TV's Rising Moguls: Young and Restless

By SALLIE HOFMEISTER and BRIAN LOWRY

Oct. 7, 1996 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITERS

Thirtysomething is back in vogue in TV land.

Jamie Tarses is 32 and the new president of ABC Entertainment, where she oversees prime-time programming. Eric Tannenbaum, 33, runs Columbia TriStar Television, which produces such shows as “The Nanny” and “Mad About You.” Gavin Polone, also 32, recently jettisoned a career as one of Hollywood’s top television agents to be a business manager. He hopes to produce shows with such clients as “Seinfeld” creator Larry David and talk show host Conan O’Brien.

These are among the young--and very restless--dozen or so TV executives in their early 30s who in the last decade have risen to Hollywood power positions.

This loose confederation of junior moguls influences which shows get developed and which ones air, working with writers, shepherding scripts and jockeying for the best creative talent. Recent promotions for Tarses and Tannenbaum signal the group’s arrival in the highest echelons, positioning them to help shape television as it enters the next millennium--a brutal period that is expected to be marked by the continued erosion in network viewership by cable, video and the Internet.

Television always has been a magnet for young, ambitious executives--and age has never seemed to be a deterrent to success. Producers Fred Silverman and Brandon Tartikoff and Tele-TV president Sandy Grushow were in their early 30s when they headed network entertainment divisions.

But never before have so many young people held such high positions at once--or brought such a collective aggression to the business. Rich and driven, many in the group hobnob at night and some share romantic ties. But they sharpen their sabers for battle by day and, with their expanding influence, point them increasingly at each other in power skirmishes that are fast becoming a favorite Hollywood spectator sport.

The speedy rise of these executives stems in part from television’s obsession with attracting the younger audiences advertisers covet. Many in the group also benefit from their pedigrees--as the children of agents, producers and studio executives. Many consider themselves hardened veterans already, having worked in the industry’s trenches with a singular focus since they graduated from college.

“What you’re seeing is huge opportunity and invitations for the next generation to ascend,” said Warren Littlefield, president of NBC and a mentor to Tarses before she jumped to ABC in June. “There’s a heavy burnout factor. The business grabs people, squeezes them dry, then you move on to the next suspect.”

That may help explain the brazen style of some members of this freshman executive class. Older executives say such behavior is a Hollywood hallmark, but may also stem from a lack of experience and immaturity. Another plausible explanation is the cynicism and callousness born of corporate downsizing, cost-cutting and the heavy debt that has cramped entertainment economics.

“They have come of professional age in an incredibly difficult period in Hollywood history, when technological and other changes have put enormous pressure on the bottom line,” said Dean Valentine, 42, president of network television and TV animation at the Walt Disney Co. “It’s all too easy today to focus on the demos, the deal, the commerce, the audience flow, especially for a generation that hasn’t known a lot of alternatives to the bottom-line mentality. The challenge for them, more than for their predecessors, is to keep the passion for the ideas and for the people who generate them that drives the business.”

New Generation

When the young executives joined the business, the networks were considered destined for extinction, with NBC, CBS and ABC all paring down under new owners General Electric, Laurence Tisch and Capital Cities, respectively.

“The rules were changing at every turn,” said Kevin Reilly, 34, who left NBC last year to become executive vice president of television at Brillstein-Grey Communications, producer of “NewsRadio” and “The Jeff Foxworthy Show.” “It felt for a while that the network business would be a diminished version of itself. One thing that united us . . . was that we came into the business when it was stale. We all wanted it to be as exciting as before.”

They soon got their wish. Federal rule changes, the advent of online and digital technologies and new broadcast networks, and exploding foreign markets and domestic cable channels fueled the demand for TV, at the same time thinning the talent pool and making hits harder to create.

The intense competition is making life in Hollywood’s fast lane complicated, as illustrated by a management shake-up at ABC last month.

After less than a year in a top development job, Michael Rosenfeld, 35, resigned from ABC in a power struggle with his new boss, Tarses. Sources say he was instrumental in her being asked to join the network and was crushed when she reorganized the staff in a way that undermined his authority. Others say Tarses viewed Rosenfeld, a television agent until last fall, as lacking the experience in development she needed to shore up ABC’s weakening ratings.

