News Shorts

ABC and CBS split with 'Football' and sitcoms
ABC won Monday in both the adult 18-49 and household ratings on the strength of “Monday Night Football.” But the night was split between ABC and CBS. CBS took the first half with its sitcom lineup. “Everybody Loves Raymond,” in fact, was the night’s highest-rated show in both demos. The network started to slip with “Becker” at 9:30 p.m., which lost 25 percent of “Raymond’s” adult 18-49 lead-in rating. And things got worse at 10:00 p.m. CBS’s “Family Law” came in a distant third place in its time slot with a 3.7 rating that was 49 percent lower than ABC’s rating for football and 21 percent lower than NBC’s rating for “Crossing Jordan.” ABC suffered from a weak showing by “Who Wants to be a Millionaire,” which came in second place among households at 8:00 p.m. but was in fourth place among adults 18-49. NBC’s “Weakest Link” beat ABC’s game show by 11 percent in the demo.
ABC averaged a 5.8 adult 18-49 rating and a 10.7 household rating and 17 share, based on preliminary Nielsen ratings. CBS had a 5.2 and 10.3/16. Fox had a 5.0 and 7.0/11 while NBC was in fourth place in both demos with a 4.0 and a 6.9/11. On Sunday night, “The Facts of Life Reunion” movie on “The Wonderful World of Disney” gave ABC a ratings boost in both its adult 18-49 and household ratings. The movie, which brought back most of the cast of the “Different Strokes” spinoff now seen on TV Land, increased its rating in every half-hour from 7 p.m. until 9 p.m. Its adult 18-49 rating, in fact, went up a full point from its first to its last half-hour and averaged a 4.6 rating. Fox, however, dominated Sunday with an overrun of NFL football and its lineup of “The Simpsons,” “Malcolm in the Middle,” and “The X-Files.” The network averaged a 6.4, adult 18-49, rating to ABC’s 5.0. Both networks far outpaced the competition. NBC was in third or fourth place for most of the night and averaged a 3.4 rating, while CBS trailed with a 2.7. The networks were more competitive in household ratings, with CBS edging out Fox with its lineup of “60 Minutes,” “The Education of Max Bickford,” and a “Hallmark Hall of Fame” movie. CBS averaged an 8.5 household rating and 13 share, based on preliminary Nielsen ratings. Fox had an 8.4/13, ABC had an 8.2/13, and NBC had a 6.6/10.

Four journalists killed in ambush on road to Kabul
Four journalists working for Western news organizations were killed yesterday in eastern Afghanistan when their taxis were ambushed on the road from Jalalabad to Kabul, according to eyewitness reports. The taxis were part of an eight-vehicle convoy traveling through territory nominally held by the Northern Alliance to the Afghan capital. According to a taxi driver and an interpreter who fled the scene, six men wearing turbans and brandishing Kalashnikov rifles stopped the cars and ordered the passengers out. They marched their captives away from the road, pelting them with stones and clubbing them with the butts of their rifles. The witnesses say they heard gunfire as they drove off, and according to several reports four bodies have been found. It's not known whether the attackers were Taliban soldiers hiding in the region or bandits, although the driver who escaped says they claimed to be the former. The journalists killed were Harry Burton, an Australian television cameraman working for Reuters; Azizullah Haidari, an Afghan-born photographer also with Reuters; Maria Grazia Cutuli, a reporter for the Milan-based newspaper Corriere della Serra; and Julio Fuentes, a reporter for El Mundo, a Madrid newspaper.

Pilots group blasts ABC for airing cockpit tape
Last week's episode of "PrimeTime Thursday" didn't go over well with the Air Line Pilots Association, which has issued a statement blasting ABC News for its decision to air a tape of cockpit sounds from United Flight 93. That was the flight that crashed in western Pennsylvania on Sept. 11 after passengers fought the hijackers, who apparently intended to crash it in Washington D.C. The ALPA says its members were "appalled and outraged" that the tape from the cockpit voice recorder was aired, calling the broadcast "repugnant sensationalism masquerading as news." ABC says it played the tape in part to show the heroism of the pilots and says that the pilots' families were notified before the show.

Showtime axes two shows, gives life to three more
Still hoping to build a buzzworthy original programming slate like rival HBO, Viacom-owned Showtime yesterday renewed its series "Soul Food" and "Resurrection Blvd." for their third seasons but killed off "Going to California" and "Leap Years." "Soul Food" has quietly become the channel's second-highest-rated program, while "Resurrection" has built up a respectable following among Hispanic audiences. The network has also added newcomer "Street Time." The Columbia TriStar Domestic Television production follows a just-released drug smuggler played by "Northern Exposure's" Rob Morrow as he tries to reestablish ties with his wife and avoid trouble with his parole officer. The sci fi series "Jeremiah" will join a schedule in mid-2002 that already features the network's top-rated "Queer as Folk," "Stargate SG-1" and "The Chris Isaak Show," which will also do double duty on sister Viacom property VH1.

O'Reilly vs. Rush in a high-noon showdown?
Sensing the demise of his fellow conservative media titan, Fox News anchor Bill O'Reilly is said to be itching to take on radio kingpin Rush Limbaugh in a head-to-head duel. O'Reilly is reportedly casting about for a network to give him a two-hour daily talk show starting at noon that would challenge Limbaugh's program, which is currently pumped out of 600 stations. Limbaugh's future in radio fell into doubt recently after he revealed that he was almost totally deaf, but O'Reilly has reportedly been looking forward to a showdown for some time. Any road to battle will go through New York, where Rush broadcasts out of Disney's WABC affiliate. Possible syndicators include Viacom/CBS/Infinit's Westwood One, whose WNEW-FM currently airs the low-rated Don & Mike midday show and otherwise airs a blend of pugnacious, male-oriented programs similar in style to O'Reilly's. The clash could ruffle some feathers at Fox News, where chairman Roger Ailes is a good friend to Rush and a former producer of his short-lived TV program.

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