Hallmark Channel revamps daytime programming block

The Hallmark Channel is setting a new table for daytime with two original programs set to launch this fall: a talk show featuring Marie Osmond and a lifestyle show called "Home & Family," which will be shot in Los Angeles on the Universal Studios lot not far from Wisteria Lane of "Desperate Housewives" fame. 

The Studio City cable network is regrouping after its 2-year-old partnership with Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia produced more lemons than lemonade. 

In the coming months, the Hallmark Channel plans to begin phasing out Stewart's programming.

The lifestyle maven's signature how-to show, shot before a studio audience in New York, will end production in late April.  Hallmark Channel will continue with reruns of "The Martha Stewart Show" until September. Stewart's other shows, including "Mad Hungry with Lucinda Scala Quinn," are expected to continue on Hallmark -- at least through the end of the year, Hallmark executives said.

"It's time for us to provide our own take on lifestyle programming," said Bill Abbott, chief executive of Crown Media Holdings, parent company of the Hallmark Channel and its sister Hallmark Movie Channel.

After failing to squeeze money from Stewart's programs, Crown Media intends to own the shows that it runs on its two channels. 

The Hallmark Channel's daytime strategy switch comes as the company embraces, once again, its trademark brand of wholesome family fare. The Hallmark channels have ordered 34 original movies this year, representing a 48% increase over their 2009 slates.

Read the full story in the Los Angeles Times.

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-- Meg James

Photo: Marie Osmond in 2001. Credit:  Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times

Made-for-TV-movie producer RHI Entertainment emerging from Chapter 11 proceedings

Scratch the closing credits for one well-known television production company. 

RHI Entertainment Inc. announced Tuesday that its pre-packaged reorganization plan -- which was designed to reduce the company's debt by more than $400 million -- had won the approval of a bankruptcy judge in New York. RHI also said the company soon would be emerging from the Chapter 11 proceedings it initiated in December.

"RHI is working with its key constituencies and exit lenders to complete the restructuring and
make the reorganization plan effective as quickly as possible," the company said in its statement.

The television movie company, which has offices in New York and Los Angeles, entered Bankruptcy Court with more than $600 million in debt.

As part of its reorganization, RHI plans to emerge with a new capital structure that includes a debt reduction of approximately $298 million as well as lower interest costs and extended debt maturities. The plan also includes settlement agreements with "certain production partners and talent guilds," which eliminated or reduced payment terms associated with more than $100 million in obligations, the company said.

Remaining unsecured creditor claims would be paid in full, RHI said.

During the nearly four-month period the company was in Bankruptcy Court, it continued to operate and began production of three TV miniseries, “Neverland,” “Treasure Island” and “Blackout.”  It also produced movies for the Syfy and Hallmark channels.

"This is a great day for RHI Entertainment,” Chief Executive Robert Halmi Jr. said in the statement. “With the Bankruptcy Court’s approval, we are cleared to emerge from Chapter 11 with a strengthened balance sheet and the financial flexibility that will enable us to continue to deliver high quality, one-of-a-kind entertainment content. We believe ... we are well positioned for success in the years to come."

-- Meg James

Photo from "Dinotopia," a 2002 TV miniseries produced by Hallmark Entertainment and Robert Halmi Sr. and Robert Halmi Jr. Credit:  ABC / Hallmark Entertainment

 

Halmi's RHI Entertainment files for Chapter 11

In a move that underscores the dramatically changing of tastes of television viewers and the overleveraged finances of some media companies, the once-vibrant Robert Halmi Inc. production company has filed a prepackaged Chapter 11 reorganization in New York Bankruptcy Court.

In its Friday afternoon filing, RHI Entertainment listed assets of $524.7 million and liabilities of $834 million. The company plans to keep operating.

RHI Entertainment specializes in made-for-TV movies and miniseries, a genre that has slipped in popularity as younger viewers have warmed more to reality and competition shows such as Bravo's "The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills" and MTV's "Jersey Shore."

The filing had been expected. The company has spent the last few months securing creditors' approval for its prepackaged bankruptcy. Its largest creditors are JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America.

"Today's action is the next step in the process to reduce our debt and formulate a new capital structure that will better enable us to invest in our businesses and continue to provide one of a kind content to our customers," the company's chief executive, Robert Halmi Jr., said in a statement.

Major creditors have approved the company's plan for recapitalization that would reduce its debt by approximately 51%, or $309 million, while also allowing it to lower its interest costs. In its statement, New York-based RHI said it also had struck agreements that it said would eliminate, reduce or "favorably amend the payment terms associated with over $100 million in potential claims of a number of creditors, including various production partners and talent guilds." 

The Screen Actors Guild has a claim against RHI valued at more than $12.73 million. The company owes the Writers Guild of America nearly $3.8 million and the Directors Guild of America $3.42 million, according to the filing.

