Latest / The Front / Huge pay cuts looming for media superstars

Transcript

Huge pay cuts looming for media superstars · The Front

0:03
Speaker 1: From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.
0:06
Speaker 1: It's Monday, June twenty two to twenty twenty six. Auction
0:12
Speaker 1: clearance rates are at pandemic level lows, prompting fresh calls
0:16
Speaker 1: for the government to rethink its tax overhaul yet again.
0:20
Speaker 1: Just forty seven percent of homes at auction are selling
0:24
Speaker 1: in the Capital Cities and in Brisbane it's down to
0:27
Speaker 1: thirty three percent.
0:30
Speaker 2: Monday is Media.
0:32
Speaker 1: Day at The Australian and that means all the biggest
0:34
Speaker 1: yarns in entertainment, showbiz and journalism are live right now
0:38
Speaker 1: at the Australian dot com dot au. This week there's
0:42
Speaker 1: a fresh drama about the chair of the Walkley Judging Board,
0:45
Speaker 1: and in Steve Jackson's media diary, a pretty confronting moment
0:49
Speaker 1: for some household names who are about to take a
0:52
Speaker 1: big pay cut. The big money days are gone in media,
0:55
Speaker 1: but someone still has to tell the big money stars.
1:00
Speaker 1: Our TV newsrooms is in danger of disappearing all together,
1:04
Speaker 1: with huge implications for the way Australians consume news. Steve
1:08
Speaker 1: Jackson is here in just a moment. Steve Jackson is
1:16
Speaker 1: the Australian's Media Diary columnist and JACKO. It's rare to
1:20
Speaker 1: feel grateful that you don't earn more than a million dollars,
1:22
Speaker 1: But I feel like the days of big money in
1:24
Speaker 1: media might be over.
1:25
Speaker 2: You're breaking a yarn about this today. What's happening?
1:27
Speaker 3: Well, very interesting you ask, as you say, very rare
1:30
Speaker 3: that you feel happy not to have a million dollars,
1:32
Speaker 3: But then you also don't have a target on your back.
1:34
Speaker 3: What we're about to see is the biggest names in
1:36
Speaker 3: radio in the firing line. The more you're on, the
1:39
Speaker 3: more you're going to feel it. And Claire, I'm going
1:40
Speaker 3: to be honest with you, it's going to be painful.
1:43
Speaker 3: What we're seeing is, and we've talked about this before,
1:46
Speaker 3: Tapped Media has these new billionaire pub barons. I've taken
1:49
Speaker 3: over and they've gone out and told everyone not it
1:52
Speaker 3: going to be any changes. We're happy with everyone. There's
1:54
Speaker 3: photos of them cheering in the pub and hey, which
1:57
Speaker 3: were their pubs?
1:58
Speaker 2: Hey come down vertical integration, Yeah.
2:01
Speaker 3: Yeah, and there's great and everyone's going to be the
2:04
Speaker 3: land of milk and honey and a couple of skiwies
2:06
Speaker 3: and just even a month on all that's changed already
2:09
Speaker 3: we're hearing behind the scenes there are cuts. They've cut
2:12
Speaker 3: a weekend show in Sydney. And now what I'm hearing
2:15
Speaker 3: is as talent is being resigned and we're talking their
2:17
Speaker 3: top tier talent, Russell Helcroft, he's just resigned his contract now.
2:22
Speaker 3: As we've discussed previously on the show, those contracts have
2:25
Speaker 3: been funded in part by nine Radio and topped up
2:29
Speaker 3: by nine to Television arm because it's all the one company.
2:32
Speaker 3: It will take some money from TV now that they're
2:35
Speaker 3: looking at resigning people. They go, hey, Russell, great, we
2:38
Speaker 3: love to have you back. Here's the part that was
2:40
Speaker 3: paid by nine Radio now tapped and he said, well,
2:42
Speaker 3: where's the TV part. We're not part of nine TV anymore,
2:45
Speaker 3: so you'll take assuming the whole contract. No, no, we're
2:49
Speaker 3: just going to pay the radio part.
2:51
Speaker 2: Fair enough.
2:51
Speaker 3: So well, yeah, fair enough unless you're one of the
2:55
Speaker 3: people with you know, the million dollar paycheck and as
2:57
Speaker 3: I say, mo money, more problems.
3:00
Speaker 1: People got mortgages to pay.
3:02
Speaker 2: They got mortgages.
