An Uneasy Truce Rules Over the Networks

For decades, the world’s superpowers lived under a nuclear stalemate known as MAD, or mutually assured destruction, an understanding that if one side launched missiles, the other would retaliate and take the aggressor down with it.

An equally tenuous truce exists in the television business, in which a few major companies sit with guns trained at one another, trying to behave like civilized people but warily waiting for all hell to break loose.

This chess game amid uneasy allies came about thanks to a wave of corporate mergers fueled by industry deregulation in the 1990s, allowing studios to buy networks or start new ones. As a result, companies like Fox and Disney (the latter owns ABC) produce shows for one another’s networks, meaning they are both occasional partners and direct competitors.

These connections create the possibility for bizarre scenarios. Consider a recent rumor that ABC tried pressuring NBC to schedule the new sitcom “Daddio” on Thursday nights by promising not to throw designated new-series exterminator “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” up against it.

Why? Because “Daddio” is produced by Walt Disney Co.’s Touchstone Television, which falls under the stewardship of the same people who run ABC.

Officials involved say such a threat was never issued. The explanation is that an NBC executive joked about “Daddio’s” being the one series ABC wouldn’t try to squash with “Millionaire,” based on its desire to protect Disney’s investment in the show.

Yet the prospect of one network arm-twisting another in this fashion lingers, as these major companies oscillate between their interests as producers and broadcasters, hoping to score big ratings on their networks and garner millions in profits from selling rerun rights to the next “Seinfeld” or “Home Improvement.”

Though the manic pursuit of this dual payday has been happening for some time, the organizational lines separating networks and their sister production studios--once treated like the demarcation between East and West Berlin--have been erased or blurred, opening the door for all sorts of shenanigans.

In the last year, the executive presiding over Fox’s production arm, 20th Century Fox Television, was put directly in charge of the Fox network, just as ABC and Disney blended into one big dysfunctional family. Even Warner Bros.--known for stability--shook up the studio’s TV unit to smooth the flow of material to its WB network.

At the same time, these companies remain very much tied up in one another’s destinies. NBC gets “Friends” and “ER” from Warner Bros. and “Frasier” from Paramount, a Viacom division that will soon share parentage with CBS and UPN. Warner Bros. makes ABC’s “The Drew Carey Show,” and Disney reciprocates by supplying the WB’s “Felicity.”

Fox’s production division, prime time’s most prolific program supplier, oversees “The Simpsons” and “The X-Files” and is also responsible for hits on the other networks, including ABC’s “Dharma & Greg” and “The Practice,” CBS’ “Judging Amy” and WB’s “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and “Angel.”

Protecting these valuable assets provides companies a clear incentive to get along. Some have entered into pacts saying they won’t engage in poaching their own shows from rival networks.

These companies don’t always play nice, however, as demonstrated by the current flap between Disney and Time Warner, with the latter blacking out ABC-owned stations on its cable systems--in the midst of a sweeps period, no less--over an arcane dispute regarding the compensation ABC receives in exchange for allowing Time Warner to carry its signals. The dispute has amounted to a corporate game of chicken, with each side putting its own interests ahead of the viewers’, barreling toward a cliff’s edge and hoping the other bails out first.

Such behavior comes naturally. Television, after all, is a business in which leverage counts for everything. The popularity of “Friends” gave its producers and studio the clout and reputation to shoehorn mediocre comedies into NBC’s coveted Thursday night lineup. In this environment, with the right time slot often dictating success or failure, there’s no point in having a big gun if you can’t hold it to someone’s head once in a while.

So assuming that NBC renews “Daddio” for next season, it’s not preposterous to think that ABC-Disney--which presents its fall lineup to advertisers a day later, on May 16--would push for the best available time slot and might point out it would be inclined to let “Millionaire” beat up on some unfortunate sitcom Disney doesn’t own.

Executives say they will do what’s best for their networks, which continue to be symbols of prestige and strategic importance; still, broadcasting operations have become cogs in larger corporate machines, meaning that decision-making at any network reaches beyond traditional concerns to what benefits the corporate parent in the long run.

Given that, would Fox attempt to shift “Buffy” to its network when the program is free to explore greener pastures? Would Warner Bros. consider moving an aging network hit to the WB for the final few seasons, where even a portion of the audience for “Drew Carey” or “Whose Line Is It Anyway?” would be a boon?

Here’s where the MAD theory comes into play. Someone might be tempted to take such action, but the first studio that does so effectively kills its ability to sell programs elsewhere. Disney would thus be confined to supplying for ABC, 20th Century Fox for Fox, Paramount for CBS, etc.

The real question, then, is which hothead will violate the peace among TV’s superpowers. On its face, Disney--wielding a big club with Regis Philbin on the end of it--appears the most likely suspect, especially because the studio is already developing most of ABC’s new shows for next season and has relatively few series in play at the other networks.

Still, don’t rule out Fox, whose guiding force, Rupert Murdoch, has already exhibited a willingness to engage in preemptive strikes. It was Fox, after all, that stole NFL football from CBS in 1993, later convincing a dozen stations affiliated with major networks to switch their allegiance to Fox. When the dust finally settled from those maneuvers, the networks had collectively shelled out billions of dollars in increased fees to the various sports leagues as well as higher payments to the TV stations that carry their shows.

Whoever fires the first shot, the repercussions will be swift and will leave TV industry leaders looking back years from now wondering how their business got so fouled up, pointing fingers at the idiot who pushed the button.

Sooner or later, however, it seems inevitable someone will get greedy and escalate the occasional skirmish into full-scale conflict. Because while the stakes in TV aren’t as dire as the Cold War, rest assured, it’s a MAD, MAD, MAD, MAD world.

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Brian Lowry’s column appears on Tuesdays. He can be reached by e-mail at brian.lowry@latimes.com.