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In the middle of last week’s riots – and last year(s) for that matter, it’s nice to stop for a little breath and look at what works in Hollywood. Or he’s already worked and doesn’t have a life beat for him, of course.
And it’s okay to ask about something in Hollywood: why did this work? What makes this thing?
Felix Gillette and John Koblin take a deep breath with a new book, It’s not TV, captures the unlikely saga of HBO, the network’s dramatic rise from fourth-tier sports to the sacred totem of America’s educated elite. The story plays almost like an episode of Mr. Magoo as the small network stumbles while corporate chaos wreaks havoc around it, from the AOL merger onward.
Most important in its first chapterHBO is surviving its brand’s near-death experience at the hands of AT&T and a philistine empire that seems intent on erasing everything special and unique about the network.
And it appeared. Without scratching. Brand intact, audience loyalty unwavering, still able to produce hits in the gold standard batting average of the Media Wars, and live to fight another administration. At least with the rise of David Zaslav they started with an owner who said the right things about HBO, releasing the madness of the past few years in the Bewkes game plan.
How will it succeed?
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