DOCUDRAMA ON BIN LADEN RAID SCORES NGC’S HIGHEST RATINGS

The controversial docudrama SEAL Team Six: The Raid on Osama bin Laden — controversial primarily because of the decision to air it two days before the presidential election — turned out to be a big winner for the National Geographic Channel, which aired it Sunday night. The film, which recounts the events surrounding the raid […]

DID WEINSTEIN TURN MOVIE INTO HYPE FOR OBAMA?

Harvey Weinstein insisted that the movie SEAL Team Six, a drama about the killing of Osama bin Laden, be reedited to include documentary footage featuring President Obama, the New York Times disclosed today, a decision, commented the newspaper, that “is virtually certain to bolster claims that the approximately 90-minute film amounts to a political stunt.” […]

PROFITS AT FOX PLUNGE 50 PERCENT

Without Avatar, operating profits for 20th Century Fox fell 50 percent to $248 million against $497 million during parent News Corp’s third quarter last year, the company said in an SEC filing on Wednesday. The steep drop contributed to a 24-percent plunge in overall News Corp revenue to $639 million from $839 million, even though […]

YANKED CHANNELS RESTORED TO TWC’S IPAD APPS

Two weeks after Time Warner Cable yanked its Fox, Viacom and Discovery iPad apps that allow its subscribers to receive real-time programming from them at home, the Fox and Discovery apps were again up and running on Friday, leaving Viacom as the only cable programmer still balking at TWC’s iPad service. The return of such […]

FOX DISHES IT OUT; YANKS CHANNELS

The satellite DISH Network, which had previously benefited from retransmission disputes between cable companies and content providers, has now found itself embroiled in one itself with Fox’s cable networks. At midnight, Fox halted sending signals for FX, National Geographic Channel and 19 regional sports networks to DISH. But unlike the last retransmission dispute when ABC […]