Newsday July 14, 2002 'Breaking News' Survives. BRAVO! by Noel Holston

Just when it seemd that the TNT series about a cable news channel would never air, Bravo snapped it up

This just in: There is some justice in the world after all.

Yes, justice. So shout hallelujah and roll the tape. "Breaking News," a splendid, addictive dramatic series about an upstart cable-news network called I-24, is going to see the light of day.

Until recently, the series' prospects looked dismal. Thirteen hour-long episodes were filmed more than a year ago for the cable channel TNT at a cost of about $20 million. But after setting and scratching several premiere dates, TNT decided last summer that the series' commercial potential was limited and announced that it would write "Breaking News" off as a tax loss and not show it.

The suspicion then was that the series had been abandoned because it was a less-than-flattering portrayal of a fictional news network that bears a passing resemblance to CNN, which, like TNT, is a subsidiary of AOL Time Warner Inc. TNT officials have maintained that their misgivings about "Breaking News" were wholly about its viability. Either they are being disingenuous or, despite their extensive marketing campaign, they don't "know drama" from squat.

Don't get me wrong. I've long had respect for TNT's programming instincts - and I'm not just talking about its making it possible for me to get my "Law & Order" fix almost any time of day I turn on the set. TNT arguably has been second only to HBO in recent years when it comes to turning out quality made-for-TV movies - William H. Macy's "Door to Door," premiering Sunday night at 8, is a sweet, satisfying case in point. TNT has been active on the original-series front, too, with shows such as the unjustly short-lived Wall Street serial "Bull" and the incessantly promoted supernatural action-drama "Witchblade."

Even so, "Breaking News," with a strong ensemble cast headed by Tim Matheson (Vice President John Hoynes on "The West Wing"), would have been the finest original series TNT ever presented. It's a show worthy of being mentioned in the same breath with broadcast TV's finest dramas, such as "ER" and "NYPD Blue," and cable darlings "Six Feet Under" and "The Shield."

It still will be. But all the accolades will now accrue to another cable channel, Bravo, which snapped up the series on the rebound and will begin weekly telecasts Wednesday night

at 8.

The baffling thing - and I can say this now that I've compulsively screened the first six episodes - is that "Breaking News" is anything but a slap at real-world news networks like CNN. In sharp contrast to TV shows (and theatrical films) that often use TV news as the butt of ham-fisted satire - as if the venality and sensationalistic tendencies of electronic journalism are a joke we're all hip to - "Breaking News" offers a remarkably balanced, mature view of the good, bad and ugly sides of electronic journalism.

One might quibble about the exactitude of its portrayal of news gathering. Like "The West Wing" or Ed Asner's old newspaper series "Lou Grant," it exaggerates the involvement of a handful of people in what realistically would be a far larger, more complex organization. On the other hand, the depictions of vanity and ego, sometimes reckless ingenuity, rampant worka- holism and the inevitable difficulties of doing honorable work in a high-pressure, high-stakes business are spot-on.

"One of the things that attracted me to this 'arena' is the fact TV news is one of the few places where there is a kind of intersection of commerce and public service, show business and journalism," series creator and co-executive producer Gardner Stern said in a recent telephone conversation. "And then you layer on top of that the incredible demands a 24-hour news site places on people both personally and professionally. And you get a certain type of very ambitious individual who's drawn to it. It's a potent mixture."

Stern said the model for his struggling I-24 network is not CNN but MSNBC, where he did his early research. "When I wrote the pilot script, it was sent to CNN, and I received many pages of notes," he said. "I ignored 95 percent of them because I didn't think they were appropriate. They were in the vein of technical notes. And since I had done most of the research at MSNBC, I knew that just because they didn't do something 'that way' at CNN, they did at MSNBC. Some of the other notes were more about the dramatic content of the show and the portrait of the characters. I discounted that, too. No news network had any omniscient understanding of the human condition so that they could tell me how every person in the world would act in a certain situation."



