PBS has more vice presidents than APS has employees, says Zesbaugh. Shown are in their office above the Boston Commons: Porter, Zesbaugh and staff.
Originally published in Current, April 6, 1998By Steve Behrens
Boston -- Well before John Porter passed its reins to Joe Zesbaugh last week, American Program Service was evolving.
Increasingly, it's developing (instead of just buying) specials, blocks of programs, and series like Sessions at West 54th, a Saturday-night pop concert series that featured 26 Grammy nominees in its first season.
Increasingly, it's trying to set its satellite feed times near broadcast time, as with its American Weekend program package that specializes in Saturdays, when PBS doesn't have a firm schedule.
Increasingly, it's putting prices on its a la carte menu of services: evaluating shows, marketing them to stations, preparing publicity materials, uplinking tapes, and more.
Increasingly, it will earn its living by taking on the "presenting" role that stations often play for independent producers, according to Porter and Zesbaugh. Some stations make fine presenters, says Zesbaugh, but others don't devote the resources necessary.
Increasingly, it will sell at international program markets, instead of just buy for U.S. stations. Its representatives were at work in Cannes this week.
The syndicator--a $12 million company that distributes 2,000 hours of programming a year to public TV--is a fraction the size of PBS but constantly maneuvering in its shadow.
Porter retired after nearly 30 years with APS, having built it out of the Eastern Educational Television Network (EEN) that was founded by WGBH, years before PBS. Last year he recruited his successor, Zesbaugh, the entrepreneurial president of the Pacific Mountain Network.
Though Porter will continue to work for APS part-time, he said goodbye March 27 with a retirement toast/roast party for 130 revelers from around the country.
"I'm looking at the company almost as a start-up company," though it's founded on "a terrific platform that John has built up," Zesbaugh says.
Porter, always one for pushing ahead, says: "I think we all agree that in a time of great change, APS should not retrench."
To do the program part of Porter's job, Zesbaugh has hired Francine Achbar as its first chief programming executive, starting May 4.
Achbar comes from CBS's Boston station, WBZ, where she is director of programming and development. She's known on public radio as panelist on WGBH-FM's national word-game show Says You!. Achbar has worked 20 years in TV, winning Iris, Gabriel, Peabody, duPont-Columbia and Emmy awards as a producer and executive producer. David Liroff, a v.p. at WGBH, introduced Zesbaugh to Achbar last fall.
With her arrival, APS is recovering from the loss of some key programmers, including Alan Foster (who has since beefed up competing services at PBS), Pat Faust and star consultant Kevin Harris, whose brief relationship with the syndicator fell apart last year.
Now Achbar is studying up on public TV and APS's complex role within it: one of the most market-driven companies in public TV, which works for both makers and users of programs, paying or charging them as the market demands. Major services, besides program development, include:
- APS Syndication, for programs offered to stations at a price, including Nightly Business Report and Mr. Bean.
- APS Exchange, for programs offered free, including The Big Comfy Couch; and
- APS Premium, for development, co-production or acquisition of strong programs often used in pledge drives like the original Three Tenors special. Sixty participating stations entrust $2 million in up-front cash for quick decision-making.
Premium Service has had huge hits like "Lord of the Dance" but also a weaker period lately, by most accounts. Zesbaugh aims to return more autonomy to the programmer in charge. APS started the service to put program-investment cash in the hands of an expert buyer, but more than a year ago, APS tried consulting an advisory panel of station reps, and Zesbaugh believes that has muddied and delayed verdicts. He wants to use a smaller panel and give more authority to the programmer.
The company's biggest challenge, says Zesbaugh, is to make or buy "programming that stations can't keep off the air." This desire is driving APS deeper into co-production and program development. As Porter observes, APS is now looking at treatments and proposals instead of finished videocassettes.
"Our role has got to be as overseer of executive producers," Zesbaugh adds. To develop Sessions, Vice President Niki Vettel was absorbed for much of a year, Zesbaugh observes. "We don't want to own our executive producers. We want to contract with them when the right project comes along."
At the same time a million cable networks are leaving fewer good programs available for syndication, APS wants to become more selective in choosing programs, not less.
"We say 'no' now to two out of three programs. Maybe we will say 'no' to four out of five in the future," says Zesbaugh. "At our last screening, we had 10 or 12 cooking shows. That's probably more than the system can handle."
After finding a good program, APS has the labor-intensive task for convincing programmers to agree. Syndication chief Eric Luskin believed in the "Horse Whisperer" special that aired during many pledge drives last month, but "had a heck of a time getting enough stations behind it" to swing the purchase, Zesbaugh says. Luskin struggled to sign the necessary 17 stations; now 68 stations are airing it.
But even with its successes, APS has a hard time beating the PBS schedule. Richard Goldsmith, president of Hollywood Ventures, and his staff worked hard with APS to put the Canadian kidvid hit Big Comfy Couch into U.S. living rooms and eventually succeeded. Yet Goldsmith says he returned to PBS "several times" after Couch became a hit to see if they'd take the show, because PBS provides "instant access" to stations' schedules. PBS again turned down Couch--because of the "not-invented-here syndrome," he thinks. Now Goldsmith is aiming to compete with PBS instead, and has created Someday School, a new hour-long package for preschoolers that APS is distributing.
For APS, it's disappointing to hear that Goldsmith had been courting PBS, Zesbaugh says. "We work harder with our producers than PBS does. Sometimes they find that little P-head very important, even though it may not enhance their carriage one bit."
In other cases, Zesbaugh admits, PBS does give programs a good shot at wider carriage--the uncontested schedule slots in primetime, or the publicity machine around Ready to Learn kidvid.
"We're going to try to find producers who would prefer to be with us, not just the ones waiting to get onto PBS," says Zesbaugh. "We don't look at ourselves as a farm team for PBS."
Earlier story: APS was so low-key that for years it had no logo. Published 1996.
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