Vet Barbera ads up for cabler Odyssey

Channel to relaunch in spring as family Web

By RICHARD KATZ

The Odyssey Channel, on the move since Hallmark Entertainment and the Jim Henson Co. invested a total of $100 million in the cabler, hired cable ad sales vet John M. Barbera as executive VP, advertising sales.

He'll be responsible for strategizing Odyssey's overall sales operation, incorporating the current Odyssey sales division into an expanded sales staff.

Barbera, who will be based in New York, made his name in the industry as president of ad sales for Turner Broadcasting Sys-tem, which he left in 1994 after 16 years with the company.

At Turner, Barbera was responsible for the ad sales of CNN, Headline News, TBS Superstation, TNT, Cartoon Network and CNN Intl. He was a member of the executive committee of Turner Broadcasting and an officer of the company.

Following his career at Turner, Barbera formed his own consulting firm, J.B. Communications. His clients included TCI's Liberty Sports (currently Liberty Fox Sports), CNET and WBIS, the New York broadcast station briefly owned by ITT and Dow Jones.

Relaunching channel

This spring, the 29-million-subscriber Odyssey will relaunch as a general family-entertainment cable web. The service is currently a multidenominational religious-based channel that runs entertainment programs such as "Trapper John, M.D." and "Brooklyn Bridge."

The new Odyssey will benefit from the Hallmark and Henson programming libraries. Henson will contribute "The Muppet Show," and Hallmark's miniseries such as "The Odyssey," "Gulliver's Travels," Moby Dick" and "Merlin" will run on the cable web.

Under its new ownership structure, Liberty Media Corp. owns 32.5% of Odyssey, with Hallmark, Henson and the National Interfaith Cable Coalition each owning 22.5%.

Former Fox Kids Network president Margaret Loesch is Odyssey's new prexy and CEO.