These Days, Everything’s a ‘Classic’
“The Honeymooners†is a classic. So are “The Dick Van Dyke Show,†“Gone With the Wind,†“The Godfather,†“The Seven Year Itch†and “All About Eve.â€
But “Gammera, the Invincible,†the Japanese movie about a giant flying turtle? “Bare Essence,†a 1983 soap set in the perfume industry, starring Genie Francis? Months-old sitcom episodes tossed on to replace one of their canceled brethren?
As cable network officials descend on Los Angeles this week for their annual convention, it seems the TV industry--faced with the challenge of how to affordably avoid running test patterns on the fast-growing roster of channels--is contributing to a severe devaluation of the term “classic,†which doesn’t have to mean “old†but, at least according to Webster’s, should connote “traditional,†“excellent†or “superior.â€
ESPN has its own network, ESPN Classics, which is pretty classic when showing the 1983 NCAA basketball championship game between Houston and North Carolina State, not so classic when it’s running old segments of the goofy game show “Sports Challenge†to flesh out its lineup. TV Land presents true series classics, but at other times dredges up shows best seen through the hazy filter of memory.
Broadcast networks have become even more glib in this regard. Fox, for example, recently promoted a “classic†episode of “King of the Hill,†which amounted to a classy way of saying here was a repeat to plug a hole in its Sunday lineup.
Nowhere, however, is the strain on the word “classic†more apparent than among movie channels, where the granddaddy of that genre, American Movie Classics, has demonstrated not only do you need not be traditional or superior to be classic, sometimes you don’t even have to be a movie.
This is in part because AMC occasionally devotes its schedule to showcasing programs regularly shown on two spinoff networks, Romance Classics and American Pop. The result has been the scheduling of oddities such as “Everyday Elegance With Colin Cowieâ€--a series that has lots to do with planning “fabulous†parties and precious little to do with movies.
Another factor may be that AMC is owned by cable operator Cablevision Systems Corp., meaning the channel lacks the studio backing of its main competitor, Turner Classic Movies, which has access to parent Time Warner’s library of more than 3,300 films.
With other relatively new channels such as fXM: Movies From Fox joining the party, one begins to wonder whether every studio will want its own “classic†venue once the digital television age truly arrives, offering more channel capacity and thus heightening the appetite for anything capable of filling the void.
This is all well and good until you start to ponder what it might mean for the “classic†designation and unaffiliated players such as AMC, which currently licenses movies from everyone. If studios begin hogging their films, any venture without deep pockets and even deeper vaults faces a serious handicap over the long haul.
Like Bravo, another Cablevision property, AMC has already been forced to introduce advertising on the channel. While it isn’t interrupting movies, some fret a reduction in the number of black-and-white films could eventually follow, since media buyers prefer playing their color ads next to color programs.
Not surprisingly, AMC insists there is little to be made of its recent flights of fancy and that the “movie classics†label is about more than just, well, classic movies.
Marc Juris, AMC’s senior vice president of production, programming and packaging, said even programs that deviate from a purist’s vision of a classic movie channel still fit in with its nostalgic orientation, adding that rivals will be hard-pressed to match the general environment AMC creates for film fans.
“It takes a long time to cultivate a true personality as a network. How do you talk to viewers? How do you make it different? It’s not just about your library. It’s about how you show them,†he explained. “We give you greater context. We really try to create an overall experience for our viewer.â€
Juris also defended showing cheesy monster and B-movies on the channel, noting that not every film has to boast four-star credentials to merit a place on AMC.
“They have cultural significance, and they certainly have cinematic significance,†he said. “You talk to anyone in Hollywood with real power, and they tell you these were the movies they loved when they were kids.â€
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For his part, Tom Karsch, executive vice president and general manager of Turner Classic Movies, conceded “classic†has become “an overused, hackneyed word,†stressing that his channel takes its middle name very seriously.
“I’d say ‘classic’ means time-tested appeal that transcends age and generations,†he said.
Both AMC and TCM maintain they can’t be completely dependent on any one studio for their lineup. Because of the star system that once existed, such channels need access to material from various studios, they say, to fully represent the vast array of talent in early Hollywood.
Still, the conceit of any “classic†channel--whether it’s a commitment to film history, reveling in sports the way they used to be or preserving “our television heritageâ€--belies a larger corporate aim to wring every last dollar from programming inventory, a goal often at loggerheads with living up to pithy promotional slogans.
In that respect, TCM owes its enviable position to the foresight of Time Warner Co-Chairman Ted Turner. While at times dismissed as a wacky billionaire--famous for colorizing movies, yachting, snoozing at baseball games and trading nasty barbs with fellow mogul Rupert Murdoch--Turner indeed possessed a vision, early on, that owning thousands of movies would someday be a very, very good idea.
“The one thing that Ted recognized is content is king,†Karsch said. “You’re only as good as your content.â€
Admittedly, this sort of dry academic discussion of “classic†isn’t as much fun as debating whether the John Wayne western “Rio Bravo†deserves the tag more than his later oater “El Dorado,†if Samantha from “Bewitched†could beat “I Dream of Jeannie’s†namesake in a magic power duel, or, less existentially, with whom you would rather be trapped in a bottle.
Rest assured, however, if employed the way TV programmers bandy about the term, a few months from now this column will be a “classic.â€
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* Brian Lowry’s column appears on Tuesdays. He can be reached by e-mail at [email protected].
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