The David Letterman-Jay Leno confrontation starts on the air a week from tonight, but an equally important battle has raged behind the cameras since the day CBS announced it had lured the late-night star away from NBC. The skirmish, surprisingly, has been between CBS and some of its own affiliates.
This contest is about clearances - commitments from affiliates that they will carry the network's new late-night show, "Late Show With David Letterman."It's not that the reluctant affiliates dislike Letterman's show. In fact, many CBS station managers are enthused at the prospect of having Letterman on the network. But some CBS stations have balked because they can make more money by broadcasting syndicated shows or reruns.
(Among them is Utah's KSL, which will delay Letterman until 11:05 p.m. - after "M.A.S.H.")
The clearance issue has been crucial to CBS, which needs to provide enough viewers for Letterman to compete with Leno.
CBS has been at a disadvantage because it has never had a successful programming franchise after 11 p.m. Leno enjoys the legacy of Johnny Carson's three-decade-long domination of late night: NBC stations clear the "Tonight" show to about 99 percent of the country's homes.
As of this month, CBS finally seemed on the right track. The network made several deals with affiliates and has now cleared "Late Show" to about 98 percent of the country's homes. Reflected in that total are recent deals with stations in Denver, San Antonio and Madison, Wis.
Still, only about 67 percent of Americans will see Letterman's show at the same time as Leno's: 11:35 p.m. to 12:35 a.m., Eastern time. Elsewhere, "Late Show" will be offered at 12:05 A.M., after a half-hour syndicated show or rerun.
The differential gives Leno, whose ratings continue to be strong and steady, a head start over Letterman. CBS is already preparing elaborate interpretations of the ratings to try to make the comparisons reflect head-to-head competition.
CBS wants Letterman's show to start at 11:35 p.m. because more viewers are awake at that time than at 12:05 a.m. David F. Poltrack, the senior vice president of research for CBS, said the difference in the number of available viewers was equal to about one full rating point, or 931,000 homes.
"With Letterman delayed in about 30 percent of the country," Poltrack said, "that means he starts with about a three-tenths of a ratings point handicap."
NBC executives, meanwhile, have been dropping not-so-subtle predictions that Letterman will roar out of the gate with at least an 8 rating in his first week - Leno has been getting a rating of about 4.6 - because of all the publicity surrounding his move to CBS.
The story already sounds a lot like the New Hampshire presidential primary: it's the expectations game. NBC wants to create extremely high expectations that will be difficult for Letterman to attain, even as CBS tries to lower expectations by stressing the difference in clearances.
But for CBS, the clearance problem has been a real one. The network's current late-night programming, a melange of crime dramas, has been cleared at 11:35 p.m. in less than 30 percent of the country.
Many CBS stations have preferred to show syndicated programs like "Cheers," "Murphy Brown," or, most often, Arsenio Hall's late-night talk show.
That has forced Anthony C. Malara, the network's president of affiliate relations, to patch together deals with affiliates to get Letterman on the air. "Like they say about putting sausage together," Malara said, "you don't want to know how this was done."
It was not done by paying stations, Malara said, though he has promised some stations a bit more money for promotions. Other stations received extended network affiliation contracts or other considerations.
But the financial benefits of syndicated late-night programs are so vital to some stations that they have strongly resisted all blandishments from the network.
Replacing a syndicated program with Letterman's show will definitely cut into a station's revenues. A station will get eight minutes of local time to sell in the hour-long Letterman show. In two syndicated half-hours, a station can sell about twice as much commercial time.
In addition, some deals for syndicated shows include guarantees that a station will run some national commercials, sold by the syndicator, during a specific time period. So even if a station moves a show in favor of Letterman, it may have to run commercials sold by the syndicator during his show, further reducing the time the station can sell for itself.
Why would any station take the Letterman show if it can make more money running "Love Connection"?
Primarily because syndicated shows are a big investment for a station, and they provide no long-term guarantee of success. Old sitcoms usually work for a while in reruns, then have to be replaced - at a cost.
In contrast, a network station receives compensation payments from the network for carrying a late-night show, and if the show succeeds, the affiliate won't have to worry about buying any new syndicated shows for a long time.
Of course, a local station might also want to help the network. But most stations are too concerned with their own business to care much about how a network is faring. And CBS stations have feuded with the network in recent years because of a CBS proposal to slash compensation payments.
But the Letterman show has won a lot of stations over. "They're getting caught up in the excitement," said George Schweitzer, senior vice president of communications for CBS. "They know this is going to be a television event."
In two cities, Milwaukee and Baltimore, Malara simply couldn't win a CBS station over to Letterman. In both cities, the show will play on independent stations.
The clearance level is important to more than just CBS's pride. The network has sold "Late Show" to advertisers with a guarantee of a 4.1 national rating.
Joseph Abruzzese, the senior vice president of sales for CBS, said advertisers have been extremely enthusiastic, buying more than 80 percent of the show's time for the 1993-94 season, for a total CBS take so far of more than $90 million. He said Letterman had brought more than 40 new late-night sponsors to CBS.
The key to making sure the advertisers get their money's worth is to increase the clearances for the show, Malara said. And the key to that is simple. "It all comes down to Dave," he said. "If he performs well, everything will work out."