from nytimes.com
The Fox sweeps special has been cancelled. The book has been recalled.
The buck stopped with Rupert Murdoch yesterday, who said: "I and senior management agree with the American public that this was an ill-considered project" and apologized for "any pain this has caused the families of Ron Goldman and Nicole Brown Simpson." And that was that — no blockbuster sweeps programming (however much Fox may need it), and no hotly-awaited book.
Pretty much everyone agrees: It was the right decision. "Is there anybody outside of Regan — which has so far maintained a restrained silence — that isn't expressing a public thrill to see how O.J. Simpson's If I Did It has been shot down and stomped on in the last 24 hours?" asks Ron Hogan at publishing blog GalleyCat. In the NYT, Bill Carter and Ed Wyatt describe the reaction at NewsCorp as "thankful" that the project was off, quoting an unnamed NewsCorp exect as saying that the project had been considered a "disaster" internally. At HarperCollins, a stiff-upper-lip mentality had been urged from the top with President and CEO Jane Friedman asking employees to maintain (as GC puts it) a "supportive silence" to the outside world. Fox affiliates, many of whom refused to carry the documentary, also expressed approval of the decision, according to the NYT. Observed blog Pre-emptive Karma: "Fox Realizes Morality Produces Revenue."
Or, the lack thereof. The AP makes a good point about another compelling reason to cancel the show: Advertisers. A source at an ad-buying firm expressed doubt that advertisers would want to be associated with the project; without advertising, there would be no profits in that timeslot, and no ratings from Nielson, thus obviating the whole sweeps-bump idea. On the book front, a bookseller's industry poll revealed that over 10% of booksellers wouldn't stock it and 97% of potential readers said they wouldn't buy the book.
So now, the fallout: Whither Judith Regan, who took the publicity from bad to worse this week with her excruciating mea culpa (published in its entirety in Murdoch's New York Post) (which, incidentally, seems to be making a disturbing habit out of publishing the painful ramblings of bizarro public figures)? This whole debacle was her brainchild, but the NYT reports that Murdoch was aware of the project before the details were made public, presumably for the purposes of a pre-publicity blitz. So it's sort of hard to make her the scapegoat here; plus, as Hogan points out, Regan got where she is because her books "work at the cash register" (and he cites the Amazon/B&N sales rankings for the book; apparently people were buying it, just not in public or admitting it to pollsters). Even so, her credibility is very damaged (one Gawker commenter puts it into context: "It appears that even Geraldo and Rupert Murdoch have more class -- and sense -- than Judith Regan") and she's taken a big hit within the publishing industry, and made HarperCollins look very bad. Also, the guy she accused of abuse and by whom she was driven to avenge all battered women everywhere isn't too happy with her, either.
But there is a silver lining: Out of the smoldering ashes of the book and TV special has come Ben Greenman's "If I Did It: The Musical" at McSweeney's, which is pretty brilliant (if crossing the crassness line itself in including Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman as singing characters). Other than that, all that remains is the knowledge that millions of printed, recalled books are out there, many of which have already been shipped, just waiting to be inadvertently sold by an unsuspecting clerk at Barnes & Noble. Julie Bosman, we're looking at you.
Related:
O.J. Book Deal In 90 Seconds [GalleyCat]
"Judith Regan and O.J. Simpson. A Match Made In Free Speech Hell" [Firedoglake]
Did We Mention People Hate the OJ Book? [GalleyCat]
