The Ratings: Inside and Out

Throughout the debate over adding content-based labels to television programs, NBC West Coast President Don Ohlmeyer has remained one of the few entertainment executives willing to directly challenge the industry’s critics on the issue.

Nevertheless, it came as a surprise when NBC rejected the amended ratings just adopted (albeit with considerable reluctance) by its industry brethren, citing concerns about government intrusion into programming decisions.

The campaign to impose ratings specifically designating sex, violence, offensive language and suggestive dialogue within programs has won support on both sides of the political aisle. According to NBC, however, “as a matter of principle, there is no place for government involvement in what people watch on television.”

NBC’s decision follows a period in which television officials seemed reluctant to articulate that position, possibly fearing public rebuke and congressional reprisals.

Frequently controversial, the 52-year-old Ohlmeyer, a producer of entertainment and sports programs before joining NBC in 1993, expanded on the network’s position and possible ramifications during an interview Friday in his Burbank office.

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Question: How did the network come to the decision not to go along with the rest of the industry?

Answer: There’s a history that’s involved. It’s difficult to just look at this as an isolated instance. This goes back 3 1/2 years, to Sen. [Paul Simon, the former Illinois Democrat] and his crusade against violence on television--Sen. Simon being someone who repeatedly said he never watched television but went on this crusade anyway.

At the time, the networks agreed to go along with advisories. The real issue, and the difficulty with the issue, was if you ask people what on our network was violent, nobody could really come back with an answer. . . .

That was the beginning, and it [brought] some political success to Simon. He got his picture on the front page of the New York Times, getting television to bow. I think to a great degree that opened the door to what is continually going on.

The networks then capitulated to doing a study by UCLA, which basically gave broadcasting a clean bill of health and said, basically, the violence is on cable television. That fact didn’t matter.

Then President Clinton picked up the baton, with Rep. Edward Markey [D-Mass.], on the V-chip. . . . When the networks capitulated to [adopt ratings], President Clinton said, “Let’s give it 10 months to work,” and three months later this current round started.

Our position after the last round was, this is as far as we’re prepared to go. We’re in favor of giving parents as much information as they need, but we felt we were getting into the area of misleading information.

There’s a mistaken impression that you can label a television program or movie like you can label ice cream. I’ve even seen this analogy in the press. . . . [But] there are not hard and fast ingredients in a television program. It is subjective. This is what concerns us, and this is what makes us think this ongoing [campaign] to label everything is only going to confuse the public.

Q: What’s wrong with giving more information?

A: There’s nothing wrong with giving more information. There is something wrong with giving misleading information. . . . Our position is we don’t put gratuitous violence on the air, yet what you might call violence, sexual innuendo or profanity--your neighbor may not agree with your definition.

Q: What about the perception that standards have relaxed beyond the point many people are comfortable with--that Hollywood is out of step with the public?

A: What is totally lost is that a number of checks and balances exist that allow us to listen to the public--probably better than the advocacy groups and certainly than the politicians. . . . We have an entire department of standards and practices that reviews every single show to make sure [it fits] the general context of what “the average American” would find acceptable on television.

Every advertiser then pre-screens every show that goes on the air, because they don’t want to be in something that they consider inappropriate. These people are from a different part of the country, they’re family people, they’re very protective of where their advertising appears.

You then have 215 affiliates who don’t want to offend people in their community . . . [and] all the television critics in America, who are not shy about telling us whether we’ve done something inappropriate. Ultimately, you have the viewer, who has two switches--one changes the channel and the other turns it off.

Why does this need to be regulated then by the government and these special-interest groups? There is a mentality that the public can’t fend for itself without the government intervening.

Q: Why didn’t that point get across? If people hate Hollywood, they hate government at least as much.

A: We’re living in an age where everyone is trying to tell everyone else how they should live. There are special-interest groups for every occasion. While listening to them, which we do, we also try to take the temperature of the public. . . . [Many people] say, “I control television in my house. It’s a nonissue.” It’s become a political issue.

Q: There’s an assumption NBC, between now and the revised ratings beginning Oct. 1, will be compelled to go along. Do you fear reprisals or pressure from Congress?

A: As long as this is a political issue, where people can seem to be taking a stand for the family and parents, it’ll continue.

From a political standpoint, this is a perfect issue, because there is no other side. We’re not for violence on television; we’re not for sex or profanity on television. And we think we have appropriate safeguards in place.

We try to be very sensitive to what [are] the current accepted standards of American society. We can’t please all the people all the time. About 20% of the population are kids under 17. We can’t program all the time for those kids, and that’s not really the role of network broadcasting. . . . There has to be some assumption that parents are taking control of what their kids do.

Q: Would you acknowledge that the networks made some mistakes in the way programs were rated?

A: I think that there were some discrepancies; I wouldn’t say there were mistakes. There’s a basic disconnect here, which is that by any standard, the vast majority of stuff we put on is PG, at the most PG-14. We then got criticized for giving everything the same rating.

Q: NBC said it would tinker with or adapt the ratings as they exist. How will that work?

A: Our goal is to give as much information to people so that they can make a determination as to whether they want to watch our programming or not, and whether they want their children to watch.

When we showed “Schindler’s List,” which I think most people would consider one of television’s fine moments of the year, we went to great lengths to make sure the public knew that many of them may not find this appropriate for their children to watch. But does that mean we shouldn’t put anything on like “Schindler’s List”?

That’s what people are concerned about: Should television be precluded from doing something as powerful as “Schindler’s List,” from confronting important issues, because of labeling? . . . That’s why this is a much bigger issue than labeling ice cream, and that’s what NBC sees as dangerous.

Q: Do you feel like you’ve scored points with the creative community, writers and producers, by taking this stand?

A: This was not done to score points. Some of our competitors--I feel disingenuously so--have accused us of making this decision for some sort of commercial and competitive reason, and that’s disappointing. This decision was made because this is what we think is right. We feel that we have reached the point where government intervention any farther is not appropriate.