Television
On the endangered list: ABC's Oscars
By Kevin Downey
Jan 10, 2008 - 9:22:07 AM

With the Golden Globes airing over the weekend as a news special on NBC, after striking writers refused to cut a deal to allow a full awards ceremony, nervous eyes quickly turned to the Academy Awards, set to air on ABC on Feb. 24.

Don't expect it to.

ABC has $80 million in advertising riding on the event, the second biggest in any year after Super Bowl, a point not lost on the Writers Guild of America. The hard-knuckle union has every reason to scuttle the broadcast and none to see it air.

And if the WGA refuses to cut a deal with the production company putting on the Oscars, Hollywood's top actors will surely boycott the evening in support of the WGA, leaving ABC little choice but to cancel it.

Or be hugely embarrassed.

“In the 1988 strike, it was a disaster,” with few actors showing up for the ceremony, says Jonathan Handel, an entertainment lawyer with Troy & Gould of Los Angeles and the author of a strike blog on the Huffington Post. “This time, as with the Golden Globes, I don’t think anyone would show up. That will diminish the wattage of the Oscars dramatically.”

The one chance for the Oscars to air as it normally does is for the WGA to finally come to terms with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, the negotiating arm of the studios, ending the two-months-plus strike. But that seems no less likely.

The two sides are still way far apart over the key issue on what compensation writers should receive for their work on content that appears on the internet, and negotiations are now stalled and show no sign of moving ahead.

Further, while there's a chance some sort of deal may be struck that would allow the Academy Awards to air, it's unlikely any such deal will be made until the final hour. It's in the interest of the WGA to drag out the talks, knowing full well its leverage increases the closer it gets to the Feb. 24 telecast.

At this point, the WGA is remaining largely mum on the whole matter, but its one statement has not been encouraging. On Dec. 17, it said it would not waive fees to air clips from old movies, something it almost always does.

Similarly, the Screen Actors Guild has said little, though it seems a sure bet it will follow the lead of the WGA, as it did when it advised member actors to skip the Golden Globes, costing NBC perhaps $15 million in lost revenue.

In theory, the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts & Sciences, which owns the Oscar broadcast, could work out a deal with the WGA similar to that David Letterman’s Worldwide Pants production company worked out to allow the CBS late-night shows to return to the air. Both the WGA and SAG have cut a deal that will allow the Screen Actors Guild Awards show airing on TNT and TBS on Jan. 27.

But they are not the Oscars, which last year drew 40 million viewers and which is far more important to advertisers beyond ratings and eyeballs. As with the Super Bowl, it's an event for which advertisers come up with unique creative, and those ads gets tons of media coverage.

It's the sort of buzz money can't buy.

“Advertisers are buying the Oscars not for the ratings but they're buying it to associate themselves with such a fantastic viewing experience,” says Rob Jayson, executive vice president and media planning director at Zenith Media. “There is no like show to replace that type of engaging content.”

If the Oscars don’t air, some advertisers will ask ABC to shift money to other highly rated, talked-about shows like “Dancing with the Stars.” But others will ask for money back.