The company's rich history could itself be the stuff of a made-for-TV movie. Founded in 1979, the company spent decades pumping out programming, including the miniseries "Lonesome Dove," with Robert Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones, and the TV movie "Gulliver's Travels," with Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen. In recent years, RHI claimed at least half the market for TV miniseries and movies, many produced for the Hallmark Channel.

RHI was a public company until 1994, when Hallmark Cards bought out the Halmi family. Twelve years later, in 2006, Robert Halmi Jr. and other investors bought it back from Hallmark, which left the production company burdened with debt of more than $600 million. Two years later, RHI mounted a public offering which raised $189 million -- not as much as the company had hoped. Then the recession hit and its primary buyer, Hallmark Channel, pulled back, triggering a cascade of financial misfortune. Its stock was delisted earlier this year.

-- Meg James   

Hallmark Channel shakes up programming ranks in wake of Martha Stewart ratings woes

Amid the disappointing performance of Martha Stewart on the Hallmark Channel, the company Friday forced out a key programming executive who had been hired just four months ago to work closely with the lifestyle maven.

Laura Sillars, a former HGTV programming executive, joined Hallmark in June as senior vice president for lifestyle programming. 

"We mutually decided to go in different ways," said Bill Abbott, chief executive of the Studio City-based Hallmark Channels. "It was not a good fit for either of us."

Sillars was not part of the team at Hallmark that decided in January to introduce Stewart to the channel and attempt a wholesale makeover of its programming.

She had been tasked with developing a slate of other original lifestyle shows so that Hallmark could wean itself from its reliance on reruns of classic feel-good programs such as "Little House on the Prairie" and tear-jerker movies.  She also was the company's day-to-day liaison with Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia.

"It takes time to find the right chemistry and the right mix when you are dealing with high-profile talent," Abbott said.

Abbott also said that the demands of the job became too much for Sillars, who was commuting to the company's New York offices from New Orleans. 

"I wish the Hallmark Channels much success with their Martha Stewart programming, and their future programming," Sillars said Friday night.

Abbott's big bet this season was to turn over eight hours of its daytime schedule to Stewart.  But in the four weeks since Stewart's marquee show launched, it has produced anemic ratings. Telecasts of "The Martha Stewart Show" on Hallmark have been averaging fewer than 200,000 viewers -- less than half the audience of "The Golden Girls," which ran in the 10 a.m. slot on the channel a year ago.  A show featuring Stewart's daughter, Alexis, has produced even more dismal ratings.

"We are off to a slow start but the ratings have started to improve," Abbott said. Wednesday's telecast marked the show's highest ratings on the channel to date, with 250,000 people tuning in. 

The problem, Abbott said, is that viewers are used to watching original shows in the daytime on stations affiliated with the major networks. Hallmark's shift to lifestyle programming was a radical move that alienated many of its longtime viewers. Meanwhile, many of Stewart's fans have not made the switch to cable. Until this season, Stewart's show ran in syndication and was on NBC-owned TV stations.

Next week, Hallmark will try to boost the numbers by running Stewart's show at 8 p.m., when more viewers are available.

-- Meg James

Photo of Martha Stewart courtesy of Crown Media Holdings

 

Hallmark Channel goes dark on AT&T television

Hallmark Channel pulled the signals of its two cable channels from the AT&T U-Verse system late Tuesday, less than two weeks before the launch of Hallmark's high-profile programming makeover.

The company, operated by Crown Media Holdings and controlled by Hallmark Cards, has been heavily promoting the Sept. 13 arrival of Martha Stewart on the Hallmark Channel.  The style maven plans to provide eight hours of programming to the channel each weekday, replacing such classic programs as "I Love Lucy" and "Little House on the Prairie."  

The action came as Crown Media, based in Studio City, and AT&T failed to reach a new carriage agreement.  The sticking point was over how much AT&T would pay Hallmark Channel for the programming. 

Hallmark declined to say how much it was seeking from AT&T for the right to carry its Hallmark Channel and the Hallmark Movie Channel.  The  previous pact expired at 9:01 p.m. Pacific Time (12:01 a.m. Eastern time Wednesday).

"We are the nation's family networks, and we will continue to produce quality programs that connect people emotionally," Bill Abbott, Hallmark Channel's chief executive, said in a statement announcing the blackout. The statement added that Hallmark would be willing to restart negotiations.

Until late Tuesday, the Hallmark Channel was available in nearly 90 million homes and the Hallmark Movie Channel was available in about 38 million homes.  AT&T provides television service to about 2 million customers in the country.  Dallas-based AT&T contends that Hallmark has been demanding  AT&T pay more for the channels than what Hallmark charges "similarly-sized and smaller TV competitors."

"We want to reach an agreement that is fair to our subscribers and for all parties, as we have with numerous other content providers," AT&T said in a statement distributed last week after the discussions with Hallmark began to fall apart.

-- Meg James