3:04
Speaker 3: So you know, the more you earn, the more you
3:06
Speaker 3: somehow fine that you need to survive.
3:09
Speaker 1: And as the golden handcuffs you get yourself into a
3:12
Speaker 1: very nice house in a very expensive sub off, your
3:14
Speaker 1: kids are in a very expensive school. Maybe your wife
3:16
Speaker 1: has stopped working. Well, you know, I'm sorry, guys. We
3:19
Speaker 1: welcome back to the real world.
3:20
Speaker 3: Look look I do cry for them with such problems,
3:24
Speaker 3: you know, but we're going to see this happening with
3:27
Speaker 3: more and see. Russell's a great case and point. He's
3:29
Speaker 3: just resigned his contract. He's not a nobody. He is
3:32
Speaker 3: part of the top rating breakfast team at three a
3:35
Speaker 3: w probably it's best performing show.
3:39
Speaker 2: Minutes before six on a Monday morning. Good morning to
3:41
Speaker 2: you as here we go. I went down to the
3:43
Speaker 2: Bush on the weekend, which.
3:45
Speaker 3: It gets you know, one in five listeners in Melbourne.
3:48
Speaker 3: It is a powerhouse, probably their most profitable show. And
3:52
Speaker 3: even he can't keep his paycheck. So this is in
3:54
Speaker 3: real terms, he's taken a massive paker.
3:56
Speaker 1: We know.
3:57
Speaker 3: Ben Fordham's contract is up for Red Neal.
4:00
Speaker 2: Happy Friday, June nineteenth. Thank you very much for tuning in.
4:03
Speaker 3: Coming up, he's going to get the same thing. He's
4:05
Speaker 3: going to cop what I'm told. He's a half million
4:08
Speaker 3: dollar pay cut and that's you know again, he's got
4:11
Speaker 3: his expenses or whatever. That is hard to swallow. It's
4:14
Speaker 3: a bit of pill to swallow. The problem is you
4:16
Speaker 3: look around and go, where's the competing offers, where's the
4:20
Speaker 3: and so it really is a market value system now
4:24
Speaker 3: and this is what the lawndies very much from the school, right. Well,
4:28
Speaker 3: if you want this X amount of money, show us
4:30
Speaker 3: where the rival offer is, you go get usap rather
4:32
Speaker 3: offer in writing please, then we can talk. But if
4:35
Speaker 3: it's just you know, I'd really like that extra half
4:38
Speaker 3: a million, because it's very nice to have an extra
4:40
Speaker 3: half a million, come down the pub and cry into
4:43
Speaker 3: a beer over it.
4:43
Speaker 1: Okay, Well, your bonus for a continuing to appear on
4:46
Speaker 1: the front is I'll buy you a cappuccino once a
4:47
Speaker 1: week and that's it.
4:48
Speaker 3: Ohez. Yeah, can we stretch it.
4:56
Speaker 1: One of the most stunningly talented I think women in
4:59
Speaker 1: Australian Sonya Krueger. She's sixty years old, which is hard
5:03
Speaker 1: to believe, and she started out as Tina Sparkle, the
5:06
Speaker 1: character in the beloved Basloman movie Streetly Ballroom.
5:10
Speaker 3: Oh who would have thought today Alice Scott dancing with
5:14
Speaker 3: someone like Tina Sparkle. Yes, the very Princess of the
5:18
Speaker 3: Dance Woman.
5:20
Speaker 2: What's happening to Sonya Krueger now.
5:22
Speaker 3: Jacko, Well, Sonia's going global. So what I found out
5:26
Speaker 3: is she's recently cut a show reel of everything she's
5:30
Speaker 3: done in the industry so that she can entice well
5:33
Speaker 3: her agents can entice global offers for us. So she's
5:37
Speaker 3: had years of hosting pretty much everything that has been
5:40
Speaker 3: on seven, whether it be from Dancing with the Stars,
5:44
Speaker 3: the Voice that Mini put Putt game show Holy Molly
5:47
Speaker 3: that somehow made its way onto television. After years of that,
5:50
Speaker 3: she's now branching out and saying, hey, I've done Australia,
5:54
Speaker 3: not much else I can do here. I'm going to
5:56
Speaker 3: go international. So I hear she's cut a show reel,
5:59
Speaker 3: a real shows how good she is and with a
6:02
Speaker 3: view of, you know, maybe looking at gigs in UK
6:05
Speaker 3: emulating the success of Kylie and Danny Minogue there. Obviously,
6:09
Speaker 3: Danny has been a long time host on game shows
6:12
Speaker 3: over there, similar to The Voice or potentially the US.
