Fox Sets Emmys for Aug. 28 to Avoid Olympics Conflict

The 40th annual Emmy Awards will take place Aug. 28, a month earlier than usual, Fox Broadcasting Co. executives announced Tuesday. Fox programming president Garth Ancier said the network had decided on August rather than the traditional late September date to avoid conflict with the Olympic Games telecasts.

The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences’ “Television Hall of Fame” will again be on Fox in November--Nov. 28--”because we feel it plays better during the holiday season,” Ancier said. In the past, the academy’s “Hall of Fame” has been either a fall or early spring event.

Updating the late-night situation, Ancier said Fox plans to have yet another new late-night talk show ready to replace its failed efforts, “The Late Show” and “The Wilton North Report,” by the first week in March. Start-up date for the new late-night talk show will be either March 1 or March 6.

Until then, Fox will continue to air “Late Show” reruns in the 11:30 time slot (on KTTV Channel 11 in Los Angeles), featuring its most recent host, Arsenio Hall, and other guest hosts. Reruns will include installments hosted by Joan Rivers, the show’s original host, who was dismissed last May due to poor “Late Show” ratings. “It will just be the best shows,” Kellner said. “Fox has no problem with putting Joan on the air.”

Barry Sand, producer of the “Wilton North Report,” a comedy-news show which lasted for only few weeks, will not produce the new late-night effort, said Fox president and chief operating officer Jamie Kellner. He added that Sand had a continuing “agreement” with Fox under which he may serve in some other programming capacity.

For Sunday nights, Kellner said Fox in considering adding a comprehensive 11 p.m. wrap-up of the week in sports to follow its 10 p.m. news broadcast.