HBO Striking Up ‘Band’ for March Into Network Territory

When Home Box Office executives met with a group of TV critics last month, Jeff Bewkes, the pay channel’s media-savvy chairman, somewhat wryly suggested reporters go home and urge readers who don’t yet subscribe to HBO that they really should.

Bewkes, of course, was preaching to the already converted, based on the critical hosannas and amount of space newspapers devote to HBO series and movies; still, his remarks underscored what HBO strives to achieve (usually with more subtlety) through its courtship of the press--generating a steady drumbeat of praise to feed the perception consumers who don’t ante up their $12 a month risk slipping way behind the cultural curve. In that respect, HBO’s goal seems to be making it so that people don’t just subscribe to the pay service but rather submit to it.

In fact, for all the talk about so-called “reality television” in recent months, the spring and summer have arguably belonged to HBO, whose ratings for its high-profile series have climbed as those for network reruns dwindled. Small wonder, then, the networks have alternatively begun crying foul and examining HBO’s battle plan, in much the same way Gen. George Patton (if you believe the movie, anyway) studied German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel’s book on tank warfare before going up against him.

Just consider the last few months. “The Sopranos,” HBO’s breakthrough drama, continued to see its ratings build and cultural toehold deepen in the show’s third season. “Sex and the City,” the comedy that has millions of women trying to determine which of the central characters they most resemble, also saw its audience grow, while a new program about a family of morticians, “Six Feet Under,” blossomed into a hit in its own right by HBO’s standards, with more than 7 million people watching the season-ending episode two weeks ago--more than viewed “The Sopranos” during its first year.

In short, HBO has succeeded in cultivating that most coveted of media attributes--buzz--at a time when knifing through the clutter of myriad channels has generally confounded programmers.

As a result, though the channel is currently received in a mere third or so of U.S. households (more than twice that many get cable or have satellite dishes without ponying up extra for HBO), its influence clearly extends far beyond the percentage of homes the channel reaches.

Moreover, these aforementioned inroads have made HBO ever bolder. Like other cable channels, HBO has traditionally sought to capitalize on network repeats during the summer--a “Hit ‘em where they ain’t” approach that the networks, at least for a while, were content to endure, as if being nibbled at by mosquitoes.

Now, however, HBO will daringly launch a major fall-quarter offensive--somewhat fittingly--by introducing the fact-based World War II miniseries “Band of Brothers” on Sept. 9, backed by the sort of heavy promotional artillery HBO excels at mustering.

So at a time when networks have turned to unscripted television in part as a cost-cutting move, HBO counters with a splashy miniseries of a magnitude once deemed the networks’ exclusive province. While broadcasters fret about pinching pennies and about a soft advertising market, HBO--funded by subscriptions and thus unfettered by the vagaries of advertising--brags about the 10-hour production’s $120-million price tag and appears destined to spend half again that much to ensure everyone knows about it.

Indeed, the promotional blitzkrieg behind “Band of Brothers” represents the TV equivalent of the D-Day invasion, hopefully minus the casualties. Tonight’s extravagant media premiere, a private affair at the Hollywood Bowl, will be preceded by a live orchestral performance, with the dinner and screening followed by a rendition of the national anthem and a fireworks display. Oh, and did we mention Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg--at some point anointed America’s official World War II historians--are executive producers, with their names plastered across the production?

Such largess has become a staple of HBO’s strategy. By rolling out its productions as if they were feature films, the channel not only reinforces the slogan “It’s not TV. It’s HBO” but has managed to convince talent that they are in a “movie,” in the big-screen sense, and not “doing television,” in the “I’m old and can’t put paying customers in seats anymore” sense--a nose-holding proposition for big names on either side of the camera. HBO later follows up by mailing lavish videotape packages to Emmy Award voters--all part of the seemingly inexhaustible resources the channel brings to cultivating its image.

The major networks, meanwhile, remain somewhat bewildered in terms of how to respond. They have pointed out, rightly, that HBO enjoys several key advantages when it comes to garnering awards, from its ability to focus on a handful of projects to greater creative latitude to the way the service throws money at the process, strategizing that publicity equals attention equals more subscribers equals revenue.

HBO and some critics accuse the networks of sour grapes. Many ridiculed NBC Chairman Bob Wright, for example, for sending a letter to producers and executives in April soliciting feedback regarding “The Sopranos,” seeking input regarding “how [the show] impacts mainstream entertainment” and what that might mean for NBC.

Yet fumbling as the approach was, Wright nevertheless posed a legitimate question--grappling with what HBO’s recent trajectory means for television in general and the networks in particular.

HBO, after all, has been at the vanguard of acclimating consumers to paying for entertainment they receive via television. At what point, then, does that jeopardize a 50-year-old system in which the most-watched networks have been free and supported strictly by advertising?

Additional questions linger: Does paying for HBO actually give viewers more incentive to watch in order to justify the expenditure? Will people pay to receive network programs, such as “The Practice” or “The West Wing,” when and where they want them? Is it as simple as the fact that the prime-time playing field has been leveled--where people watch programs, not networks? And what is it worth to view television without commercial interruptions--once deemed a small price for being entertained each week but now seen in some quarters as a distraction endured only by the technologically challenged, those adept at multi-tasking and those burdened by weak bladders?

In that context, Wright had good reason to ponder what the spring and summer of HBO augur for the future. It’s also why there will be more than a few interested parties monitoring just how well “Band” plays--hoping to hear, in the midst of the promotional cacophony, what the audience is telling them.

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Brian Lowry’s column appears Wednesdays. He can be reached at [email protected].