6:16
Speaker 3: So while some people might think that maybe she's in
6:19
Speaker 3: the latter stages of her career, age is just a number, Claire,
6:23
Speaker 3: And as you say, she doesn't look like she's aged
6:26
Speaker 3: today and we might see her moving further afield. Of course,
6:30
Speaker 3: it comes as there's belt tightening at seven. Her latest
6:34
Speaker 3: incarnation of the Voice at seven doesn't go to wear
6:36
Speaker 3: until later this year after the Commonwealth Games. I hear
6:39
Speaker 3: it's very good, as of revealed previously special sort of
6:42
Speaker 3: cameo role by Tones and Eye, and then that's supposed
6:45
Speaker 3: to be absolutely amazing, so it is going to be
6:48
Speaker 3: a great season of that show. I hear hasn't been
6:51
Speaker 3: renewed yet for next year, and I hear that they're
6:54
Speaker 3: going to wait to see how the financial year budgets go,
6:57
Speaker 3: so that might be shelved. We know that Dancing with
7:00
Speaker 3: the Stars has already been put on ice rested. The
7:03
Speaker 3: thing about when you rest shows, they rarely wake up again.
7:07
Speaker 3: And holy moly, obviously that one's already been hit for
7:10
Speaker 3: you know four and sailed over the fairways, so we
7:13
Speaker 3: won't see that one again. So it comes as there's
7:16
Speaker 3: less for her to do it at seven. She's famously
7:19
Speaker 3: reputed to be on a very lucrative seven figure contract
7:23
Speaker 3: somewhere in the early millions, so whether there will be
7:26
Speaker 3: anything for her to do at seven that will warrant
7:29
Speaker 3: her contract which is about just over three years in,
7:32
Speaker 3: so I imagine it's still got a year to run
7:36
Speaker 3: on it. Whether there's going to be enough for her
7:37
Speaker 3: to do is going to be the question mark.
7:39
Speaker 1: We've talked before on the front about how the networks
7:42
Speaker 1: kind of pay stars these huge salaries as a way
7:45
Speaker 1: of stopping the competition from coming and getting them. But
7:48
Speaker 1: in these straightened economic times and everyone's struggling with advertising revenue,
7:53
Speaker 1: is there any risk that a nine or ten is
7:55
Speaker 1: going to come and gets on your Kruger? You know,
7:57
Speaker 1: how can they justify paying her a million dollars plus?
8:00
Speaker 3: It's interesting you say that because Sonya is one of
8:02
Speaker 3: those people who is so well like that she has
8:05
Speaker 3: played the ping pong between the networks, so she is
8:07
Speaker 3: someone who is in demand. Whether or not that still
8:10
Speaker 3: exists now, I wouldn't have thought so. At nine. We
8:14
Speaker 3: know from you know, hopefully reading the Diary this year, Claire,
8:17
Speaker 3: that they're still struggling to find out what can we
8:20
Speaker 3: do with Sam Armitage, what can we do with Tracy Grimshaw?
8:23
Speaker 3: You know, what can we do with all the people
8:25
Speaker 3: we've currently got on the books to justify their salary?
8:28
Speaker 3: So yeah, that era of stealing her for a special
8:32
Speaker 3: projects that is probably gone and we're seeing fewer and fewer,
8:36
Speaker 3: and I think into the future will continue to see
8:39
Speaker 3: fewer of these big budget reality shows as all the
8:42
Speaker 3: networks tighten their belts or as all the networks try
8:45
Speaker 3: to cut costs. The other question Market seven is going
8:47
Speaker 3: to be doctor Chris Brown, who again is in that
8:50
Speaker 3: remit of oh, we've paid this guy a lot of money,
8:52
Speaker 3: what are we getting to do now? Our lo and
8:54
Speaker 3: behold he's popping up occasionally on the Morning show because
8:57
Speaker 3: that's them trying to justify we're paying this cash. What
9:01
Speaker 3: can we get them to do? And unfortunately there's just
9:03
Speaker 3: fewer opportunities. Now.
9:04
Speaker 2: It's the end of the star, isn't it.
9:06
Speaker 1: I mean, once upon a time there were probably ten
9:08
Speaker 1: stars on Australian television who were the show.
9:11
Speaker 2: Ray Martin was a current Affair.
