A Look Ahead
GO:Walt Disney will convert all Disney Internet Group into conventional Disney stock as the Mouse House abandons its Go.com portal strategy and maintains only individual Web sites for its various properties. Some 400 pinkslips will fly.
RATES: Super Bowl XXXV scored better-than-expected ratings (despite a surprisingly poor performance in Gotham), while "Survivor II" proved decent but unspectacular. b. XFL30 -- The less-than-compelling Ravens-Giants Super Bowl game could give a boost to XFL games, which kick off on NBC in primetime Saturday, Feb. 3.
PUBLIC: Fox picks up a full 22-episode order of frosh hit "Boston Public" for next season. David E. Kelley does well indeed.
JACKASS: Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.) condemned MTV Monday for airing a stunt on "Jackass" that apparently led to a 13-year-old replicating the stunt and suffering serious burns. Meanwhile, key congressional aide on anti-Hollywood crusade ankles from Sen. John McCain's committee and heads to Sen. Trent Lott's office.
DGA: The Directors Guild of America has tapped helmers Robert Butler and Tom Donovan to receive the DGA's Robert B. Aldrich Achievement Award for service to the union and its membership.
WB: Debbie Miller has ankled her post as VP national publicity at Twentieth Century Fox to become senior VP publicity for Warner Bros. Pictures.
WGA: Writers Guild of America begins the second week of intensive negotiations with studios and networks on its film-TV contract.
KEITEL: Harvey Keitel will play a former Vietnam Marine who surfaces in South America in "Nowhere," a Spanish-lingo dramedy. Pic, budgeted at $5.6 million, is a three-way co-production between Surf Films, Italian pubcaster RAI; Spanish mini-major, the Filmax Group; and top Argentine pic production house, the Patagonik Film Group.
ASC: "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," "Gladiator," "O Brother, Where Art Thou?," "The Patriot" and "The Perfect Storm" have been tapped by the American Society of Cinematographers as feature film nominees for its Outstanding Achievement Awards.
NEWYORKER: New Yorker magazine enters e-book market, introducing new e-book imprint in exclusive deal with Microsoft.
NBA: The National Basketball Assn. has signed a deal with Real Networks to deliver live Internet broadcasts of NBA.com TV, the 24-hour digital cable network, and radiocasts of all home and away NBA games.
METRO: About 75 Metro Networks employees in Los Angeles have ratified their first contract.
A&E: A&E Television Networks has established a West Coast legal and business affairs office and has hired Barbara Rubin to head it.
UPN: Net has recruited industry vet Rachel Wells Clark to share the senior veepee of marketing title with Bob Bouknight.
B'WAY GROSS: Broadway marched in place as B.O. fell an insignificant .2%, down only $23,040 to soft land at $11,010,665. Most of the decline was attributable to the absence of "Copenhagen," which had closed the previous week, with no new shows taking its place.
BUSINESS
NTV: The Ted Turner-led international consortium still hopes to buy a $300 million stake in NTV, Russia's only independent TV station, despite Gazprom's takeover attempt. George Soros confirmed Monday that he would join Turner's consortium.
EMI: Bertelsmann and EMI are still discussing marriage but the big day, if it comes, may still be weeks away. The two music majors, according to an insider, are in "good talks on a good track," but will not meet the end of January deadline many observers thought they were shooting for.
NAB: NAB joins radio congloms in filing suit against U.S. Copyright Office for a recent ruling allowing performance royalties for music streamed over the Internet. For years, broadcasters have been exempt from paying such royalties.
WOWOW: Japanese subscription satcaster Wowow plans to launch an IPO on the venture-oriented Mothers section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange by as early as March.
WORLD NEWS
FOBO: O'seas box office.
GENIES: Denis Villeneuve's "Maelstrom," a French-language tale narrated by a dead fish, has garnered five Genie Awards, including statuette for best picture, screenplay and direction at Canada's equivalent to the Academy Awards, presented Monday night.
BRUSSELS: Italian helmer Marco Tullio Giordana has scooped the top prize worth $73,500 at the 6th annual competitive Brussels film fest with his pic "I Cento Passi" (A hundred steps). The pic is Italy's entry for best foreign film at this year's Oscars.
EMTV: The list of suitors for the troubled German kidvidder EM.TV appears to be growing with Disney reportedly interested in buying company subsidiary Jim Henson.
CESAR: The Cesar Awards, France's equivalent of the Oscars, will be dominated this year by two low-key films that were big hits with audiences -- Agnes Jaoui's "The Taste of Others" and Dominik Moll's "With a Friend Like Harry."
REVIEWS
FILM: *Home Movie (Sundance);
TV: Survivor II, Sunday, CBS; Attila, Tues/Wed, USA.
