Alexandra Waring (45 page)

***CONFIDENTIAL***

June 10, 1988

TO: Langley W. Peterson, Derek Deitz
FROM: Cassy Cochran
RE: Alexandra Waring’s Engagement to Gordon Strenn

This is to confirm that Alexandra and Gordon will announce their engagement at the boat party on Saturday, June 25.

This is also to confirm that you, Derek, may release this information to the columnists of your choice on Wednesday, June 22.

cc: Jackson Darenbrook,
Gordon Strenn,
Alexandra Waring

*

6/10/88

MEMO TO: Cassy Cochran
FROM: Deeter Page
RE: DBS AFFILIATES

Cass,

Thanks for the PR package, We’re sending them out immediately.

As I said on the phone, the affiliates couldn’t be more pleased with the performance of both shows. And from what I’ve gotten back thus far, they are uniformly crazy over the idea of Alexandra’s tour this summer.

*

June 10

Please, Deeter! Stop calling “DBS News America Tonight” a show!

Cassy

*

June 10, 1988

For: Langley W. Peterson
From: Cassy Cochran
Re: DBS Across America Tour

Langley,

This is to confirm our intention to kick off the DBS Across America tour on July 4. Our tenative schedule has Alexandra anchoring the news from 40 different affiliate newsrooms in 60 days, starting in Portland, Maine, and ending in Honolulu. Will Rafferty and his team will travel with her. Dash Tomlinson may go too, we haven’t decided.

It
is
a killer schedule, but Alexandra is determined (and able) to do it. Kyle and Dr. Kessler concur. Deeter says initial feedback is good from the affiliates, and Rookie says the sponsors are lining up. (It looks like United Airlines and Ford might pick up travel.)

More later—but I would consider this a done deed. We have our bases covered, everyone is in agreement, and the publicity, I think, can only help our case at the July board meeting.

Let me know if there’s a problem.

*

June 14, 1988

For: Alexandra Waring
From: Celia B. Smith, Public Relations

Miss Waring,

Enclosed herewith is the copy we received from your mother. Please check it over and return to me. You will of course see the final announcement before it is released. Thank you.

The engagement of Alexandra Bonner Waring and Gordon Cannondale Strenn, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Bradden Strenn of Locust Valley, L.I., has been announced by Mr. and Mrs. Paul Allen Waring of Haven Wells, Kansas.

Miss Waring graduated cum laude from Stanford University and is Anchor and Managing Editor of “DBS News America Tonight,” the nightly newscast of the DBS Television Network. Her father is a practicing attorney and served nine terms as a United States congressman. Her mother is general manager of Waring Farm and chairperson for the Great Plains Foundation for the Arts.

The future bride is the granddaughter of the late Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Alexander Waring of Haven Wells, the fifth generation of farmers on the Waring homestead, and of Mrs. Hayston Lee Bonner of Lawrence, Kansas, and the late Dr. Bonner. She is also the great-great-granddaughter of Peter S. Bonner, founder of the First Bank of Kansas-Missouri.

Mr. Strenn, who graduated from the Hill School and the UCLA Film School, is a television producer whose most recent miniseries,
This Side of Paradise
, an adaptation of the F. Scott Fitzgerald novel, won Mr. Strenn an Emmy Award. He is currently Executive Producer of DBS International Films. His father, who is retired, was the president of Cannondale Clothing.

The future bridegroom is the grandson of Mr. and Mrs. Drew Strenn of Boca Raton, Florida. He is also the grandson of the late Mr. and Mrs. Percival Scott Cannondale III of New York City.

An April wedding is planned.

*

15 June 1988

MEMORANDUM TO:
All Board Members of Darenbrook Communications
FROM: Jackson Andrew Darenbrook, Chairman
REGARDING: DBS Television Network

Dear Gang,

Enclosed please find the excellent report regarding the ratings for the first two weeks of DBS programming. It is an excerpt from a report to Langley, written by the president of DBS News and Information, Catherine Cochran.

As you know, Langley and I will be making a complete report on the DBS Television Network at our July board meeting. Until then, may I say that it is turning out to be a most exciting and profitable and prestigious venture for Darenbrook Communications.

Jack

*

6/14/88

—Memo to Peterson from Cochran—DBS (cont’d) —6—

RATINGS

To fully appreciate the ratings performance of the DBS programming in the past two weeks, it is helpful to view DBS in comparison to the major commercial broadcasting networks, ABC, CBS and NBC, henceforth referred to as The Big Three:

**The Big Three each has approximately 207 affiliates to our 71, a ratio of roughly 3: 1.

**CBS and NBC have been household names as broadcasting networks for 50 years; ABC for over 25; whereas we are virtually unknown, offering largely unknown programming, part time, over independent stations often considered to be the “less-than” station against the Big Three affiliates in town.

**In the A. C. Nielsen ratings system, each point represents 880,000 viewers. The Big Three run their half-hour newscasts in the evening hours and, in season (end of September—May), generally tie at around a 9.5 rating. In the summer, with lower viewership, this number drops by at least a third.

**For prime-time programming, in season, a Big Three program needs at least a 12 rating to survive, an 18 to be strong, and in the 20s to be a hit. In the summer quarter, these numbers drop by a third as well.

DBS NEWS AMERICA TONIGHT
WITH ALEXANDRA WARING

If we carried the comparison through, then, in Big Three terms, a summer newscast should have a rating of about 6.3. When we apply the ratio of a 207—affiliate network to our 71 affiliate network of 3:1, the rating would be 2.1 f
or an established network anchor on an established network newscast on an established network.

***Our anticipated rating on “DBS News America Tonight with Alexandra Waring” was 1.5 and has averaged, for the past two weeks, 2.2. In other words, “NAT” is already “pulling” like Big Three news (2.2 X 3), and in prime time—where The Big Three wouldn’t dare run their newscasts.

THE JESSICA WRIGHT SHOW

For
regular
prime-time programming, in the
regular
season (end of September—May), a new program would have to achieve a rating of at least 12 to survive. When we apply the ratio of The Big Three to DBS, 3:1, the necessary rating would be 4.

—Our anticipated rating on “The Jessica Wright Show” was 2.5 and has averaged, for the past two weeks, 5.3. In other words, if we apply the ratio in reverse, Jessica would be pulling a 15.9 on The Big Three, which means that, on DBS or anywhere, “The Jessica Wright Show” has made an extremely healthy start. And if we take into consideration the third lower viewership in the summer, then her reverse-ratio rating in Big Three terms would be 21:1—
an unqualified hit
.

NOTES:

—Of course, we expect our ratings to rise as the number of our affiliates increase.

—Of course, we expect our ratings to rise as word gets around.

—Of course, we’re all deliriously happy here because, unlike The Big Three, we here at DBS do not carry the kind of overhead they do, and so we are well on our way to becoming an extraordinarily profitable venture.

*