I wouldn't know these "anchors" from a fried herring, but it's obvious it gets nasty on these cable news networks.
TOP AGENCY OUT-FOXES ITSELF
New York Post - PAGE SIX
February 17, 2007 -- THE William Morris Agency tried to play hardball with the Fox News Channel, but it struck out big time - with its client, news cutie Kiran Chetry, getting cut from the network.
TVNewser reports William Morris super-agent John Ferriter - who'd recently started representing Chetry, co-host of "Fox & Friends" weekend shows - told the network to fire Gretchen Carlson, co-anchor of the higher-rated weekday "Fox & Friends," so Chetry could take her place.
But the backstabbing request backfired on Thursday, when Fox executives fired off an angry letter to Ferriter saying they were terminating their contract with Chetry for the treachery.
Sources tell the Web site the dark-haired, Nepalese beauty had been pulling down $300,000-plus a year, and Fox offered to bump her salary to $400,000 in a new contract that could have started March 6. But Ferriter countered with a salary demand of more than $700,000, plus his insistence that Chetry take over the morning job from Carlson, a blond former Miss America.
In a letter dated Thursday, Fox legal and business affairs v.p. Dianne Brandi told Ferriter he had "treated Fox News with such arrogant disregard that we do not desire to do any further business with you . . .
"You and your client's unprofessional demand that we include a clause in her agreement which would have been detrimental to other Fox talent, is simply not the way we do business. We had hoped that Ms. Chetry would have a bright future with the Fox News Channel, however this negotiation has now become more trouble than it is worth."
Another Web site, FTVLive.com, cattily commented: "Looks like Ferriter tried to play hardball with [Fox News Chairman] Roger Ailes . . . And to think that some people say TV agents are bad. We know of one that certainly is." A Fox spokeswoman confirmed the story to Page Six. Ferriter did not return a call for comment.
Meanwhile, fast-sinking, second-place CNN picked up top-rated Fox's crumbs yesterday, signing Chetry as a substitute anchor and correspondent. One Fox insider scoffed: "Let's see what happens. Remember, the last one they took from us was Paula Zahn, and look where she went." |