Notes or no notes, TNT approved Stern's pilot script and ponied up millions toward its production and that of 12 more episodes. "They said, 'Love the pilot.' Everything was great," he said. "We had to delay production for a couple of months because one of our actors was pregnant, but we resumed production in October and basically shot through April of 2001. We finished post-production shortly thereafter, and then they sort of dropped the bomb on us."

Having sat by while Stern filled the 13-episode order, TNT pulled an Emily Litella and said, in effect, "Never mind." Or so he heard from his bosses at New Line Television.

Stern said that to this day no one from TNT has called him to explain its loss of faith in the show - or returned his calls. At a news conference in Pasadena last summer with visiting TV critics, Jamie Kellner, then newly installed as chairman and chief executive officer of Turner Broadcasting System Inc., said he had not seen the show and that the decision to ditch it had been made before he came aboard. He said TNT's programming executives "felt it was not going to be a show that was going to last and work on their network, so I just agreed with them."

Stern is not some greenhorn. His writing and producing credits include "Chicago Hope," "Law & Order," "NYPD Blue" and this fall's "John Doe" on Fox. He has a Humanitas Prize and two Peabodys, as well as Emmys and a Golden Globe. He said he can only guess at what happened. He doesn't put much stock in the conspiracy/conflict-of-interest theories.

"I don't think anybody at CNN picked up the phone and said we don't want this on the air," he said. On the other hand, he said he "wouldn't rule out the possibility that in the back of people's minds in Atlanta was the notion that, well, we have a 24-hour news network that's having some trouble and now we have another network airing a series about a 24-hour network, and even though it is made crystal clear that it is not CNN, there might be some confusion."

Remember, it was last summer that CNN was contorting itself like Plastic Man in the face of the ratings growth and taunts of Fox News Channel and taking critical flak for stunts such as hiring actress Andrea Thompson as a Headline News anchor.

More likely, Stern speculated, "Breaking News" got caught in a changing of the guard - and philosophy - at Turner Broadcasting. "During the year we were in production, the AOL-Time Warner merger occurred, which I think brought about several changes at TNT," he said. "One of the changes was a retrenching and falling back on what had been successful for them previous to that point. Their reputation had been built mainly on movies of the week, which they had done fairly well. There were a lot of westerns and fantasy-type things. And here you had this show, this hour drama which, particularly compared to what they had done in the past, was probably a little more thought- provoking and sophisticated. It might be that they just didn't think they wanted to try to reach a new audience."

All's well that ends well, as another dramatist once wrote. Stern isn't just being diplomatic when he says he believes Bravo is a better fit for "Breaking News" than TNT. It is. And Bravo is so keen on the show that, if it does well this summer, the network may order additional episodes.

Nothing would please Stern more. "Assuming the financial issues can be resolved, I'm sure we can get it back going," he said. "As it happens - and I find it very gratifying - many of the actors have remained very supportive of the show, and several of the key actors have told me that they would like to come back and re-up, as it were."

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REACTION TO THE NEWS

Not surprisingly, Frances Berwick, Bravo's senior vice president of programming and production, is ecstatic about her channel's picking up "Breaking News." She spoke recently to Newsday TV critic Noel Holston about the new series.

What did Bravo see in "Breaking News" that TNT's programmers apparently didn't?

I have no idea why TNT programmers didn't like the show. You'd have to ask them, but it's quite different from "Witchblade."

Did you go, like, "Wow! I can't believe they let this get away" and dance around your office?

Yes, we did think immediately that it was a gem. I've never been offered a top-notch, broadcast network-quality, fully completed series that's never aired before, and that felt totally right for Bravo's audience. It was a great opportunity.

If it does perform well, will Bravo ask for more episodes?

If the series is a big hit, we'll certainly look at continuing it.

Can Bravo afford to pay what TNT paid?

While I know the production budget, I'm not sure what TNT paid and how much was deficited by New Line. This quality of drama is pricey, but we'd find a way to do it if the first series becomes our "The Shield."

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