The Perils of Keeping It in the Family

Developing a hit television show is challenging enough in the best of times, when all the stars align in your favor. Imagine how much tougher the process becomes when executives and producers must also navigate a maze of business considerations, which, while played out in corporate suites, are occasionally becoming perceptible on the screen.

With networks to unveil next fall’s prime-time schedules in mid-May and the remnants of the current TV season still being sorted out, it’s increasingly apparent the many ways an incestuous web of relationships can skew the creative process--and not always in the manner desired by those pulling the strings.

Not quite two years ago, the Walt Disney Co., having acquired ABC, merged the network and the studio’s TV production arm. Last year, Fox implemented its own restructuring, placing both its network and 20th Century Fox Television--which produces “The Simpsons” and “Ally McBeal” as well as such competing network shows as ABC’s “The Practice” and CBS’ “Judging Amy”--under one roof.

As usual, both Disney and Fox are providing the vast majority of new series candidates for their sister networks. As it is, Fox already receives 80% or more of its programming, depending on the week, from divisions of parent company News Corp., including the network’s entire nightly lineup from Friday through Monday.

In similar fashion, ABC scheduled just one new series from a competing studio last fall and, coincidentally or not, came away with precious little to show for its efforts, at least in terms of programs destined to linger beyond Mother’s Day.

The chicken-or-egg question here is what ultimately inspired networks to become their own best suppliers. Was it simply to cash in on the untold riches associated with owning the next “Seinfeld” or “The West Wing,” or did networks feel compelled not to be raked over the coals in future negotiations, as NBC was by Warner Bros. in renewing “ER” for a jaw-dropping $13 million per episode in 1998--preceded by pricey extension arrangements for “Cheers” and “The Cosby Show.”

Whatever the cause, effects can be seen even by the casual viewer. The most recent example involves an agreement that will send “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” produced by Fox, from the Warner Bros.-backed WB network to UPN--a network in which Fox has a vested interest via its pending acquisition of several key UPN affiliates, among them KCOP in Los Angeles. (The WB is part-owned by Tribune Co., which owns the Los Angeles Times.)

Among the innocent bystanders is “Roswell,” another Fox-produced entry for the WB. As a cult sci-fi series that barely survived to a second year, “Roswell” probably would be canceled anyway, but conspiracy theorists presume the “Buffy” move has sealed its fate in a way even alien healing powers can’t cure. And though the parties deny it, some harbor the suspicion that Dr. Ruth Westheimer has a better chance guarding Shaquille O’Neal than Fox does peddling new shows to the WB.

Having studios approach one another in this atmosphere of distrust ripples through the television industry on various levels.

For starters, costs escalate, because executives must sign sought-after talent to lucrative deals to ensure access to their services, wary of being caught relying on rivals to make their A-list talent available to them.

This in turn ratchets up pressure on executives, who lose money on two fronts--as production company and broadcaster--in making a failed series for their own network. So while there is the rare success story such as NBC’s “Will & Grace” or “Everybody Loves Raymond”--a CBS production that the network stood behind until the show blossomed into a well-deserved hit--in some cases trigger-happy networks have incentive to be even less patient with their own projects.

At the same time, network executives can feel pressured to order shows from writers affiliated with their studios to justify the advance payments shelled out retaining them. Many studios have spent heavily gobbling up talent via what are called overall deals and need to keep those contract writers working. As a result, writers who aren’t developing their own show are frequently added to projects for which they harbor no great enthusiasm simply because they are getting paid regardless and the studio desperately wants to defray some of its overhead.

So what happens? Writers find themselves at the wrong network, doing the wrong show, for people who either don’t want it or resent being obligated to develop it. In this environment, the ideal of creative talent passionately wedded to material flutters out the window.

The emphasis on synergy, meanwhile, can actually backfire, creating friction between a network and its sister studio. Sources say Viacom’s acquisition of CBS has amounted to such a shotgun wedding between the network and Paramount Television, just as the WB and Warner Bros. Television engaged in their own behind-the-scenes version of “Family Feud” a few years ago.

It’s equally true talent doesn’t trust studios any more than studios trust one another. The evidence resides in a series of high-profile lawsuits filed by producers and actors who maintain they were denied their due share of profits by studio self-dealing--that is, Disney selling shows to ABC or Fox striking agreements with its networks.

The most recent showdown, producer Steven Bochco’s suit against 20th Century Fox over the studio’s sale of “NYPD Blue” reruns to FX, was settled on the eve of trial this month--following Fox’s settlements with “The X-Files’ ” David Duchovny, as well as Alan Alda over “MASH,” indicating the studio has little appetite for seeing its business practices exposed in open court.

Let’s not forget, either, that whatever outcome the Writers Guild of America reaches in negotiations with the major studios, many writers will assume they are being abused--that studios are pocketing huge sums of money and tossing them a pittance by comparison. This philosophy was best summarized by Mel Brooks, who told an interviewer years ago that each studio has inscribed on its columns in ancient Hebraic the phrase, “The money is here. We dare you to find it.”

All this because executives can’t play nice with one another. No wonder comic Martin Mull has referred to the entertainment industry as high school with money.

And yet despite all these obstacles, once in a while the germ of an idea merges with the right talent and a hit series is born. Not bad, really, when you realize these offspring are often conceived by parents hopping on one foot, who hand their babies over to nannies who may not want them.

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