No TV Tie-In for Airport

Looks like “John Wayne Airport” won’t become “The O.C. Airport” after all…

An Orange County supervisor’s idea to rename John Wayne Airport after a prime-time soap opera called “The O.C.” lasted about as long as one of the show’s short-lived romances.

Two days after suggesting a name change to capitalize on the show’s popularity and help give the county a hip, marketable image, Orange County Supervisor Chris Norby said maybe it wasn’t such a good idea after all.

“Let’s just say it was a trial balloon. It crashed and burned,” Norby said. “With all the priorities we have, it is not going to be one of ours.”

Norby’s staff was besieged with e-mail and telephone complaints in the two days since he floated the idea at a board meeting and in interviews with reporters. He never proposed the idea formally and said he certainly wouldn’t now after seeing the reception it received.

“I think people are happy with John Wayne Airport,” Norby said. “I’m happy with it too.”

I guess this rules out Kennedy Airport capitalizing on the Steven Spielberg/Tom Hanks movie by dubbing a terminal “The Terminal Terminal.”

As Primitive As Can Be

Bob Sassone alerted me that Telepictures is now casting for real people to become the fictional characters on Gilligan’s Island… a milionaire and his wife, a movie star, etc… for a new reality series.

Here’s the casting call…

CALLING ALL CASTAWAYS!

Get ready to take a three-hour tour and end up on an uncharted desert island.

That’s right — Gilligan’s Island is coming back on TBS — and this time, you can be a part of it!

The producers of “Gilligan’s Island” are teaming with the producers of the “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette” to bring you The Real Gilligan’s Island.

This all-new version of the classic sitcom will feature real life versions of the original show’s characters: a real-life skipper, first mate, millionaire couple, movie star, professor and Kansas farm girl. And one of them could be you!

Just like the original show, the castaways will work together to get off the island, and episodes will include situations drawn from the original series.

So if you’re the perfect Gilligan, Skipper, Thurston or Lovey Howell, Ginger Grant, Mary Ann, or The Professor (just what was his name, anyway?), fill out the application and mail it in, along with a video of yourself telling us why you’d make a great castaway.

Who knows, it could be you who takes the fateful trip to that tropic island nest.

Got questions? Call our Casting Hotline: 888-634-4550

Please submit tapes by 6/30/04

REAL GILLIGAN’S ISLAND OPEN CASTING CALLS

Saturday, June 12th
Towne East Square
7700 East Kellogg
Wichita, Kansas
10am-4pm

Saturday, June 19th
Boston, MA
location and times TBA

Thursday, June 24th
Tampa, FL
location and times TBA

We’ll be adding location details — check back often.

DON’T FORGET TO COME DRESSED AS YOUR FAVORITE CASTAWAY! (Here are some examples of what we’d like to see: Gilligan-red shirt
and sailor hat, Ginger-evening gown, Mary Ann-daisy dukes and pig tails, Skipper-captain hat and blue shirt, Professor-something scholarly, The Millionaire and his wife-come dressed up to the nines. Be creative!)

I can’t wait until they do the reality version of “Hogan’s Heroes.”

Random House Slashes E-Book Royalties

Here’s some important news on e-book royalties from the Authors Guild…and some essential advice to authors on how to deal with this issue in their book contracts.

* * * * * *

Random House recently advised literary agents that it will reduce the e-book royalties it will pay, starting with contracts signed this month. Since November 2000, Random House had essentially based its royalty rates on the notion — correct, in our view — that selling e-books has financially more in common with the act of licensing than with selling a traditional book. Once an e-book is created, the cost of producing an additional copy is practically nothing, just as a publisher incurs no production costs when it licenses the paperback reprint rights to a book, only the costs of negotiating and administering the license. Until now, Random House has split the net revenue from the sale of e-books with authors 50-50, just as it typically splits reprint-licensing revenues with authors. Random House’s e-book royalty rate had been the best among major trade publishers.

Unfortunately, Random House is abandoning this sensible approach. Random says it will honor its promise to pay 50 percent of net receipts on e-book sales for works under contract by May 31. For contracts signed on or after June 1, the publisher intends to pay 25 percent of list price until the author’s advance has earned out. (In its letter to agents, Random says that 25 percent of list is equivalent to 50 percent of net receipts, implying that its standard e-book discount is 50 percent.) Once the advance on a work is earned, royalties are sharply cut, to 15 percent of list price. For high-discount sales — those sold at discounts of 65 percent or greater — Random intends to cut its royalty rate further by applying its new royalty rates to net receipts rather than list price. That is, for high-discount sales, it will pay 25 percent of net receipts on titles with an unearned advance and 15 percent of net on titles with an earned advance.

What it means:

E-books aren’t dead; these royalty rates will matter. Random House clearly anticipates that e-books will be an important source of income and has decided that the author-relations value of its e-book royalty rates declared in 2000 is outweighed by the costs it now anticipates those royalty rates would incur. (Recent figures confirm that e-book sales are growing rapidly, though from a quite small base.) Those with negotiating clout should do what they can to secure more favorable terms, whether they are negotiating with Random House or any other publisher.

