Parent company 21st Century Fox has tapped 20th Century Fox Television chiefs Dana Walden and Gary Newman to head Fox Broadcasting. As chairmen and CEOs of the newly minted unit Fox Television Group, the two will continue to be responsible for the company's studio operations, which they have led for 15 years.
Walden and Newman will report to Peter Rice, chairman of Fox Networks Group.
The announcement comes eight weeks after the network announced that Kevin Reilly would step down from his role as chairman of Fox Broadcasting.
Word of Reillys departure came fewer than two weeks before the end of a season that saw Fox finish second among the Big Four broadcasters with an average 2.5 Nielsen rating among adults 18-49 in primetime. That number, assisted by Fox's February Super Bowl broadcast, was even with the network's average rating from the Super Bowl-free 2012-13 season. The 2012-13 performance ended an eight-season run by Fox as the top network in the demo, one that began prior to Reilly's arrival.
The tail end of Reilly's tenure was marked by the dramatic ratings decline of American Idol, long the bulwark that held the network above all competitors in the numbers race. Ratings for the show have declined every season since Reilly's first, with a steep drop off in recent years. Idol finished the 2010-11 season with an average 7.5 demo rating and 23.1 million viewers. In 2013-14, the series averaged a 2.6 and 10.2 million total viewers.
Fox's studio operations, by contrast, have been a boon to the company in recent years, producing hits such as ABC's Modern Family and Fox network's Sleepy Hollow. Under Walden and Newman, 20th Century Fox Television, Fox Television Studios and Fox 21 combined to earn the second most Primetime Emmy Award nominations last week with 44, behind only HBO Entertainment and HBO Films.
Walden and Newman inherit a network that has been trending downward, but also one that had recently experimented with disrupting traditional development models. Reilly, long a critic of the pilot-season process, announced at the TCA winter press tour in January that the network would be bypassing it going forward.
We are in sort of that transitional year where we are willing all of it to happen, the deconstruction of pilot season, Fox Broadcasting COO Joe Earley told B&C less than a month before the network's May upfront presentation. News of Reilly's departure came two weeks after that upfront presentation, in which he touted the first new fall lineup developed under a model that relied more heavily on straight to series orders. It is not known yet whether Walden and Newman will maintain the same level of commitment to upending the development process that Reilly so publically engaged in.
In a letter sent Monday morning to the staffs of the network and studios, Newman wrote, In this incredibly dynamic television landscape, uniting these two companies under one management will foster more successful collaboration among our executives and create greater paths to success for our creative partners. We are humbled by the challenge, energized by the opportunities and emboldened by the fact that well be joined by such talented executives on both sides of the organization.
Fox now becomes the third of the Big Four broadcasters to have a network programming chief also maintain oversight of the company's studio operation. Only CBS keeps the two businesses separate.
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Parent company 21st Century Fox has tapped 20th Century Fox Television chiefs Dana Walden and Gary Newman to head Fox Broadcasting. As chairmen and CEOs of the newly minted unit Fox Television Group, the two will continue to be responsible for the company's studio operations, which they have led for 15 years.
