CBS News Dabbles in Prime-Time TV : Programming: Producers are quietly developing news-magazines--low-cost alternatives to expensive hits--as possible series.

In an effort encouraged by CBS Entertainment President Jeff Sagansky, CBS News producers are quietly developing several newsmagazines as possible prime-time series for next season.

The hope is that the shows will give the news division much-needed outlets for programming, while providing CBS with low-cost shows at a time when prime-time entertainment hits are getting harder to find and more expensive to buy.

CBS News already supplies “60 Minutes” and “48 Hours” to the prime-time lineup, and Sagansky has said that in order to offset the escalating costs of entertainment series, he needs more such smaller-budgeted programs, whether from the news division or the outside companies that make CBS’ “Rescue 911” and “Top Cops.”

CBS News producers recently began shooting the first of eight episodes of “The Verdict,” a series that will feature coverage of real-life courtroom dramas. CBS executives are said to have committed to airing the eight episodes either later this spring or during the summer.

A spinoff of recent programs on CBS News’ current newsmagazine “48 Hours,” “The Verdict” was developed by “48 Hours” executive producer Andrew Heyward and other “48 Hours” producers.

The same team recently completed the pilot for a prime-time series called “Whose Side Are You On?” that each week would present debate on a controversial topic. The pilot reportedly features Mike Wallace moderating a debate on the issue of assisting someone who wants to commit suicide.

“The goal of ‘The Verdict’ is to put the viewer in the front seat for an important trial, providing not only courtroom coverage but insight into the behind-the-scenes strategies” of the defense and the prosecution, Heyward said in an interview. “These will be real trials, with no re-enactments.”

He declined to discuss details of “Whose Side Are You On?”

While both “The Verdict” and “Whose Side Are You On?” are being produced entirely within the news division, a third pilot, “Boy Meets Girl,” is something of a hybrid. A series about love, it is being developed specifically for the entertainment division by CBS News producer Andrew Lack, who created “Saturday Night With Connie Chung,” a controversial CBS News series that was criticized by reviewers for its use of dramatic “re-enactments” of historical events.

Although Lack was unwilling to give many details of “Boy Meets Girl” in an interview, the pilot is said to include some dramatic re-creations.

“The show will focus on ordinary love stories, and there will be both actors and news footage,” said Lack, who is shooting the pilot for delivery in April. “ ‘Boy Meets Girl’ is separate from my work for CBS News; it’s intended strictly as an entertainment show.”

Lack has an unusual contract whereby he is paid by both the entertainment and news divisions of CBS. Under that agreement, he is also developing several fact-based TV movies for CBS.