Negotiate the premium or high-discount sales clause carefully. When a sale falls into a contractually defined high-discount category, the result is always a drastically reduced royalty (in the case of Random House, this lops 65 to 70 percent off of royalty earnings). Protect yourself by inserting language specifying that sales will be deemed to be high discount only if they are made outside of normal trade channels. Since most e-book sales are made online, where Amazon.com dominates, it’s conceivable that Amazon may successfully demand high discounts as the cost of reaching its customers. If these sales are deemed “high discount,” then the author would shoulder nearly all of the burden of the reduced revenues to the publisher.

Random House has confirmed to us that they will make this change — specifying that only sales outside of normal trade channels may be deemed special sales — to their contract, but you have to ask for it.

Negotiate a higher royalty rate for direct sales by the publisher. Random House may be anticipating that its own e-bookstores will generate significant revenue. It’s certainly possible. By giving the e-book buyer an incentive to register with Random House (“Any e-book we sell for $1!”), Random could capture the e-mail addresses and other information it needs to market specific e-books directly to those who are likely to buy them. Under the old royalty scheme, Random would have to pay royalties of 50 percent of net receipts for these sales, which might be made at very low discounts. If Random sold the e-book directly at a 20 percent discount, for example, the author would earn 40 percent of list price. (This is fair, since Random would also be doing quite well by the sale.) Under the new scheme, Random would pay the author as little as 15 percent of the list price.

Authors with negotiating leverage should consider seeking a net-revenue based royalty for any direct e-book sales by a publisher or any of its affiliates, including its book clubs.

Important: While this advisory addresses the Random House e-book royalty situation specifically, we think the lessons apply to e-books generally. Authors should be paying close attention to e-book royalty rates when negotiating contracts.

TV Guide International Airport

Orange County Supervisors are thinking about renaming John Wayne Airport. They want to call it “The O.C. Airport” as a tie-in to the one-year-old, hit Fox show.

It’s got cache,” Orange County Supervisor Chris Norby said. “It’s concise.”

From a practical standpoint, Norby and other county boosters say “The O.C.” has name recognition and is more identifiable than Orange County Airport, John Wayne Airport or SNA, the federal designation for what was once Santa Ana Airport.

Roger Faubel, a board member of Arts Orange County, a group that promotes arts in the county, says he supports Norby’s plan and is already working on a logo with the new airport name.

“We’re going to explore that branding and see if it resonates,” Faubel said. “It’s an idea. If it gets legs, great.”

I am not making this up…it was reported in this morning’s Los Angeles Times.

So what’s next, renaming Newark Airport “Sopranos International Airport?” McCarren Airport in Las Vegas “C.S.I.X?” I got an idea — half the bodies in the three “Law and Order” shows are found in Central Park, why not rename it “Law & Order Park?” Maybe Dick Wolf will make his fifth series about Park Police, and the branding will come full circle!

Television audiences are notoriously fickle… and tastes change fast. “The O.C.” may not be on the air two years from now. What will Orange County do then… name the airport after whatever series happens to be a hit that season?

Sweet Badass Jews

I just got back from seeing “Baaadasss,” Mario Van Peeble’s film about his father Melvin’s struggle to make the breakthrough indie flick “Sweet Sweetback’s Badass Song.” It’s a good movie, and a lot of time is spent telling us that Melvin’s movie was a reaction to the terrible, stereotypical roles for blacks in Hollywood… roles that didn’t reflect the black race, the black culture, or the way blacks were being treated in mainstream society.

No argument there. But apparently, as long as you’re breaking down one stereotype, it’ s okay to perpetuate another. The portrayal of the Jewish characters was about as one-dimensional, unflattering, and stereotypical as you can get: hawk-nosed, crass, money-grubbing… well, you get the picture. The depiction of Jews was about as dated, and racist, as the shuck-and-jive Negro.

I admire both Mario and Melvin, and I enjoyed the movie… but I don’t understand how people so sensitive to stereotyping could be so blind when it applies to others.

Martini Shot

I enjoyed writer/producer Rob Long’s “Martini Shot,” a new weekly radio commentary on the Industry that airs on KCRW. One of his comments really struck home…

people in this business love their souped-up vocabulary: we “green-light” things, and dump things in “turnaround” and “negative pick-up” and “pitch” and make “pre-emptive strikes.” And we love our creative talk too. We like lots of “character journeys” and “story integrity” and “deeply humanistic values.” Our slang is so vivid and energetic that’s it’s hard to remember that these phrases are used mostly when people are alone in their cars. Although it comes up a lot in meetings, too. I remember a network executive telling me once that while she liked our script, she wanted to see if we could “platform our heroes sooner in the piece, so the audience could begin to celebrate with them earlier in their journey.” Okay. Sure. Not a problem. Just platform the…thing….with the….journey and the…stuff.

Recently, we got a note asking us to have a detective “unpack the clues more extensively.” Within days, we found ourselves also being alerted that “there were more emotions to unpack in this scene, now it is Bob’s to command rather than his to assist and we think that could be amped.”

