TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/062590/0625220.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 3.8 KB | 91 lines

                                                                                PRESS, Page 53

Reworking the First Act



After a high-stakes launch, E.W. encounters "creative
differences"


    It is an axiom of publishing that the first months, even
years, of a new magazine's life are the most traumatic. Vanity
Fair, for example, went through millions of Conde Nast dollars
before its third editor, Tina Brown, found a formula for
success. Thus industry observers were not surprised when
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY, less than 16 weeks after its premiere
issue, overhauled a glitzy format that both readers and
advertisers found confusing. Many more eyebrows, however, were
raised last week when E.W.'s founding managing editor, Jeff
Jarvis, 35, abruptly resigned, citing "creative differences"
with top editorial management of the parent Time Warner Inc.

    Jarvis, who proposed E.W. while serving as a writer for
PEOPLE, was succeeded by that magazine's executive editor,
James W. Seymore Jr., 47. "Leaving the staff is the hardest
part," said Jarvis, who has not decided on future plans.
"ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY may have been my idea, but it's their
magazine." E.W.'s stunned staff members anxiously sought out
word of mouth about their new boss. In announcing Seymore's
appointment, Time Warner editor-in-chief Jason McManus said,
"Jim is an inventive, imaginative and skillful editor. By
talent and temperament, coupled with his background and
interest in the subject of entertainment, he is very well
suited for his new assignment."

    The magazine was the first new weekly to be produced by the
company since the notorious failure of Time Inc.'s TV-CABLE
WEEK in 1983 and the shutdown of PICTURE WEEK in 1986 after
nine months of test marketing. To promote a creative,
entrepreneurial atmosphere and contain costs, Jarvis and
publisher Michael Kling ensmith set up offices outside the Time
& Life Building. Editor-in-chief McManus  and his principal
deputies -- editorial director Richard Stolley and corporate
editor Gilbert Rogin -- paid close attention to the start-up
but did not turn to hands-on editing of the magazine until a
month ago.

    "We felt we needed to make some changes quite quickly," said
McManus. "The magazine was hard to read, not very user
friendly, and cluttered. Readers and advertisers were
complaining." Jarvis and E.W.'s design director, Michael
Grossman, willingly carried out the format revisions. But a
more subtle problem was Jarvis' choice of covers, like the one
on the very first issue (Feb. 16), which featured the offbeat
country singer K.D. Lang. Many media watchers felt that to
succeed as a mass magazine, E.W. had to appeal to a broader
audience, one perhaps more attracted by covers about Madonna
and Dick Tracy.

    Publisher Klingensmith says E.W. has already met its
circulation target of 600,000 readers and that its average of
20 advertising pages an issue is "extraordinary" for a new
magazine, especially one born in a soft economy. Two key tests
of the magazine's viability, industry observers believe, will
be renewal rates of short-term subscriptions and the response
to new mailings of subscription offers.

    Some media experts wonder whether Seymore has been
instructed to turn E.W. into a PEOPLE clone, with a stronger
celebrity orientation and reviews that lack the gleeful chomp
Jarvis favored. Not so, says Seymore: "I want the magazine to
have the snappiest and most interesting reviews anywhere. I
don't want anything bland or formulaic." But he also believes
the magazine has to be "broadened" to become "a newsmagazine
of entertainment" with a strong service component. "The staff
and I will invent ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY, or reinvent it, as we
go along," he says. "It's day one of a new magazine."


By John Elson. Reported by Leslie Whitaker/New York.