As war looms, ABC mobilizes ‘Front Line’
Once the February sweeps battle ends, ABC is going to war.
“Profiles From the Front Line,” an unscripted program that has languished for months on the network’s shelf, will join ABC’s Thursday lineup for a limited six-week run starting Feb. 27, a day after the current rating sweeps end.
More significantly, that debut coincides with a window when U.S. troops might be fighting in Iraq, raising questions about how the program will be perceived and whether the premiere is meant to cash in on patriotic zeal.
As recently as a few months ago, published reports in the Hollywood Reporter indicated that the project -- a look at U.S. Special Operations units in Afghanistan, from blockbuster film producer Jerry Bruckheimer and Bertram van Munster, once a senior producer on Fox’s “Cops” -- might not be televised at all.
There has also been some criticism -- including, when the project was announced, from within ABC News -- that the Pentagon and the Department of Defense were granting wider access to entertainment producers than news organizations apt to provide a more unvarnished view of war.
“It raises all sorts of questions, which are exacerbated by the entertainment factor,” said Robert Lichter, president of Washington, D.C.-based Center for Media and Public Affairs, on Tuesday. “One check on war news becoming propaganda is the professionalism of journalists, which will be ostentatiously lacking.... Documentaries are inherently more informative than entertainment. ‘Reality’ programming turns the tables.”
Van Munster, who is also partnered with Bruckheimer on CBS’ adventure-staged reality series “The Amazing Race,” stressed that it was not their intention to create propaganda and that there was no government interference.
“The last thing I want is people nosing in my business and telling me how to make television,” Van Munster said. “They have not taken out one frame, which I think is miraculous, and we have some nasty stuff.”
Production crews spent nearly six months with soldiers in Afghanistan beginning in May, “after some degree of calm had set in,” Van Munster said, adding that the crew nevertheless had undertaken “great personal risks to do this.”
Still, the producer acknowledged that he wasn’t doing a news program. The series follows individual soldiers across various episodes, without commentary or narration.
“There’s not one word written by us,” Van Munster said. “It’s pure documentary.”
ABC has scheduled the project in one of its most perilous time slots -- 8 p.m. Thursdays, versus NBC’s “Friends” and CBS’ “Survivor” -- during a relatively fallow period between the February and May rating sweeps, key periods that networks use to determine advertising rates.
That timing, and time slot, might otherwise suggest that ABC has little faith in the series. The decision takes on a different light, however, set against the prospect of war in Iraq.
Jeff Bader, ABC’s executive vice president in charge of scheduling, admitted that the network had grappled with some uncertainty about when it made sense to broadcast the program, which he called “a tribute to the people who are over there, doing what they’re doing.” He added that ABC will “be gauging the mood of the country right up until this premieres,” which could result in a scheduling change if events warrant it.
Bader also conceded that it’s unclear how “Profiles” will perform in the ratings, which explains its placement on a low-rated night for the network at a time when the competition is likely to be showing more reruns than usual.
“It’s not the type of reality show people are watching right now,” he said. “It’s not fun and escapist.”
Similarly themed programs haven’t performed especially well in the ratings. The VH1 cable network’s “Military Diaries” covered similar terrain last year, seeking to put a face on U.S. forces serving abroad, and CBS canceled another unscripted program, “AFP: American Fighter Pilot,” after only two episodes in April.