contracts-related stories
Posted Jul 9th 2009 1:05PM by Brad Trechak
Filed under: Other Reality Shows, OpEd, Casting
This news actually made my day. Apparently, in order to appear as "celebrities" on the television show
The Real Housewives of New Jersey, the housewives themselves
were not paid and in some cases owed the producers some of their non-television related income.
This is brilliant! This solves the issue of declining profits for television. Want your own reality show? Then pay for the privilege. It's like buying commercial time without anything definitive to promote. If any of them start their own business as a result of their undeserved fame (like a line of clothing or something), will they owe that income to the producers as well?
No matter how much I loathe reality television, I loathe
The Real Housewives of New Jersey just a little bit more. I applaud any opportunity to stick them with a fine for having the viewer subjected to them. The punchline to this joke would be if they all signed the same contract for their
upcoming second season.
Posted Apr 9th 2009 5:10PM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: Law and Order, Reality-Free
And I can hear every
Law and Order: SVU fan screaming at the same time,
"Noooooooooooooooooooooo!"Michael Ausiello is reporting that stars Christopher Meloni and Mariska Hargitay
are asking for more money (they currently get $7 million a year), and sources say that the network might replace them if the stars keep asking for that money. The show was recently
renewed for an 11th season.
I'm not too sure they couldn't be replaced. I mean, it would, of course, depend on who they go to replace them, but haven't they replaced the cast of the original
Law and Order quite a bit? Characters left, characters died, some actors died in real life, and they brought in new people. Though I wonder if Meloni and Hargitay, since they have been on the show for so long,
are the show and just can't be replaced. Or maybe they can just have it be
John Munch: Private Eye.
Posted Jan 9th 2009 12:06PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: How I Met Your Mother, Reality-Free
You think the recession hasn't hit the TV industry yet? Here's some proof it has:
the stars of How I Met Your Mother received pay raises...but not the kind of big money you've heard about in years gone by. The ensemble of five, Josh Radnor, Jason Segel, Cobie Smulders, Neil Patrick Harris and Alyson Hannigan renegotiated with the producers (20th Century Fox TV) to boost their salaries to $90,000-$120,000 per episode. That's still a lot of money in today's economic strife, but compared to
Two and a Half Men's Charlie Sheen's $825,000 per ep, it's downright modest.
Continue reading How I Met Your Mother's pay raise
Posted Oct 29th 2008 4:40PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: The Simpsons, Pickups and Renewals, Reality-Free
Animation domination will continue with
The Simpsons anchoring the Fox toon programming for at least
three more years. Al Jean,
Simpsons' exective producer, confirmed that since the actors are signed up till 2011, he's pretty much banking on the fact that the award-winning comedy series will stay on the air.
Considering the fact that
The Simpsons continues to be so successful -- last year's movie, for instance, grossed a staggering $526 million worldwide -- and remains hilarious and relevant, Fox would be nuts to let the show go. And one of the best things about this family sitcom is that the characters never age. Bart and Lisa only age in the episodes that fantasize about the future.
The Simpsons, paired with the
Seth MacFarlane shows --
Family Guy and
American Dad -- plus
King of the Hill, gives Fox the most competitive and alternative programming for Sunday nights.
Continue reading Expect three more years of The Simpsons
Posted Apr 23rd 2008 9:39AM by Jane Boursaw
Filed under: News, Talk Show
Doesn't it seem like Larry King is aging at about five times the normal rate? I keep thinking he must be in his 90s, but in reality, he's only 74. And it looks like he'll be around a while.
According to a TVNewser report,
CNN and King have agreed on a contract that will keep the suspender-clad one with the network through June 2011. For the record, he'll be 77 -- but he'll probably seem like he's 153.
A recent
New York Times story speculated that ratings-challenged
CBS Evening News anchor
Katie Couric might be eyeing King's CNN slot. "Couric discussed several things she might do if she left the anchor post, according to the executives, including a daily talk show to be syndicated by CBS, or replacing Larry King in a prime-time position on CNN," notes the Times story. Not so, a CNN spokesperson told TVNewser. "Larry is the best there is. He'll be here for a long time."
Continue reading Larry King signs extension that takes him into 2011
Posted May 7th 2007 5:23PM by Joel Keller
Filed under: OpEd, Gilmore Girls, Celebrities
One of the big reasons why
Gilmore Girls is not returning for an eighth season is because Warner Brothers and the CW reportedly could not come to terms on new contracts for both Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledel. So, it's not a big surprise to hear that Graham
is not sorry to see the show go gently into that good night.In fact,
she told Newsweek as much in this week's issue. "I think it's the best decision for the show," she told the magazine. "One of the things Alexis and I wished could be different was the schedule, and it really can't be."
(Update: Graham also spoke to TVGuide.com's Mike Ausiello about the show's end.)Continue reading Lauren Graham not sorry to see Gilmore Girls go
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