Best of friends a year ago, Tarses and Rosenfeld are estranged. Last week, he landed at Brillstein-Grey Entertainment as a senior vice president, where he will manage talent and oversee production of TV shows and films.

The ambition of this new breed, however, is perhaps most threatening to the established power structure in TV.

Tarses caused an uproar in February when she pressured NBC’s top brass to release her nearly a year early from her contract to pursue the ABC job. She had just been promoted to head both comedy and drama series but saw her pace of advancement slow after her boss, Littlefield, signed on as president for five more years.

Opening Doors

Sources say that in a tactic to get out of her contract, Tarses let NBC know that she was prepared to raise allegations of sexual harassment against a high-ranking NBC executive. The network let her out of her contract, though both she and NBC say such allegations were never made. The episode created a negative swirl of publicity that clouded her reputation and triggered corporate warfare between NBC and Disney, ABC’s parent.

For her part, Tarses insists her motives have always been confined to producing good TV shows. “I’ve never felt there was a blind ambition that came at the expense of immediate objectives,” she said. “I never had a goal in terms of my career. These opportunities came my way because of the work I’ve done.”

Like many other star executives, Polone, Tarses, Tannenbaum and Rosenfeld were weaned on Hollywood, with parents in the business who set an example, taught them early lessons and in some cases helped jump start careers. Polone’s mother, Judy, is a producer, though Polone is closer to his father, a real estate developer, with whom he lived as a teenager. Tannenbaum’s father, Thomas, was president of Viacom and MGM Television before becoming a producer.

Rosenfeld followed in the footsteps of his father, Michael Sr., who co-founded Creative Artists Agency with Michael Ovitz and three other agents. His father was a television producer when Rosenfeld started in the agency’s mail room. He became a TV agent under the tutelage of Ovitz, who placed him at ABC after signing on as president of Disney a year ago.

Tarses’ father, Jay, created such shows as “The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd” and “Buffalo Bill” as well as the new CBS comedy “Public Morals.” Tarses says her knack for working with writers stems in part from living with one for so long.

She says she learned the importance of separating her personal life from her career after a harrowing experience as an executive charged with marshaling one of her father’s series at NBC.

Held as a back-up for months, the show finally premiered off-season under the title “Black-Tie Affair” before being quickly canceled. To keep the family peace, Tarses says her mother has since forbidden her from talking about her father’s work.

Even so, at ABC, Tarses has drawn criticism for letting personal relationships color her business judgments. Even before her first day on the job, sources say, she tried to secure a production deal at ABC for boyfriend Robert Morton, who earlier this year was ousted as executive producer of David Letterman’s show.

Sources say her insistence on making the deal so early in her tenure was unsettling to top ABC and Disney executives. The network nevertheless has agreed to pay Morton an estimated $4 million over two years, although ABC Entertainment chairman Ted Harbert said Tarses recused herself from negotiations.

Critics also say Tarses looked naive in championing a $45-million production deal proposed by her good friend Polone, in light of the shaky reception by Disney of two similar joint ventures ABC has to produce shows with Brillstein-Grey and DreamWorks SKG.

Several studios and networks have turned away Morton and Polone.

Rapid Rise

Parents may have helped open doors, but hard work and obsessive focus put these Baby Moguls on the map. Most entered the business out of college, rather than segueing in later in their careers as did bosses like Leslie Moonves, the president of CBS Entertainment, who started as an actor.

Tarses was a casting director before she joined NBC at 23. Five years later, she was in charge of comedy development.

Known for her talent in fixing scripts, she has received much credit for shaping “Friends,” which may be her generation’s signature show. “Luckily for me,” she said, “my sensibility seems to be in sync with the desirable demographics right now.”

As No. 2 to Harbert, she is the first network president born after the Kennedy administration. Diligent, poised and articulate, with a salary in the low seven figures, she has signed a raft of talent to the network and been somewhat reluctantly profiled in such magazines as People and Working Woman.

Her highest-ranking contemporary is Tannenbaum, who began working as an assistant to Jon Feltheimer, now head of Sony Pictures Television, almost directly after graduating from Tufts University. At the time, they were at New World Entertainment. Tannenbaum’s easy-going, straightforward style has endeared him to agents and network buyers. At Sony, he headed TriStar Television--and the team that developed NBC’s “Mad About You” and CBS’ “The Nanny.” In June, Feltheimer consolidated sister Columbia TV under him, putting Tannenbaum in charge of 10 prime-time shows.

