Word: heywards
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...compete for ratings just as Home Improvement and L.A. Law do. "We could do an hour on Whitewater, but we wouldn't survive," says Now executive producer Jeff Zucker. "If I don't do at least some of these true-crime stories, I won't be doing anything." Andrew Heyward, executive producer of CBS's Eye to Eye, is worried that the similar impulses of these shows will ultimately turn viewers off. "To the degree that we all chase the same surefire stories," he says, "we'll stand out less and less...
...latest Nielsen ratings, four magazine shows ranked in the top 10, and seven were in the top 25. Because the networks own these shows outright (unlike most entertainment shows), prime- time magazines are the best thing to happen to network news since Huntley and Brinkley. Says CBS's Andrew Heyward, executive producer of Chung's show: "They have kept the news divisions viable and healthy at a time when economic pressures are enormous...
...Maggie Hadleigh- West, a New York City woman who took a video camera onto the streets to record instances of sexual harassment. Four of the shows, according to Hadleigh-West, offered her money as inducement; she eventually picked CBS's Eye to Eye with Connie Chung. Executive producer Heyward says the payment is strictly for use of her video footage -- "standard practice in the business" -- and asserts that CBS's long-standing policy has not changed: "We do not pay for news...
From the networks' standpoint, the shows make economic sense: they cost only half as much to produce as entertainment programs, and a successful one can run virtually forever. Viewers, for their part, may be turning to news out of exasperation with the sameness of network entertainment fare. Andrew Heyward, executive producer of 48 Hours, theorizes that short newsmagazine segments suit the habits of zap-happy viewers. "Unlike a drama show," he says, "you don't have to watch the whole hour to get something out of it." PrimeTime Live executive producer Richard Kaplan contends that people are "hungry for information...
...producers of these shows deny any tilt toward tabloid subjects. "These are not sensational stories; these are stories in the headlines," says Victor Neufeld, executive producer of 20/20. Heyward admits there are some topics that the prime-time shows have a hard time doing. "But that's one reason the networks still need documentary units," he says. "There are some subjects that need to be done, damn the ratings, full speed ahead...