9:14
Speaker 3: From Government House in Brisbane, A very special edition of
9:17
Speaker 3: a Current Affair relaxed and candidates you've never seen before,
9:21
Speaker 3: A conversation with Prince Charles.
9:23
Speaker 1: George Nigus was the face of Channel ten Goday, Welcome
9:27
Speaker 1: to the very first six PM. Well, I've seen the
9:30
Speaker 1: billboards and whatever else there certainly be. But the real
9:33
Speaker 1: point is I'm thrilled to be part of what is
9:35
Speaker 1: it those kinds of formats. That's the Carl Sandalans Show,
9:38
Speaker 1: That's the Carl Stefanovic Show. It's like, I think, if
9:41
Speaker 1: you want to be that kind of person, you're now
9:43
Speaker 1: doing a podcast. You know, you're not necessarily anchoring a
9:46
Speaker 1: primetime show. The thing about primetime news is that it's very,
9:50
Speaker 1: very expensive. And that's what Channel ten is discovering right now,
9:53
Speaker 1: isn't it.
9:53
Speaker 3: Ah Yes, super expensive. And look, they've been making sly
9:56
Speaker 3: cuts basically since the start of COVID. There their news
10:00
Speaker 3: and current affair budget ten years ago one hundred and
10:03
Speaker 3: ten million nationally. Today I'm here and it's already down
10:06
Speaker 3: to thirty five to forty million, and hopefully they're thinking
10:09
Speaker 3: we can get it down even further. How do you
10:11
Speaker 3: do that? One way of making news and current affair
10:14
Speaker 3: a chief but get rid of all the journals, right
10:16
Speaker 3: and so, very very worryingly, this is something that they're
10:20
Speaker 3: actively looking at at the moment, which is going to
10:22
Speaker 3: have massive rabmnifications for our entire industry. But they're talking
10:26
Speaker 3: as they have been. These have been intimate conversations for
10:29
Speaker 3: five six years. They're talking to the other commercial networks
10:33
Speaker 3: and some other players about, hey, can we get you
10:35
Speaker 3: to basically give us our news for us and just
10:38
Speaker 3: outsource that entirely.
10:40
Speaker 1: That would be the first disappearance of a major commercial
10:43
Speaker 1: news broadcast news outlet. I mean, for Channel ten to
10:46
Speaker 1: stop doing news the place where George Nigas you know,
10:49
Speaker 1: our own Paul Kelly, various other kind of luminaries of television.
10:53
Speaker 3: And Carl Stefanobe have made their home.
10:55
Speaker 2: I think it would be really really sad.
10:57
Speaker 3: News is expensive, though, yeah it is, And it's one
11:02
Speaker 3: of these things where when we stall the demise of
11:06
Speaker 3: regional newsrooms and everyone like to talk about where they
11:10
Speaker 3: started out. And for many years ten has also been
11:15
Speaker 3: as much as they play as hard as they can
11:17
Speaker 3: in the news field, they've also been a great training
11:20
Speaker 3: ground for journals that have then gone on to bigger things.
11:24
Speaker 3: Quite honestly, if nine sees someone on ten, they snap
11:27
Speaker 3: them up. So there's great tradition of them people who've
11:30
Speaker 3: carved out their careers there, but also people who've worked
11:33
Speaker 3: there and then gone on to be part of the
11:36
Speaker 3: star factory that nine's had.
11:38
Speaker 1: Ten seems to have set itself up as the bridesmaid, though, Like,
11:40
Speaker 1: why is there bulletin still on at five pm? I
11:43
Speaker 1: mean nine and seven have made their six pm bulletins
11:46
Speaker 1: the battleground. ABC's persisted with seven pm, Ten's persisted with
11:50
Speaker 1: five pm. I mean, is it just that it's too
11:52
Speaker 1: hard to break into six pm?
11:53
Speaker 2: Now?
11:54
Speaker 3: Well, it is extremely hard, and I have tried that
11:56
Speaker 3: with ten News Plus, which has been diabolically bad for
11:59
Speaker 3: a number of ree since, one of which you've been
12:01
Speaker 3: very unkind to, one of which it's not their fault, right.
12:05
Speaker 3: One of the problems they've had on ten News Plus
12:07
Speaker 3: is that it was budgeted for half an hour, but
12:10
Speaker 3: from the outset they stretched it out to an hour.
12:13
Speaker 3: So it was never budgeted to be an hour long show.
12:16
Speaker 3: And they were trying to fill an hour long show
12:19
Speaker 3: with budget for half an hour. What chance did they have?
