THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 1, 1994 TAG: 9406010033
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: LARRY BONKO
DATELINE: 940601 LENGTH: Medium
There will be seven hours of live programming daily, including a half hour of talk at 8 p.m. about what's making headlines that day: ``Under Scrutiny with Jane Wallace.'' Wallace, who was a network whiz kid for CBS in the 1980s as a reporter with ``West 57th Street,'' was last seen as co-host of CNBC's ``Equal Time.''
{REST} She left that neat little talk show in a dispute about wages. Now she's back on the tube where she belongs. Jane's cool.
fX signs on daily with three hours of live programming - ``The Pet Department'' at 6 a.m. followed by ``Breakfast.'' Then come the reruns followed by another hour of live stuff (``Personal fX: The Collectibles Show'').
And that's how it goes all day long.
Live stuff. Reruns. Live stuff. Reruns.
Won't it be exciting to see Lynda Carter in her Wonder Woman costume again?
On the Cox Cable system, fX will be seen on Channel 16, with VH-1 moving to Channel 60. Tele-Communications of Virginia in Chesapeake assigned fX to Channel 31, moving TNT to Channel 34.
The cable company in Suffolk, Falcon Cable, will carry fX to its subscribers in Chincoteague, but not in Suffolk at this time.
On all cable systems, fx will be part of the basic package and will not cost extra.
Launching fX is just one more bold stroke by Rupert Murdoch, owner of Fox Inc. He outbid CBS for the rights to the National League Football earlier this year, and last week committed a half billion dollars to buy 12 TV stations, including eight that will switch affiliation from CBS to Fox.
And today comes the launch of fX. It's going out to 18 million subscribers, which is a record number of customers for a new channel. Murdoch is on a roll.
Maryse Najar, vice president of public relations for fX, said the channel will send out crews and trucks throughout the United States to do reports from the field. Live remotes.
``Look for us to be in the Norfolk area soon,'' she said when we discussed fX at the recent cable-TV convention in New Orleans.
When the fX crew arrives, it won't be a short visit.
``We'll stay a week,'' Najar said.
That should be plenty of time to see Nauticus and grab some crab cakes at the Duck Inn.
fX will be a channel with a family feel to it.
First, the wake-up show at 6:30 a.m. with Tom Bergeron, Lauie Hibberd, Gwen McGee and Patricia Moreno will originate from a homey set on Fifth Avenue in the Flat Iron District of New York City. The apartment will be home base for all of fX's live programming. They'll even have a microwave in there.
Secondly, fX will have folksy channel hosts (Peter Chaconas, Ellie Devers, Luann Lee, Rosalinde Milan and Jeff Probst) who will appear on camera throughout the day at the top of each hour. They'll update viewers on the news.
fX ends its daily live programming with ``Back Chat'' at 12:30 a.m., when viewers will be invited to call or fax the hosts.
``We expect our live programming to be as exciting as it is spontaneous,'' said 32-year-old Rich Ross, vice president for programming, who had much to say about the old shows selected for fX.
``They're shows that Americans are comfortable with.'' That includes his generation - the famous Generation X. Is that why they named the channel fX?
Rising from their TV graves to entertain America again on fX are ``Batman,'' ``Dynasty,'' ``Eight is Enough,'' ``Family Affair,'' ``Fantasy Island,'' ``Ghost and Mrs. Muir,'' ``Greatest American Hero,'' ``Green Hornet,'' ``Grizzly Adams'' and ``Hart to Hart.''
And ``Home and Away,'' a series from Australia about a couple raising kids from broken families, ``In Living Color,'' ``Mission: Impossible,'' ``Nanny and the Professor,'' ``The Green Hornet,'' ``The Swiss Family Robinson'' and ``Wonder Woman.''
See Bruce Lee as the Green Hornet's faithful servant, Kato.
Other live programming on fX includes the noon show about collectibles and ``Sound fX'' at 11 p.m., which is about music videos. Karyn Bryant, who used to be VJ Karyn on MTV, will host this show.
Maybe you're wondering why fX found a home on hundreds of cable systems so quickly after being conceived by chairwoman Anne Sweeney. Other channel operators have been begging for space on cable systems such as Cox's for years.
It's because of a deal struck by Fox with cable companies last year. That's when new government regulations gave the OK for broadcast stations to charge cable companies for re-transmitting their signals to subscribers.
Fox said you can have our programming for free - take ``The Simpsons,'' ``Beverly Hills 90210'' and the rest of it - but in return we want you to carry our new cable channel. And that is how fX will resurrect the Carrington clan on ``Dynasty.''
That Rupert Murdoch is some horse trader.
by CNB