The Record from Hackensack, New Jersey • 27

THE RECORD, SUNDAY, MARCH 15. 1S87 Two shows herald a new TV era FROM PAGE A-l by 1990. "We're not trying to be number one 1 In household ratings," says Fox President Jamie Kellner. "We are targeting the smaller audiences, the more desirable ones," he adds, meaning the young, upscale professionals whom advertisers find most attractive. "We'll concede winning households to others.

But maybe someday, who knows? We're in this for the Ion haul." 6 That FBC has come even this far is remarkable. The quest for a "fourth network" has long been akin to the search for a 10th planet. Would-be television magnates have dreamed of one since the Du-mont network collapsed in 1956. FBC's progress offers a rare illumination of the questions and challenges such a venture involves. Where many tried and failed, Murdoch succeeded within two years, spending almost $2 billion in the process.

First he bought the film studio Twentieth Century Fox, whose lot in West Los Angeles houses FBC headquarters and the studio for FBC's "The Late Show Starring Joan Rivers." Then Murdoch purchased Metromedia, a company owning Channel 5 and five other stations. Murdoch's right-hand man, Barry Diller, engineered the recruitment of producers and of a lineup of affiliate stations whose signals reach 84 percent of all Americans who can receive broadcast TV. While that figure does not equal the Big Three's 99-percent penetration, it is far larger than any other would-be network ever has achieved, via airwaves or cable. As noteworthy as what FBC did is what it didn't do. In early dreams for the new network, its programmers' imagination briefly ran wild.

They considered the idea of shows that ran other than 30 or 60 minutes, shows that didn't begin on the hour or half hour, and shows' that did not adhere to the other networks' broadcast standards. Just as quickly, they discarded them. "Yes, we thought about putting all the commercials at the end, starting shows five minutes later, those things," says Charles Hirsch-horn, FBC's director of prime-time programming. "The reality is, most of these people are experts in a given format and are most comfortable working within that format. And I think viewers are, too.

"There are all sorts of promotional tricks you can play, but ultimately you want to put on the strongest programming. You don't want to preempt that." Even though there will be no revolution on the screen, Fox stands to revolutionize the inner workings of TV should it succeed. Minus any sizable research, testing, sales, and publicity departments; minus a news division; and even minus a sizable network headquarters building, FBC is employing one tenth the personnel of a major network and subsisting on one hundredth the major network budget. It aims to be a Volkswagen among gas guzzlers. "Anybody has the right to be skeptical about what we're attempting to do," says Diller, the chairman and chief executive officer of Fox Inc.

and chief engineer of the FBC project. "But we really believe we will succeed eventually." Fox's headquarters is a modest three-story office building on the Fox lot. It houses FBC's 61 employees. (The Fox Television Center, a converted sound stage that serves as Joan Rivers's studio, is a few yards away.) It is a stark contrast to CBS's "Black Rock" on Manhattan's West 52nd Street, a monstrous headquarters that, even with 36 floors, is not large enough to house the network's news department. Attracted by Diller's promise that they could work without creative interference, several notable TV producers have jumped to Fox, including James L.

Brooks and the film "Terms of and Gene Reynolds They and the other producers claim 45 Emmys among them. Two big-name actors, Scott and Duke, also have jumped aboard. Still, the network has its doubters. "They have the odds against them," says CBS President Gene Jankowski. Rejection by Tinker The new network already has sustained bruises.

For one, Diller was hopeful of enlisting Grant Tinker, the outgoing and fabulously successful chairman of NBC, for his stable of The Fox network's key players The power at the Fox Broadcasting Company is the Australian-born publisher-turned-TV-czar Rupert Murdoch, who spent almost $2 billion to purchase Twentieth Century Fox Film Inc. and the Metromedia television stations. (Murdoch still owns The New York Post, although federal regulations force him, as the owner of a New York TV station, to eventually relinquish the newspaper.) The man Murdoch put in charge of pooling his new resources into a "fourth network" is Barry Diller, a veteran of the TV and film industries who helped guide Paramount Pictures toward its current status as Hollywood's most successful film studio. As chairman and chief executive officer of Fox Diller oversees the Fox film studio as well as Fox's television operations, but it is the quest for a "fourth network" that currently concerns Diller most. It is Diller's low-overhead, one-step-at-a-time vision that is guiding FBC out of infancy.

"I've read things about how he Murdoch has been looking over my shoulder. That's not true," Diller said recently. "Actually, I'd rather have more of his participation. He has great instincts and stimulating interests. You could have him in my chair or me in my chair and it would make no difference.

We're working together." Diller said they keep in contact irregularly. Says producer Grant Tinker, "If anyone can get this off the ground, it's Diller." Among the other top FBC brass are three former New Jerseyans: Garth Ancier, vice-president in charge of programming, is the most pivotal person in FBC's future. He's a 29-year-old native of Perth Amboy who majored in political science at Princeton. He got a head start on his television career at the age of 12, as an intern at public TV station WNJT. Andy Fessel, vice-president in charge of research, comes from Closter.

The former ABC employee heads a staff of eight researchers. Dennis Fitch, vice-president of advertising and promotion, is a former ABC employee from Leonia. JOEL PISETZNER 'A (iifidiH A-27 FOX PRIMETIME 8 p.m. "Down and Out In Beverly Hill" A sitcom adaptation of the hit movie, with Mike the Dog reprising his role as Matisse. Hector Elizondo (the father in "The Flamingo and Anita Morris play Dave and Barbara, with veteran club comic Tim Thomerson as the bum Jerry.

