In the last month, Barbra Streisand, Whitney Houston and Michael Bublé have all appeared and sang on The Oprah Winfrey Show. All three have had number one albums. Coincidence? No. Good promotion (although Whitney had already reached number one by the time she warbled on Oprah). Therefore, I have to wonder why Jon Bon Jovi has entered an exclusive "artist in residence" deal with NBC Universal? For two months, Bon Jovi will promote the new Bon Jovi CD, The Circle, only just on NBCU channels.
You'll see him on Today, The Tonight Show, The Jay Leno Show, Saturday Night Live, a segment of the NBC Nightly News With Brian Williams and a sit down with James Lipton on Bravo's Inside the Actors' Studio. When The Circle is released on November 10, you'll know all about it... if you've watched NBC and Bravo.
A long-awaited merger between two cable channels has been finalized...uh, finally.
A&E Networks aquired Lifetime as part of a deal between Hearst, Disney and NBC Universal. The deal makes Lifetime a sub-company in the A&E empire.
The deal puts Disney and Hearst in the front row seats of both networks with NBC in a distant third. This means that NBC can sell its holdings in Lifetime to the other two parties within the next 15 years.
There doesn't seem to be any serious announcement or confirmations of a name or brand change under their new owners. Lifetime will still be called Lifetime.
NBC Universal has just turned five years old, and I didn't get them a present. What do you get a giant international media and entertainment company? Tonight at 8 they're running the ad below, and not just on NBC. You'll also see it on other NBC Universal properties, including MSNBC, CNBC, USA, Bravo, and The Sci-Fi Channel. And if you're not in front a TV and happen to be in Times Square, you'll see it there too.
It was all really uncomfortable, obvious and out of place when you are tuning in for news, politics, some pop culture and get NBCU corporate cheerleaders in full pom-pom mode.
Okay, enough ranting; there is some news to report. If the deal goes through -- and it will -- Today weatherman Al Roker may be relocating or he'll be repurposed, becoming the face of The Weather Channel.
The takeover of Oxygen by NBC Universal has now lead to 25% of Oxygen's employees being let go, per this Variety article. "We have consolidated functions and operations, resulting in job impact," said J.B. Perrette, president of distribution for NBCU. Can't you just see Jack Donaghy (Alec Baldwin) delivering that line. "Job Impact." I love wordspin. Not "We just told 65 people that come the New Year they'll be on the streets looking for work" but "We told 65 people that their jobs have been impacted."
It's a rumor that's been going around Hollywood for years; heck, we even mistakenly thought this was going to happen last year. But now it looks like NBC Universal president Jeff Zucker has finally had enough and is replacing the president of NBC Entertainment, Kevin Reilly.
Over the weekend, Nikki Finke of LA Weeklyreported on her blog that Reilly will be replaced by two people: producer Ben Silverman, whose company brought The Office and Ugly Betty to the U.S., will be in charge of the entertainment side and Marc Graboff, currently NBCU Television's West Coast chief, will run the business side. Bill Carter of The New York Times is also reporting on the change, but in a less definitive manner.
Last summer, I told you about a dispute NBC Universal was having with the Writers Guild of America over the webisodes they asked the creators of The Office, Heroes, and Battlestar Galactica to write and produce prior to this season. It seems as if the WGA was a little cheesed off that NBC was asking writers to create these web-only vignettes for no extra compensation, and ordered the writers to stop working on them. NBCU filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board over the union's order.
Well, the NLRB finally ruled on the matter, and NBCU came out on the losing end. Sort of. The board dismissed the case yesterday, ruling that there was no evidence that the union coerced or pressured the show-runners of those shows to not work on the webisodes. So, while NBCU technically lost, all they wanted from this case was for the WGA to admit that they didn't pressure anyone, which is what they got, according to Broadcasting & Cable. Another dispute between the two parties, about a "side-letter" agreement regarding web content, will be decided by a private arbitrator in late spring.
Even though it totally slashed its staff, NBC is upping its order of Dateline to three nights per week. Most notably, it's going to air in the slot where Friday Night Lights currently sits on Tuesday nights. Now, FNL fans probably shouldn't worry! Even though its ratings haven't been outstanding, NBC did order a full season of the teen football drama and promises it is committed to the series. The network just hasn't announced where Friday Night Lights will land, but previous speculation puts it on Sunday nights.. Dateline will also air on Saturdays and Sundays, once the NFL season is over. The new schedule begins Dec. 26th.
According to the New York Times, NBC is planning to shuffle its schedule for the New Year. The network has said that it wants cheap shows (reality shows, news, and game shows) in its 8 pm time slots and dramas and comedies at later hours.
Last month, Rich told you all about NBC Universal's plans to cut costs by cutting jobs. Seven hundred jobs to be exact. The first wave of cuts came last week, where at least 17 people were laid off from Dateline NBC. Most of those jobs were based out of New York, with a handful in Washington, D.C. and Chicago. There is also an undisclosed number of people who volunteered for the company's buyout package.
More layoffs within NBC News will come this week, with even more coming in the next year. According to Broadcasting & Cable, NBC Universal is slashing costs mostly at the NBC television network, while its movie and cable networks remain untouched. That means the news division is going to take the biggest hit because it takes a lot of people to cover the news. I guess we know where NBCU's priorities are. If it's anything like the newsrooms I've worked in, the most expensive employees will be told to take a hike and they will be replaced by cheaper people with less experience. Does the quality of the product take a hit? You betcha.
In the last month, Barbra Streisand, Whitney Houston and Michael Bublé have all appeared and sang on The Oprah Winfrey Show. All three have had number one albums. Coincidence? No. Good promotion (although Whitney had already reached number one by the time she warbled on Oprah). Therefore, I have to wonder why Jon Bon Jovi has entered an exclusive "artist in residence" deal with NBC Universal? For two months, Bon Jovi will promote the new Bon Jovi CD, The Circle, only just on NBCU channels. 
A long-awaited merger between two cable channels has been finalized...uh, finally. 
So, you probably heard that the NBC Universal empire will be expanding by one, once 
The takeover of Oxygen by NBC Universal has now lead to 25% of Oxygen's employees being let go, per 
It's a rumor that's been going around Hollywood for years; heck, 
Last summer, 
Even though it totally 
Last month, 
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