Re: Why Canceled?

From: chance <chance_at_unix.infoserve.net>
Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 06:48:59 -0700

>But you don't get it, do you? Just what event that happens every two years?
>What event takes place in the winter one year, and in the summer two years
>later? What is everyone looking forward to? What is everyone sponsoring? The
>Olympics are taking place in Atlanta, Georga, U.S.A., this year. You can
>tell that somehow Ted is involved in the Olympics being held in his
>hometown. Somehow he's getting a ton of money over this. Ted isn't losing
>anything. He's loosing millions in broadcasting, but is making it up by
>having the Olympics in his home town. It's just a hunch, but all the peices
>fit all too well.......

Turner's last two years were a couple for the red-ink record books, I think.
The 9 mil flushed on the JQ dead-ends were just microscopic drops in a
very large bucket near full to overflowing with failures like that Whoopie Goldberg
thing that went nowhere, "Pagemaster" and a couple of other offerings that
were non-starters (live ac, I believe). I think Tedco got the rights to the animated
mascot of the Games, but can't think what he/she/it would be good for in terms
of revenue generation. Oh well.

I think CNN turns a profit regularly, H-B probably never has, TNT and TCN
still need better market penetration domestically to earn megabucks, and I
don't know an awful lot about TBS. We won't mention WCW wrestling
in case any of us have just finished eating. They also make money off of
the broadcast rights to all those old MGM epics that they own ("Turner
Programming Services"), in addition to the "cost nothing" airing of them
on their owned networks.

Turner's next feature is "Cats Don't Dance" (by all accounts none-too-shabby,
and utilizing the talents of the great Maurice Noble!), and I think the jury is still
out on whether or not the TVA stuff come fall will sink HB or save it. Latest
rotation of the Rumour Mill has H-B unlikely to survive a failure of JQ without
"restructuring" to the point the entity is no longer recognizable *as* H-B.

(Once again, the merger talks appear stalled. A WBA friend says that he's
  heard that "the whole thing's off". Sometimes his crystal ball is a bit dusty though.)


Received on Tue Jul 02 1996 - 10:40:11 PDT