekend back home in Toronto I'm back on the Rock and deep into the shit. Deep work on several fronts trying to get stories up and running -- reading, writing, noting, and breaking new stories so that the great production machine can begin to rumble to life.

So the combo of those two things means that you should expect crickets here for the next bit. Now, ahem, if any of the brave souls I specifically, pathetically, pleadingly asked for material from this week come through, maybe there will be joy. But til then, may I suggest you visit all your other favorite TV sites to find out about such brilliant topics as:

• The Wonderful, Evolving World of U.S. Network Pickups
• The Canadian shopping spree that follows
• The bloodbath in TV representation

And also, Jim Henshaw has a scorcher of a post about the [REDACTED] "in camera" license renewal hearings at the CRTC, where the broadcasters explained their business for the commissioners far from the prying, dirty eyes of the great unwashed. (That's you and me, bub.)

What becomes clear is that Canadian nets still fail to see that the way around their problems is the same strategy most European nations have used to end-run the Hollywood studio insistence on owning it all -- to produce programming they can own and sell.

But I’ve been beating that drum since I started writing this blog and it seems CTV and Global would rather swallow lye than make a couple of dollars from their own labor.

At any rate, my favorite moment in this whole sorry affair occurs on pages 144-145, wherein the Commission Chair offers the following:

Unfortunately, “…what Ms. Williams just explained to me” has been redacted. So I, my fellow artists and the Arts Guilds the Commission Chair speaks of have no way of understanding her argument.

Or perhaps – of REFUTING it…

But then, we don’t matter to this Commission any more than the public does. And that’s made crystal clear over and over during CRTC hearings.

Writers Guild of Canada Executive Director Maureen Parker can explain a half century of Broadcaster “betrayal” of her membership and MP Cheryl Gallant can detail how her constituents in Pembroke were consistently lied to by CanWest. But those submissions are not explored while this document illustrates that the Commission feels enormously educated by whatever the broadcasters have to say.

My favorite moment of the redacted CRTC stuff (which was redacted, supposedly, because they didn't want "competitive details" revealed so that competitors could see them,) was the CEO of Canwest, Peter Viner, answering a question about Canada's creatives "not getting" the message that the money spent on U.S. shows subsidizes Canadian production (a point that not a single member of the WGC I've ever talked to disputes) apparently Viner said the following:


Oh MAN! He said Whhhaaaaa? What do you think's under that black bar?

"These are very intelligent people; we wish they'd just %$#$@ go away?"

Remember how the bleeps made The Osbournes funnier? Who was the guy at the CRTC wielding the pen? Dick Cheney?

Anybody who wants to guess what salty or businessy-competitive thing that was said "in camera", let me know in the comments below.

(And to Mr. Viner, I'm pretty sure you didn't drop a few stray F-bombs there. Here at Dead Things Labs, we give all professional broadcasters the benefit of the doubt. You gotta admit though -- that looks pretty dang funny.)

See you when I see you.