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Jim Rutenberg

Bob Iger Rules TV … With Help From Regis

Bob Iger, the handsome, gleaming, departing head of ABC, sat at a center table in the vast Waldorf-Astoria's Grand Ballroom on Feb. 10 as Regis Philbin, in a double-breasted, charcoal-gray pinstripe suit, began pelting the air with insults directed at the new president of the Walt Disney Company.

Why did he get the appointment? "Because he Read More

Brave New TV World: Sopranos Team Joins With Big Ad Agency

On Jan. 14, Brad Grey's Basic Entertainment, which has brought you The Sopranos , Just Shoot Me and Politically Incorrect , announced it had formed a partnership with J. Walter Thompson, the second-largest ad firm in the country representing big-name advertisers like the Ford Motor, Kellogg and Miller Brewing companies.

The partnership harks back to the Read More

Get Well, Dave, but Why Not Hire Guest Hosts?

Best wishes on a speedy recovery. Sure was a great run up to the operation. Top form with Hillary. Total class the way you broke the heart news with Regis, who handled it perfectly. Great television.

The people who work for you are too blinded by loyalty to suggest this, Dave, but it's really in your Read More

Warner Bros.’ Big-Idea Guy in L.A., Peter Roth

Wednesday, Jan. 19

PASADENA, Calif.–The TV reporters from all over the country were picking at plates of fajitas and corn chips in the middle of Stage 19A in the Warner Brothers lot. Peter Roth, the Warner Brothers Television president, approached the group and took a seat. It was to be a casual, catered lunch thrown so Read More

Warner Bros.’ Big-Idea Guy in L.A., Peter Roth

Wednesday, Jan. 19 PASADENA, Calif.–The TV reporters from all over the country were picking at plates of fajitas and corn chips in the middle of Stage 19A in the Warner Brothers lot. Peter Roth, the Warner Brothers Television president, approached the group and took a seat. It was to be a casual, catered lunch thrown Read More

Odd Alliance: ABC, CBS, Fox Make Strange New Alliance …

ABC and CBS have teamed up with Fox News in an effort to take on Ted Turner's CNN and, while they're at it, NBC. They've formed an unprecedented news alliance that would have been unheard of just a few years ago.

Under the agreement, finalized late last month, the three news organizations and their affiliates Read More

Odd Alliance: ABC, CBS, Fox Make Strange New Alliance …

ABC and CBS have teamed up with Fox News in an effort to take on Ted Turner's CNN and, while they're at it, NBC. They've formed an unprecedented news alliance that would have been unheard of just a few years ago.

Under the agreement, finalized late last month, the three news organizations and their affiliates Read More

A Divine Comedy for Bette … Givebacks for Gumbel Backers

Wednesday, Dec. 22

Columbia Tristar Television is finally getting close to creating a show for Bette Midler. The diva recently signed a deal with the studio, but coming up with an appropriate vehicle has been slow going. "It's almost impossible," said one writer. "It's like, what do you do? This is Bette Midler! You can't come Read More

New York Likes to Watch… TV !

If television is a mirror for the culture that watches it, then New York dreams about money more than other places and it's more obsessed by the legal system than the rest of the country. Surprisingly, New Yorkers are less enthralled with its onetime hometown hero, David Letterman, than viewers elsewhere, and they would rather Read More

Insider Apology? Michael Eisner Phones Don Hewitt With Regrets

The week after the Walt Disney Company's Touchstone Pictures released The Insider , Disney chief executive Michael Eisner called 60 Minutes executive producer Don Hewitt to discuss the film that has embroiled both men's organizations for the past few months, according to sources at CBS.

The discussion was brief, and neither man will talk about it. Read More

Dan Kellison of Man Show Is ‘Whipped’ Husband at Home

Daniel Kellison, executive producer of The Man Show , pointed to the stacks of boxes filled with baby toys and furniture. "The great emasculation has begun," he said.

By his wife's command, the poker room in the Kellisons' newly refurbished Greenwich Village town house is being dismantled to make way for a playroom for his 2-month-old Read More