English Entertainment
Fox wins the season in 18-49 demographic
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MUMBAI: Buoyed by the sucess of its music based reality show American Idol, US broadcaster Fox got its first ever win for a TV season in the 18-49 demographic. This age group is highly sought after by advertisers and Fox came out on top for the September 2004-May 2005 season. |
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CBS scored its third consecutive victory in the total viewers column by a comfortable margin. American Idol took the top spot in the top 10 shows of the season in the 18-49 age group. ABC’s Desperate Housewives was next. What is interesting is that Fox started the season on a bad note. Its reality show The Next Great Champ fared so poorly that it was quickly shipped off to Fox Sports.
At the start of the season another flop for Fox was The Rebel Billionaire. Hosted by Richard Branson, the Rupert Murdoch owned broadcaster had been hoping that the show would prove to be a rival to NBC’s The Apprentice. The race to win the 18-49 category was close. Early projections showed that Fox was slightly ahead of CBS in that group by one-tenth of a demo rating point (4.1 versus 4.0), according to data from Nielsen Media Research. Third-place ABC (3.7) was been bolstered by Desperate Housewives and the medical soap Grey’s Anatomy. NBC lost 19 per cent of its viewership in the 18-49 demographic. One show that did not work was The Contender. Its failure along with Fox’s previously mentioned Next Great Champ puts a question mark over the future of sports based reality shows.  |
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The 2004-05 TV season went out with a bang when the two-hour season finales of Fox’s American Idol and ABC’s Lost drew a collective average of 51 million viewers to broadcast television. Another notable feature during the season was that the sitcom continued its decline. ABC cancelled its show 8 Simple Rules. It lost 43 per cent of its viewership in the 18-49 age group. NBC‘s Will And Grace lost 38 per cent of its share because there was no Friends lead in. NBC suffered the blows of losing Friends at the same time that viewership of other established programmes on its schedule took a dive in the ratings. The situation was very different in August 2004 when the network was doing well with its coverage of the Athens Olympics. During the recently concluded season even established shows like Law And Order struggled in the face of competition from CBS’ ratings winner CSI: NY and ABC’s Desperate Housewives. With The Apprentice suffering from viewer fatigue with a 37 per cent drop in viewership, the hospital drama ER ended up being NBC’s top-rated programme overall. It came in at number nine as far as ratings for the season in the 18-49 age group was concerned. Meanwhile, as far as the May Sweeps are concerned CBS won for total households, with an 8.8 rating and a 15 share, while Fox won the 18 to 49 segment with a 4.5 rating and a 13 share. One show that benefitted from American Idol is the show that immediately follows it on Fox – the medical drama House. The question for the other broadcasters is how they will counter the Idol effect next year. ABC is said to be moving Lost into that slot. |
English Entertainment
Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders approve Paramount deal
Investors wave through a $111 billion megamerger but deliver a stinging, if toothless, rebuke over half-a-billion-dollar goodbye packages
NEW YORK: The shareholders said yes to the deal. They said no to the cheque. At a virtual special meeting on Thursday that lasted barely ten minutes, Warner Bros. Discovery investors voted overwhelmingly to approve Paramount Skydance’s $111 billion acquisition of the company — and then turned around and voted against the lavish exit pay packages lined up for chief executive David Zaslav and his fellow outgoing executives.
Not that it will make much difference. The compensation vote is purely advisory and non-binding. The Warner Bros. Discovery board can, and almost certainly will, pay out as planned.
But the symbolism stings. It is the second consecutive year that WBD shareholders have voted against the executive compensation packages, and this time they had good reason. Zaslav’s exit deal is, by any measure, extraordinary. Under the terms filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, he is set to receive $34.2 million in cash severance, $517.2 million in equity in the combined company, and $44,195 in continued health coverage — a total of at least $550 million. On top of that, Warner Bros. Discovery has agreed to reimburse Zaslav up to $335 million for taxes assessed by the Internal Revenue Service on his accelerated stock vesting, though the company says that figure will decline depending on when the deal closes. As of March 11, Zaslav also held $115.85 million in vested WBD stock awards — and last month sold a further $114 million worth of WBD shares.
Shareholder advisory firm ISS recommended voting against the compensation measure, citing “problematic” tax reimbursements to Zaslav and the full vesting of his stock awards.
Zaslav will be bound by a two-year non-competition covenant and a two-year non-solicitation of customers and employees after the deal closes.
His lieutenants are not walking away empty-handed either. J.B. Perrette, chief executive and president of global streaming and games, is in line for $142 million, comprising $18.2 million in cash severance and $123.9 million in equity. Bruce Campbell, chief revenue and strategy officer, will receive an estimated $121.5 million, including $18.8 million in severance and $102.7 million in equity. Chief financial officer Gunnar Wiedenfels is set for $120 million, made up of $6.6 million in cash severance and $113.1 million in equity. Gerhard Zeiler, president of international, will get $82.6 million, including $11.9 million in severance and $70.7 million in equity.
The deal itself, clinched in February after Netflix declined to raise its bid for Warner Bros., still needs regulatory clearance from the Justice Department and European authorities. Several state attorneys general are also weighing legal action to block it.
Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, was unsparing. “The Paramount-Warner Bros. merger isn’t a done deal,” she said after the shareholder vote. “State attorneys general across the country are stepping up to stop this antitrust disaster. We need to keep up this fight.”
If it does go through, the combined entity would be a formidable beast, bringing together Paramount Skydance’s stable — CBS, CBS News, Paramount Pictures, Paramount+, BET, MTV and Nickelodeon — with WBD’s portfolio of HBO, Max, Warner Bros. film and TV studios, DC, CNN, TBS, TNT, HGTV and Discovery+. Paramount has said it expects $6 billion in cost savings from the merger, which is Wall Street shorthand for mass layoffs on a significant scale.
The ten-minute meeting was presided over by chairman Samuel Di Piazza Jr., with Zaslav, Campbell, Wiedenfels and chief communications officer Robert Gibbs in virtual attendance. Di Piazza was bullish. “We appreciate the support and confidence our stockholders have placed in us to unlock the full value of our world-class entertainment portfolio,” he said. “With Paramount, we look forward to creating an exceptional combined company that will expand consumer choice and benefit the global creative talent community.”
Zaslav echoed the sentiment. “Over the past four years, our teams have transformed Warner Bros. Discovery and returned the company to industry leadership,” he said. “Today’s stockholder approval is another key milestone toward completing this historic transaction that will deliver exceptional value to our stockholders.”
Paramount Skydance struck a similar note. “Shareholder approval marks another important milestone towards completing our acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery,” it said in a statement, adding that it looked forward to “closing the transaction in the coming months.”
The shareholders have spoken on the merger. On the pay, they were ignored before the vote was even counted.