If Tannenbaum is his generation’s Mr. Nice Guy, Polone prefers to be its Bad Boy. While his peers drive BMWs and Range Rovers, Polone has a Ferrari and fancies himself a “warrior”--ready to kill any opponent at the negotiating table. He graduated from UC Berkeley in three years because, he said, “I just wanted to work,” and he abbreviated his stay in the mail room at International Creative Management to become an agent at 22. He headed up the TV department at rival United Talent Agency for six years before leaving this spring under a cloud of acrimony.

Friends insist Polone has mellowed since becoming his own boss. “I am happy for maybe the first time in my career, after all of the sturm und drang and pain and resentment of working in an environment where people who didn’t work as hard or weren’t as smart as me were taking out more [money],” he said, adding that it is more satisfying to serve 15 clients as a manager than more than 70 as an agent.

A producer for six months, he is shooting a pilot with client Chris Elliott for ABC and a movie for New Line Cinema.

Polone initially refused to be interviewed for this article because he did not want to be lumped with certain peers he views as lightweights. (He said that did not include Tarses and Tannenbaum.)

Even his supporters say his brutal honesty often offends people. For instance, after the Northridge earthquake in 1994, he posted a sign on the glass wall of his office that, agents recall, warned visitors: “Don’t talk to me about the earthquake. I don’t care about you or your problems.”

Gaunt and lanky, with a dark beard and wavy mane, he was ousted in April from United Talent Agency by partners because of his bullying and abrasive style, critics say. He was paid millions to settle with the agency, which he claimed had defamed him.

His friends say partners were jealous that he was the agency’s top revenue generator and had refused to give him the authority he demanded in exchange for signing a new long-term contract.

The younger generation’s reputation for hardball tactics has raised questions among older executives about whether the group is ready for their new responsibilities. “There really is that attitude among those young turks that anything goes,” said a senior executive, who added that his generation may harbor some of the blame for not instilling better values in tutoring them. “There is no sense of history, no sense of who helped me along the way among that group.”

Others say these are simply knee-jerk reactions to the frontal assault on their careers from a younger generation. “The more things change, the more they stay the same,” said attorney Ernie Del, whose clients include Tannenbaum as well as such key members of the fortysomething generation as Moonves, Harbert and Feltheimer. “People kind of forget. There’s always been a tendency to look warily at the next group coming up: Are they ready? Can they be trusted? Are they too ambitious?”

Strained Relations

Even so, suspicion and distrust are distorting the harmony of the junior moguls. Tarses’ rise “into a league of her own,” as one put it, has fueled jealousies and rivalries. At the Ivy at the Shore, a favorite Santa Monica hangout, dinner conversation has turned more than once to a debate about balancing ambition and power, loyalty and social responsibility.

What was a tightly knit clique last year began unraveling earlier this year after Tarses and Dan McDermott, 32, co-head of television at DreamWorks, divorced. Just last year, McDermott, Tarses, Rosenfeld and wife Sonya, a Creative Artists Agency agent, and Adelstein and his wife vacationed together in Hawaii. “Now, no one is talking,” said Adelstein, only half in jest.

Despite an eagerness to advance, the members of this generation may find matching Tarses’ high-profile position slow-going.

And in a matter of just a few years, even the new generation acknowledges that a successive group of eager young executives will be clamoring for their jobs.

“It’s the nature of business,” said TV agent Chris Harbert, 33, Ted’s younger brother, who co-heads United Talent with 29-year-old Jay Sures. “By the way, in 10 years, when it’s the next group, I’m not going to want to go anywhere either. . . . I’m not going to roll over just because I made my dough. I’m going to go kicking and screaming.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

TV’s Brat Pack

Among the hottest young executives working in television:

NAME: JAMIE TARSES

AGE: 32

TITLE: President, ABC Entertainment

INVOLVED, PAST AND PRESENT: “Friends,” “Frasier.”

****

NAME: ERIC TANNENBAUM

AGE: 33

TITLE: President, Columbia TriStar Television

INVOLVED, PAST AND PRESENT: “Mad About You,” “The Nanny.”