[Groop]Syndication

[Mark Evanier]

On Wed, 3 Apr 2002 07:16:41 -0800, "Gary Grossmann"
<grossfam@olywa.net> wrote:

>Why do they do that?  Why not all 121?  

ME: This is kinda complicated but basically...

When we first offered GARFIELD & FRIENDS for syndication, the show was
still on CBS on Saturday mornings.  CBS had "control" of a certain
number of episodes for their use.  There were 73 episodes that they no
longer controlled so we offered the 73 for syndication.

A company called Program Exchange bought the rights to syndicate the
73 episodes.  The idea was that, at some point down the line, they'd
also buy the others.  For a start though, they just bought the 73 that
were available.

The company that produced the show (Lee Mendelson Productions) then
paid the actors, music folks and me our residuals on those 73.  The
way residuals work, the amounts go down.  That is, the first
off-network reruns are paid at a high rate and then, as the shows are
run over and over, it drops to a lower rate.  Once the shows hit their
10th run (I think it is) the residual is as low as it will ever get.

So Program Exchange markets the 73 and they do very well...so well,
that Program Exchange says, "You know, we don't need to spend the
money yet to acquire the other 49.  We'll take in just as much money
running the 73 over and over again, so it'll be more profitable for us
not to buy the rest...for now."

In the meantime, Lee Mendelson Productions says, "You know, if they
keep running the 73, we only have to pay residuals at the lowest rate.
Whenever the additional 49 go into syndication, we're going to have to
pay another huge sum to the actors, musicians and Evanier.  So we'll
put that off for a while."

Ergo, the two entities who control the syndication of the shows have a
financial disincentive to market the remaining episodes until such
time as the first 73 stop delivering.

Every time I run into one of the actors, he says to me, "How's the
show doing in syndication?" and I say, "Great," and he says, "Too
bad."

But, one of these days...
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