8:30 p.m. "Duet" A sitcom about two Californians (Matthew Laurence and Mary Page Keller) meeting and falling in love, told in "real time" that is, one week will have passed for the characters between shows as well as for the viewers. 9 p.m. "Werewolf" An on-the-road drama of a man searching for someone who can cure him of turning into a werewolf. 9:30 p.m.

"Beans Baxter" An enthusiastic 16-year-old gets caught up in his father's business as a spy. Fox programming head Garth Ancier describes it as 'Dobie Gillis with bullets." 7 p.m. "21 Jump Street" Johnny Depp, right, (one of the soldiers of stars as an undercover cop posing as a high-school student. Frederic Forrest, front, plays his police captain, and Dom DeLuise's son Peter, rear, plays a preacher. The Stephen J.

Cannell production is being shot in Vancouver. 8 p.m. "Married with Children" A sitcom about a family and its neighbors in the Chicago suburbs. Styled after British domestic sitcoms, it features jaded characters and biting lines. On the basis of some early rushes, it's the most promising of the Fox shows.

8:30, p.m. "Karen's Song" Patty Duke plays a 40-year-old publisher involved in a romance with a 28-year-old caterer (Lewis Smith, of the film "The Heavenly 9 p.m. "Mr. President" George C. Scott stars as the president of the United States in this drama-laced sitcom.

He's got a wife, son, daughter, and mother-in-law with whom to contend. Says Ancier: "It's 'Father Knows Best' in the White House, if you will." 9:30 p.m. "The Tracey Ullman Show" The personable British pop singer plays herself in a pastiche of sitcom and variety created by James Brooks One typical half-hour might contain a 12-minute story, a couple of brief sketches, and a song. Julie Kavner and Harry Shearer cos tar. F7 ou ill 7 i rv.

'4 p. JVC 120 VHS TAPE fj EA. fisherC DELUXE HQ VHS RECORDER WIRELESS REMOTE CABLE READY 16 Function Wireless Remote ill Channel Cable Ready iryj producers. Tinker wished Diller well and turned down his offer (a rejection Diller first learned of through the press), signing with CBS. Tinker said he felt more comfortable dealing with an established network.

NBC Entertainment President Brandon Tartikoff was not surprised by that. "I know that if I were a supplier, I would be putting most of my efforts into shows that had 99-percent distribution rather than shows that had 70- or 80-percent distribution. It just makes better economic sense," he said. "I always try to look at the programs rather than the distribution system. So far, I haven't seen any programs.

If I saw a great program, I would get more worried." FBC also lost out on a flagship show, the new "Star Trek: The Next Generation," when Paramount decided to market the program to independent stations itself. (In New York, Channel 11 obtained it.) FBC is counting instead on landing "Monday Night Football" for instant respectability. Despite its setbacks and smaller wrinkles such as an unreadable "Fox" logo, which has been redesigned FBC is ready to roll. A limited attack on the Big 3 It is the ambition of the Fox Broadcasting Company to form a commercial TV network that eventually will equal the three major networks. Each of the Big Three has more than 200 member stations and supplies 22 hours of prime-time shows, plus daytime and late-night programming and two newscasts.

FBC has 98 member stations, including ones in the 25 largest markets. Seven of the stations are owned by Fox, including WNYW (Channel 5) in New York. The rest are independent stations which virtually leaped at Fox's overture. "There's a status to being an affiliate," says Fox's vice-president of research, Andy Fessel. The arrangement is similar to that of the other networks.

In exchange for broadcasting Fox shows, the stations will divide 5 percent of Fox revenues and will get three 30-second advertising spots per half hour to sell for themselves. They already are broadcasting "The Late Show Starring Joan Rivers," which sells out its advertising time, even though it recently raised its rates by a third. Fox executives say that though its overall ratings are modest, the show has succeeded beyond their expectations. It began airing last September. FBC hopes to produce made-f or-TV movies by 1988 or 1989.

It is also searching for a host for a variety show. It is hoping to persuade the National Football League to give it the rights to "Monday Night Football." FBC has bid $7 million a game, to ABC's $6.5 million. The NFL is pondering both bids, wondering whether it would be wise to limit its regular-season showcase to 98 stations. FBC will not concern itself with news or public-affairs programming until it surpasses 15 hours of weekly programming, the Federal Communication Commission's minimum standard for when a company must fulfill such network obligations. It is leaving news production to its affiliates.

Similarly, it is leaving daytime programming to its affiliates, although it recently took on one daytime show "VTV" a talk-feature series whose hosts are Alex Trebek and Meredith McRae. JOEL PISETZNER Sauter predicts more cutbacks The Associated Press LOS ANGELES Former CBS News President Van Gordon Sauter, evoking images of the French Revolution, said this is a season of despair for CBS News and predicted the ax will fall soon on network entertainment divisions. Sauter, 50, was forced to resign from CBS News last fall in a corporate reorganization that elevated Laurence A. Tisch to the presidency of CBS Inc. "After he took over, the news people in effect danced to the Place de la Concorde to watch him dismantle the guillotine.

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