Your Show Belongs to US

This ad ran in today’s VARIETY:

An Open message to:
Irene Chaiken & Showtime Networks
We listened. We subscribed. We watched.
We then became the driving force behind The L-Word’s Season One success and unprecedented renewal.
So why aren’t you listening?????
Marina Ferrer, as played by Emmy-worthy Karina Lombard, is a vital part of your success!
Keep KARINA LOMBARD!
Save MARINA!
Or COUNT US OUT!
Over 4,400 Showtime subscribers can’t be wrong: www.petitiononline.com/Karina/
For More Information, visit www.savemarina.com or www.karinalombard.net
Paid for by Save Marina! Campaign and Karina Lombard fans Worldwide
!

I’m not bothered by fans expressing their enjoyment of a particular actor or character… what ticks me off is the tone of this note. It is so similar to the kinds of emails and letters we get from a vocal minority of fans every day…

Some fans think they own the show and the characters, that we are their employees, that they are the executive producers of the program they are watching. Note the key line in the ad: these fans aren’t just watching the show, they have christened themselves “the driving force behind the shows success,” not the acting, not the writing, not the direction…not the tens of thousands of other viewers who aren’t part of their newsgroup. I also like the line” “So why aren’t you listening?” In other words, these fans are chastizing the producers for not doing as they were told.

I must have missed the revolution. When did TV shows stop being the creative expression of a handful of artists… and instead the property of the most fanatical viewers? Since when do David Milch, John Wells, Steven Bochco, Dick Wolf or even Irene Chaiken need “fan permission” to make creative decisions on their shows?

Don’t worry, Marina fans. If they boot her, you can still have the last word. You can keep her alive in the fanfic!

The “Journalistic Integrity” of VARIETY, Part III

It just keeps getting better…

A week after Peter Bart wrote about how he would have protected Michael Ovitz from ruining himself if the ex-agent had given his interview to VARIETY instead of VANITY FAIR….the VARIETY editor writes today that:

After 15 years of editing Daily Variety, I will regrettably admit the following: I do not believe every word that’s published in my own newspaper.

Join the club, Pete.

He blames the problem, like Brian Lowry did few days ago, on people lying to his reporters. He forgets to mention his own questionable journalistic ethics, which he presumably imposes on his staff. Here’s a gem from the controversial Los Angeles Magazine story on him a while back..

BART HATES TO TAKE NOTES. “I don’t like to,” he says. “I just find when you take out a notebook, it just changes the atmosphere.” Nevertheless, in his column he frequently quotes conversations he has had with Hollywood figures. The quotes, which he also inserts in reporters’ stories, are nearly always unattributed. He often dictates them off the top of his head, which may explain why some of Variety’s anonymous sources sound a lot like Inventive Peter.

He may hate it when people lie to his reporters, but apparently he doesn’t mind lying to reporters himself, like this whopper he told the LA Magazine writer….

Consider what happened when we discussed the infamous Patriot Games incident of 1992, when Variety film critic Joe McBride wrote a blistering review of Paramount Pictures’ Tom Clancy adaptation. The studio, apoplectic over the review’s potential dampening of interest among overseas exhibitors, pulled its advertising from Variety. Bart got mad, but not at the studio. He decreed that McBride would no longer review Paramount films.
The New York Times wrote a story about the McBride dustup that said Variety staffers were aghast that their boss would curry favor with Paramount. The article quoted from a private apology that Bart had sent to Martin S. Davis, the studio’s then chairman and CEO. “Marty Davis and I have known each other for 25 years,” Bart told the Times. “I simply dropped him a friendly note.”

Nine years later, however, when I first ask Bart about the note, he insists it never existed. “I never wrote any,” he says, adding that he disliked Davis intensely, so “the idea that I would contact these people was bizarre.” How to explain the Times story, written by veteran reporter Bernard Weinraub? “It was a reminder to me about the nastiness of journalists toward each other,” Bart says, shaking his head.

A few weeks later I obtained a copy of the letter. Bart’s lie didn’t make sense. Had he forgotten that it was typed by his own secretary on Variety stationery?

Perhaps its embarrassing revelations like this that has inspired his policy of letting some interviewees change their quotes before publication (as he offered to do for Ovitz, as he admits in last weeks column)…

People who have worked with Bart say he would call his favorite sources–Guber, Ovitz, Weinstein, Evans, producer Arnon Milchan–and vet stories that mentioned them, letting them make adjustments. When confronted by the reporters whose bylines topped the altered stories, Bart would say he got better information after deadline. “This is my paper,” one remembers him saying. “I’ll do as I please.”

No wonder Peter Bart doesn’t believe what he reads in his own “newspaper.”

The Mail I Get…

This is a semi-regular feature where I share some of the, um, interesting mail I get.

I received this note over the weekend…I have no idea what he’s talking about. Maybe you’d like to try answering the question for him.

SeaQuest Episode Question

What is the episode number or name of the fish guy?

The actor who played the man with gills in the rear of his ribcage. It was an episode where the fish guy went out in deep sea to see about something when his gills closed and clam up causing him to drown. But not before the dolphin save him. (which always made me wonder the logic in this)

Second question, do you think there is the hope of them bringing the show back and letting Dean Cain be the fish man?