Word: flipper
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...with a run-over paw make great TV. And perhaps the network's cleverest idea of all is The Pet Shop, a talk show with pet jokes in the monologue, pet skits and celebrities who are interviewed with their pets. Animal Planet does feature too much new Lassie and Flipper, but the rest of the original programming demonstrates how broadly appealing a special-interest channel...
...McDonald's trains a burger flipper to use a computer to monitor inventory," says Shapiro, "the employee's new skills may enable him to win a better position with Red Lobster or K Mart, and the competitor reaps the benefit of McDonald's training investment." This market failure hits average workers hardest. As Clinton has noted time and again, large corporations spend whatever is necessary to ensure that their executives are up to date on management techniques because, says Shapiro, "improving the decisions of supervisors produces higher returns from the workers they direct." Those at the top receive the education...
Here's a telling story about the way the movie business works today. Last year, after shooting was completed on Flipper, which Universal was expecting to be one of its big summer movies for 1996, writer-director Alan Shapiro was approached by the studio's merchandising department. The executives had a problem: there were only three characters in the film suitable for licensing to stuffed-animal makers--Flipper, Scar the Hammerhead Shark and Pete the Pelican. Toy manufacturers were demanding a fourth to round out the Flipper line. "But the movie's been shot," Shapiro argued. "It's too late...
...same time, box-office success does not always guarantee merchandising success--analysts cite Casper and Independence Day as two recent hit movies that disappointed their licensees. Much depends on how "toyetic" a movie is, in industry parlance, and the degree to which merchandise is sympatico with the film. Flipper licensed a camping set, "which is pretty funny," says director Shapiro, "because dolphins aren't usually found in the forest...
...years. The objective was to target aging baby boomers, who presumably need entertainment that could include their kids. But as quantity increased, quality declined, and now Hollywood has a glut of wholesome movies that aren't performing well. This summer saw Kazaam, Pinocchio, Harriet the Spy and even Flipper drown at the box office. "Hollywood happens to work in cycles," says Chris Meledandri, who runs Fox's family film division. "You watched that young-skewing movie cycle burn out before your very eyes." And the problem isn't just quality: last year, despite critics' raves, A Little Princess didn...