NBC: Kevin Reilly Wasn't Fired, He Just Wasn't Comfortable Sitting In Ben Silverman's Lap All Day
· At the TCAs, non-rock-star NBC co-chairman Marc Graboff repeats the hilarious party line on Kevin Reilly's non-firing "'He wasn't fired,' Graboff revealed, inspiring instant guffaws. 'What happened was when Ben [Silverman] became available, about three months after we made Kevin's new deal, we jumped at the opportunity to bring Ben on board to the company. We thought he would be able to be the person that was going to take us to the next level. Kevin, when that happened, realized or determined, frankly, that there was just no role for him at the company and decided to move on.'" In fairness, it does get a little hard to do your job when the new guy keeps interrupting your meetings to replace another piece of your office furniture with his own. [THR]
· Acquisitive News Corp. mogul Rupert Murdoch moves closer to buying Dow Jones and adding the Wall Street Journal to his ever-growing pile of media playthings. [Variety]
· Producers open their negotiations with the WGA by offering the guild a choice: either get down on your knees and put off the issue of internet compensation until a study about new media can be completed or bend over and let us recoup whatever costs we think are fair before we pay you any residuals. Talks have been convened until Wednesday to give the writers time to craft a counterproposal that doesn't start with the words "Go fuck yourself, greedy maniacs." [THR]
· Says Var on the tenor of those initial negotiations: "The gloves have already come off." But, as noted above, not the pants. Yet. [Variety]
· Hell's Kitchen still inexplicably popular. [Variety]