Struggling NBC sends 3 top executives packing

NBC, in a move as harsh as it was swift, forced out three top programming executives Friday after a disastrous crash of its fall television season.

The three -- Katherine Pope, Teri Weinberg and Craig Plestis -- all lost their high-profile jobs amid one of the most sweeping shake-ups in television. The purging signals the desperation of NBC Universal bosses to fix the network, which slid back into fourth place last week.

NBC’s latest solution: It plans to announce next week that Angela Bromstad, who has been running a production unit for the company in London, will return to Los Angeles to become the network’s chief programming executive.

She will assume a role that many expected Ben Silverman to fill when he joined the company nearly 18 months ago as co-chairman of NBC Entertainment. Silverman is negotiating a new contract with NBC that will include additional duties, according to two people familiar with the negotiations.

“Somebody’s head had to roll,” said David Scardino, a longtime television analyst with advertising agency RPA in Santa Monica. “But why these people? Maybe they were the ones who were picked to lay on the pavement so the bus could run over them.”

The former first-place television network, once the proud home of “Must-See TV” and such award-winning shows as “Seinfeld,” “Friends,” and “Frasier,” has been embroiled in management upheaval for more than two years.

Despite the musical chairs in the programming suites, the peacock network continues to lose viewers at a rapid pace. This season NBC’s ratings are down 14% compared with the same time last season -- a new low.

Recently launched programs, including “Knight Rider,” “Lipstick Jungle” and “My Own Worst Enemy,” have all flopped as well as the heavily promoted special last week featuring Rosie O’Donnell. The sitcom “Kath & Kim” has performed below expectations. NBC’s juggernaut drama “Heroes” also has stumbled badly, losing nearly half of its audience from its peak during its first season.

As part of the restructuring, NBC plans to collapse its two separate programming groups -- one at the network and the other at the TV production studio -- into one team managed by Bromstad. Bromstad, a former NBC studio chief, is a close ally of NBC Universal Chief Executive Jeff Zucker.

The move is intended to cut costs and eliminate the seemingly endless turf battles between programming executives at the network and the studio.

The situation came to a head Friday when Pope, president of the television studio, confronted her bosses, NBC Entertainment co-Chairmen Marc Graboff and Silverman, after an industry breakfast to honor women executives in entertainment. Pope sensed something was wrong when no one sought her input into a companywide restructuring that began this week.

Pope was told that her instincts were correct that she was being moved out and that NBC “would no longer be a place where she would want to work,” according to a person who was present at the meeting with Graboff and Silverman.

The studio chief, who helped shepherd such shows as “Heroes” and “30 Rock,” had clashed with Zucker on several occasions, including earlier this year when he split Pope’s Universal Media Studios into two parts, handing half of her responsibilities to another programming executive. Pope’s last day was Friday.

Silverman had brought his assistant, Weinberg, with him in June 2007 when he left his boutique TV production firm for NBC. But Weinberg’s tenure as the No. 2 programmer was fraught with controversy, including lobbying for shows developed by her live-in boyfriend. Weinberg, who quickly alienated her staff, had never worked at a network and was suddenly charged with reading scripts, recommending what shows should be selected and meeting with advertisers.

Weinberg did not return a call to her office. She is expected to remain at NBC during a “transition” period before becoming a producer. NBC is also hiring Paul Telegdy, a BBC America executive who helped develop ABC’s hit program “Dancing with the Stars.” Telegdy will be in charge of alternative programming, taking over the duties of Plestis, who will remain at the company. Telegdy begins Jan. 5.

The shake-up was first reported by the website Deadline Hollywood Daily.

Scardino, the TV analyst, had started in the industry 45 years ago as a mail boy for NBC. He said the network has been losing ground for years, pointing to Zucker’s tenure as programming chief in Burbank and the 2004 prime-time schedule that featured such misses as “LAX” and “Joey.”

“You look at the shows they have been putting on the air and they are so generic. It’s sad,” Scardino said. “Ultimately people have to be judged by their results. Zucker took that network from first to fourth place; that’s a fact that you can’t escape.”

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meg.james@latimes.com