Viacom tries to give up control of KFWB

With radio stations, a format change usually closely follows an ownership change. But if the Federal Communications Commission approves a shift in who controls KFWB-AM (980), surprisingly little different is expected on the air or behind the scenes.

The station’s parent company, communications giant Viacom Inc., asked the FCC last week to place all-news KFWB in an “independent and irrevocable trust,” according to FCC spokeswoman Michelle Russo. Viacom was forced to give up one of its Los Angeles properties after the FCC approved its purchase of KCAL-TV in May.

That gave the company two television and seven radio stations in L.A., one more than FCC rules allow in a single market, and the agency gave the company six months to divest. So Viacom, instead of selling a station outright, is asking to turn over control to trustee Bill Clark, former chief executive of Shamrock Broadcasting, who has overseen a couple of stations previously as a Viacom trustee, said company spokesman Dana McClintock.

If the trust is approved, Viacom officials can have no contact with the station and instead would pay Clark to run it. “I’d be happy to have any and all input from him,” said KFWB general manager Roger Nadel. “He has a great track record.”

McClintock wouldn’t say why KFWB was chosen. It does, however, somewhat duplicate Viacom’s other all-news station, KNX-AM (1070).

By not selling KFWB, Viacom may be biding its time until early next year, when the FCC is expected to announce new rules for ownership caps. Observers suspect that the current commission -- which is seen as less inclined to regulate than to let market forces control the industry -- will relax its limits, and Viacom could once again take control of KFWB.

The FCC has already granted Viacom dispensation on its television stations, which reach about 39% of the national audience. The current limit is 35%, but in April the FCC said Viacom doesn’t have to shed TV stations until a year after the agency’s new rules are approved -- again, if the ownership caps aren’t eased.

But the KFWB trust has yet to gain FCC approval, which spokeswoman Russo said is “not a normal, rubber-stamping kind of thing. We’ll have to look at the specific terms of the trust.” She had no timetable for when the agency might even take up the issue.

Meanwhile, Nadel said he doesn’t foresee any changes on the horizon, no matter whom he’ll report to.

“The way the company operates, it’s managed locally on a day-to-day basis anyway,” he said.

He added that he’s been with the company 26 years, and feels he has the best interests of the station and listeners in mind. “I expect to be here for the duration.”

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Radio satirist Hendrie is taking his act to TV

Not just the voices in his head: In the prime-time comedy he’s creating for NBC television, radio satirist Phil Hendrie will still be arguing with lunatics and societal misfits. But, for a change, he won’t be the only one talking. On Hendrie’s program, heard on about 100 stations, including KFI-AM (640) from 7 to 10 weeknights, he parodies talk radio by performing both as host and as each of the dozens of bizarre characters he interviews, all to get a rise out of unsuspecting callers.

They rail at the out-of-bounds views of his “guests,” such as a Catholic priest rationalizing molestation, or a housewife who brags about being hip and using ecstasy with her kids. “There’s no way you can take my radio show and translate it to TV,” Hendrie said. “What I do here on the air is create characters, and there’s really not a big difference between that and creating a good TV show. I know how to write characters and I know how to write funny, and I’ll take that over to television.”

Last week, NBC announced it has paired Hendrie with writer Peter Tolan to create the series. Tolan’s screenwriting credits include “Analyze That,” “Analyze This,” “America’s Sweethearts” and “The Larry Sanders Show,” and he also co-created the ABC comedy “The Job” with Denis Leary.

NBC Senior Vice President Shelley McCrory said a strength of Hendrie’s radio show is his ability to make social observations through his outrageous characters, something she hopes to see repeated in the television program, slated for the fall 2003 season. “He’s an incredible performer,” she said. “I had been listening to the show for a while and was just mesmerized. What we wanted to do was get his brain.”

Hendrie will play a retired police officer, married to a woman with a teenager from a previous marriage, who moves to a gated community looking for safety and tranquillity. There he’ll be the calm center in a storm of bizarre characters, such as homeowners’ association presidents, whom he calls “suburban cultural dictators,” in a show he hopes will look at post-Sept. 11 America and prick “the illusion that we can continue as a freewheeling middle-class society.”

“We want freedom and we want security,” he said -- freedom to stroll around on a private golf course, and security from outsiders who might wander in. “You can’t have both of those worlds without an enormous amount of hilarious conflict.

“I’m not looking to change the world,” Hendrie said, “but there’s so much to comment on.”