Here's everything you need to know about the world of television for Monday, December 16th, 2024:
VOTING ENDS IN THE GLOBAL TELEVISION AWARDS
Voting has ended for the 1st Annual Global Television Awards. I'm still compiling the final numbers, but it looks as there'll be somewhere around 58,000 ballots submitted. One logistical challenge is that I used Google Docs to collect the votes and there is apparently some limit on how many votes can be compiled before everything starts to get unwieldy.
Thanks to everyone who voted and encouraged other people to participate. Based on the response, I think it's safe to say I'll be doing this again next year. And with a bit more time to plan, I'll do it with a few more bells and whistles.
The winners will be announced Monday, December 30th.
WHAT THAT DONALD TRUMP LAWSUIT AGAINST ABC NEWS HAS IN COMMON WITH DAN SCHNEIDER
There has been a seemingly endless number of hot takes on the ABC News decision to settle the defamation lawsuit brought by Donald Trump, for a $15 million payment to his presidential library, a $1 million payment for his legal fees and an apology.
This is one of those stories where we don't know what we don't know. Perhaps this was a effort to make nice with the incoming President. Perhaps ABC News wasn't thrilled by the prospect of being in the middle of a trial during the early months of the new Administration. Or perhaps there were some uncomfortable internal ABC News emails or messages that would have become public during the trail's discovery period.
The truth is that we just don't know what we don't know. And it's unlikely that either Disney CEO Bob Iger or any ABC News executive is going to provide any useful details.
But I was speaking with a lawyer for one of the other broadcast networks today and his speculation was that ABC might have been worried that a trial and the inevitable appeals would have ended up in the Trump-friendly Supreme Court. And once there, the concern would be that the court would overturn the landmark 1964 Supreme Court ruling New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, which stated that the freedom of speech protections in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution restrict the ability of public officials to sue for defamation.
Prior to the ruling, it was not uncommon for newspapers and other news outlets to be threatened with a lawsuit by parties who argued that an otherwise true news story was defamatory. That practice was often used during the height of the Jim Crow era to restrict coverage of civil rights stories.
The Sullivan vs. New York Times case goes back to 1960, when the The New York Times published a full-page advertisement paid for by supporters of Martin Luther King. The ad criticized Montgomery, Alabama police and criticized its treatment of protesters. But the ad contained several inaccuracies, including the number of times King had been arrested (this might sound familiar to those of you who followed the ABC News/Trump case).
Montgomery police commissioner L.B. Sullivan sued the New York Times in an Alabama court and a jury awarded him $500,000 in damages. An appeal by the newspaper went to the Alabama Supreme Court and ultimately the U.S. Supreme Court, which overturned the verdict in a 9-0 vote.
The court stated that First Amendment speech and wide-open debate would inevitably lead to unpleasant and sometimes misleading rhetoric. The court also adopted what it described as the "actual malice standard" for determining whether or not speech or news reporting was defamatory:
The constitutional guarantees require, we think, a Federal rule that prohibits a public official from recovering damages for a defamatory falsehood relating to his official conduct unless he proves that the statement was made with 'actual malice'—that is, with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.
The court has since extended this standard to any public figure, which is why publications such as The National Enquirer have mostly managed to dodge being sued. The plaintiff has to prove the defendant willfully and knowingly published false information and that the publication of that information resulted in provable damages.
The similarities between this Donald Trump vs. ABC News case are apparently close enough to the details of Sullivan vs The New York Times that some legal experts in the media industry feared it could be used as the basis to overturn the long-standing precedent that provides a wide swath of legal protection for media outlets.
This issue of “actual malice” is also at the core of the ongoing defamation lawsuit by Dan Schneider vs the producers of Quiet On Set. So an overturn of Sullivan vs. The New York Times might make it nearly impossible to produce those hard-hitting true crime documentaries.
TED SARANDOS JOINS THE 'BEND A KNEE" TOUR OF MAR-A-LAGO
CNN is reporting that co-CEO of Netflix Ted Sarandos will travel to Mar-a-Lago for a meeting Tuesday with Donald Trump. No details of the meeting have been announced.
Sarandos had previously donated to Democratic candidates in the past, but did not make a contribution in 2024. However, Sarandos’ wife, Nicole Avant, gave $150,000 in September to support Kamala Harris and the Democratic National Committee. Avant was also America’s Ambassador to the Bahamas during the first term of Barack Obama’s presidency.
While Sarandos is doing the "make nice" tour to meet with the President-elect, it's not clear if he'll be followed anytime soon by Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings, who contributed heavily to Kamala Harris's failed presidential run.
ODDS AND SODS
* Apple TV+ has renewed Silo for a third and fourth season, which will be its last. The four seasons will complete the storyline of Hugh Howey’s New York Times best-selling trilogy of dystopian novels.
* A&E is leaning into its Copaganda primetime programming approach with the premiere of three new shows: Homicide Squad New Orleans (Wednesday, January 1st, 2025), follows a team of detectives within the New Orleans PD; Fugitive Hunters Mexico (Thursday, January 2nd), follows an elite Mexican task force pursues American fugitives hiding south of the border; and Ozark Law (Wednesday, January 8th), follows two small police departments working to maintain order around Missouri’s Lake of the Ozarks during tourist season.
* Netflix has renewed the Ted Danson comedy A Man On The Inside for a second season.
* NewsNation announced it had reached a multiyear agreement with anchor and reporter Chris Cuomo to continue hosting his primetime program, Cuomo.
* The syndicated daytime talk show The Kelly Clarkson Show has been renewed for a seventh season.
* Deal or No Deal Island After Show With Boston Rob, hosted by semi-pro reality TV contestant "Boston" Rob Mariano, will debut Wednesday, January 8th, 2025 on Peacock, NBC’s YouTube channel and NBC.com.
* Kristen Bell will host the 31st Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards, which streams live Sunday, February 23rd, 2025, on Netflix.
* Investigation Discovery has ordered Who Is Luigi Mangione?, a Dan Abrams-produced special that seeks to delve "“into the lingering questions surrounding Mangione’s arrest and explores how a young man of such wealth and privilege could seemingly commit such a heinous crime." It's set to premiere in February. At the same time, Two-time Emmy nominee Stephen Robert Morse, who produced Netflix documentary Amanda Knox and also directed How To Rob A Bank for the streamer, is at work on another Mangione documentary. And a third documentary project is also in the planning stages, this one from Anonymous Content and Alex Gibney’s Jigsaw Productions.
WHAT'S NEW TONIGHT AND TOMORROW
MONDAY, DECEMBER 16TH:
* American Masters: Brenda Lee: Rockin' Around (PBS)
* Holiday Baking Championship Season Eleven Finale (Food)
* NCIS Fall Finale (CBS)
* NCIS: Origins Season One Fall Finale (CBS)
* Poppa's House Season One Fall Finale (CBS)
* Little Big Town's Christmas At The Opry (NBC)
* The Chelsea Detective Christmas Special (Acorn TV)
* The Neighborhood Fall Finale (CBS)
* TMZ Investigates: Liam Payne: Who's To Blame? (Fox)
* What We Do In The Shadows Series Finale (FX)
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 17TH:
* Aaron Rodgers: Enigma (Netflix)
*Ronny Chieng: Love To Hate It (Netflix)
* Sister Boniface Mysteries Christmas Special 2024 (Britbox)
* The Simpsons: O C'mon All Ye Faithful (Disney+)
* Windy City Rehab Season Finale (HGTV)
SEE YOU ON TUESDAY!