12:22
Speaker 3: So we've seen that disaster. Initially, Ten had a great model.
12:26
Speaker 3: They'd go to all the advertisers, Hey, we're not playing
12:29
Speaker 3: in that space because we're not trying to hit the
12:31
Speaker 3: over forties, et cetera. We want the young people. We're
12:34
Speaker 3: getting in at five they've come home. You know you
12:37
Speaker 3: can have it with all the families that have dinner
12:39
Speaker 3: at about five you and watch the news, and then
12:41
Speaker 3: we're into the Simpsons and through to you know, initially
12:45
Speaker 3: Big Brother when it first started, and they had all
12:46
Speaker 3: these youth orientated shows, and then the programs they were
12:50
Speaker 3: getting from the US, and then they had you know,
12:52
Speaker 3: Master Chef and that was great, and they had a
12:54
Speaker 3: market that young market does not watch free to air
12:57
Speaker 3: television anymore.
12:58
Speaker 1: They had the project, which you've memorably described in almost
13:02
Speaker 1: every column as a work nightly gibifest one of my
13:04
Speaker 1: favorite phrases.
13:05
Speaker 3: I've got that as a hot key.
13:06
Speaker 1: Did the project kind of mask the decline of news
13:09
Speaker 1: at ten because they were investing in this kind of
13:12
Speaker 1: flagship and trying to keep making that work.
13:14
Speaker 3: It's quite interesting because what the project did really well
13:18
Speaker 3: was loved or hate it. The fact is a lot
13:21
Speaker 3: of us didn't even ever watch it, but we had
13:23
Speaker 3: feelings about it and felt we were reading about it
13:25
Speaker 3: every day and what has Wali Dahali said or what
13:28
Speaker 3: has Sarah Harris said it? So it felt even if
13:31
Speaker 3: you weren't watching it, you were aware of it, and
13:33
Speaker 3: you knew about it, and you knew who the hosts were,
13:35
Speaker 3: and if you're working in sales, you can sell that.
13:37
Speaker 3: You go, hey, everyone's talking about this, you know this
13:39
Speaker 3: show where you go out now and the sales team
13:42
Speaker 3: are trying to go, hey, you know this show with
13:44
Speaker 3: Denim Hitchcock and Amelia Brace that no one's talking about
13:47
Speaker 3: and no one watches. How are you going to sell that?
13:49
Speaker 3: And you go, oh, what is it?
13:50
Speaker 1: Oh?
13:50
Speaker 3: It's like the project, but not very good. The problem
13:53
Speaker 3: with the project was it was good as done by
13:55
Speaker 3: Roth mcmanister's production company. The problem was it was too expensive.
13:58
Speaker 3: But again that showed ten already outsourcing. They've brought ten
14:03
Speaker 3: years plus back in house, presumably because they couldn't get
14:06
Speaker 3: anyone to do it for the price they wanted it
14:08
Speaker 3: to be done for. But now they're going to let's
14:10
Speaker 3: get rid of all of that. Will pay a production
14:12
Speaker 3: company or will pay another channel. Basically, they'll go out
14:16
Speaker 3: a reporter, you know, here, I am live on the scene.
14:19
Speaker 3: Behind me, blah blah blah, there's you know, it's going
14:21
Speaker 3: to flood in six weeks or whatever. They're going to
14:23
Speaker 3: change the baffle.
14:24
Speaker 2: Is that what it's called the flag?
14:26
Speaker 3: The flag they'll just change put a ten one on,
14:28
Speaker 3: maybe do a different eyeline and yeah, here behind me
14:30
Speaker 3: and just do it again. And because ten dozen national
14:34
Speaker 3: news bulletin, what they're going to do is they'll take
14:36
Speaker 3: the non exclusive stories from around the country I imagine.
14:41
Speaker 3: So it's just going to be like, hear the stories.
14:43
Speaker 3: No one's really excited about filling out it now.
14:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, aggregated news. Basically, it's the.
14:48
Speaker 3: Death of the channel clear And then what's your sales
14:50
Speaker 3: pitch on that? He's he's just some stuff.
14:56
Speaker 2: Thanks Jacket, Thanks Claire.
14:57
Speaker 3: Thanks having met.
15:03
Speaker 1: Steve Jackson edits The Australian's media diary. You can read
15:06
Speaker 1: it right now at the Australian dot com dot au
15:10
Speaker 1: slash Media