Hope for The Fugitive? Paramount is willing to listen (1 Viewer)

[JLKINSER]

I posted my review (the same one I used on this forum in The Fugitive Season Two thread) on Amazon with the same link to the contact person, Ken Ross, at Paramount/CBS. I was unable to reach him so I wrote a letter. A fellow commented on my review and he did get a hold of an upper level person at Paramount/CBS and spoke to him about the Season Two Volume Two set. I will copy his comment on my review regarding he conversation:

Mark Gaston says:
Thank you, John. I just talked with the Vice President of CBS Home Entertainment. Apparently, CBS Paramount is not REALLY sure how immense the Fuge fanbase is. By passionate Fugitive fans tactfully expressing their disappointment of the show's handling to upper management, then change is likely to occur. I told the gentleman that the people born in the 70's and 80's are keeping the interest for the show fueled. CBS has not heard from enough people regarding their displeasure of Season 2, Volume 2. Therefore, to them, no news is positive news. I let the person know that they are going to lose money with the way the show is being treated. I was told that if people seek a refund then CBS Paramount will do what they can to try and satisfy the customer. CBS Paramount doesn't think many people are lining up to watch The Fugitive. For obvious reasons, I had to refute the statement...

To me, this is VERY positive news but ONLY if we fans follow through as well! I am posting this here in hopes that all of the Fugitive fans who read this will call Paramount and send letters in hopes that they will go back and this time REALLY fix season two of The Fugitive! It is up to us! It sounds like Paramount is willing to listen and give us what we want if we show that The Fugitive has a following!

Please contact them and let them know we want The Fugitive released with all of the music intact.

Here is the info to contact them:

CBS Home Entertainment
ATTN: Ken Ross, Exec. VP & General Manager
1700 Broadway, 33rd Floor
New York, NY 10019

Leave a Voice Message:

(212) 975-3241 When transferred to an operator, ask for Ken Ross.

 

[Mark Talmadge]

You mean they're only willing to listen regarding the Fugitive? What about the other shows such as "The Sentinel?" What about the other shows that they have not yet released?

 

[Jeff Willis]

John,

Many thanks for your outstanding post. I wasn't one of the early letter writers or callers back when the music issue first became known but I am going to try with your contact info. This show's too good, imo, to pass up the attempt to get involved in communicating to CBS/P regarding the music subs in the S2 sets.

One possibility that CBS/P didn't receive many complaints about the "restored" S2V1 or S2V2 sets is that there are some that have been happy with the Rugolo portion (and not most of the library cues) of the backscore having been restored in the S2 sets. That's their right of course, since we know that there seems to be 2 distinct "camps" in these threads regarding the musuc issue. I happen to be in the other camp that requires the entire backscore (or the vast majority like the S1 sets) to be present in these CBS/P sets before I consider them restored. The restored Rugolo score with certain cues removed doesn't restore the mood of the show, imo.

 

[Jack P]

Jeff, while I'm not going to say that the current versions of S2 are perfect, I think it's a trifle misleading to say that "most of the library cues" have not been restored. The ratio is well over 60-70% for library cues, and it's only the fact that the Heyes stuff does at times tend to stick out like a sore thumb that it can perhaps fool us into thinking the percentage of restored music is lower than it actually is. "Moonchild" I felt was the worst example of where Heyes cues was present but when I watched the episode a second time just to time and gauge the amount of replacement music that was present I had to concede that more of the original cues were still in place, and they were library cues.

 

[Mary_P]

Thanks, John, for the contact info at CBS/Paramount.

I haven't gotten into the fray on this one because I never watched "The Fugitive" much back in the day, but this music issue has impacted my decisions about buying the series. I am interested in catching up on some classics that I missed during their original run, but the whole flap over score replacement has me shying away from this one, and I have too many other DVDs stacked up waiting to be watched to waste time and money on a radically altered product.

I may just drop CBS/P a line to let them know that this alteration has meant a "no sale" to this viewer with a casual interest in the show. I think they already know they can expect flak from fans of the show, but they should know that it affects their sales to others of us out there as well.

 

[Ethan Riley]

So they're willing to listen, are they? Well I hope they listen to me when I tell them I wanna light a match under them to get the Aaron Spelling shows out faster...

 

[Jeff Willis]

Jack, you're right. When I was checking that post before clicking, I forgot to edit that part out. I think I was attempting to say that the amount of Heyes content was over my "line" for the S2 sets.

That said, Mary: If you try this show out with the S2's, you might well find that you'd be in the "doesn't affect me" camp with this show regarding the backscore changes. It's arguably the all-time best U.S. TV series in its class.

From what I see on the Bd, it's a very individualized issue where there are a lot of Fuge fans here that are happy with the re-issued S2V1 set with the restored "Rugolo" portion of the backscore. I will say that I'm viewing this show for the first time on DVD and the Heyes subs are a big issue with me. I have found that, in the episodes where there's more Heyes content, it's a "deal-breaker" for me as I switch to my alternate set for viewing those episodes.

On the other hand, I give CBS/P :star: :star: :star: :star: :star: for the S1 sets. I'm just in the camp that can't accept the music changes after the S1 releases.

 

[MichaelEl]

I have the first season, but am undecided about buying any more sets. At $60 per season, it would cost $180 to complete the series, and I'm not sure I want to spend that much when this letter writing campaign may well lead to a *definitive* DVD or Blu-Ray collection a few years down the road.

My experience as a DVD collector is that it's generally better to forego well-known titles with audio or video problems, as the studios almost always come out with better quality releases (and usually at a lower price too!). In this case, however, I'm not sure if it's a good idea to wait, given that the economy, Blu-Ray, and time are putting a damper on the demand for classic movies and TV shows.

I sure would hate to miss out on THE FUGITIVE, as it's easily my favorite non-genre series of all time, but I also don't like the idea of being forced into buying a version with only 65-70% of the musical cues intact. IMO, Paramount should stop leading people along. They should either pull Season 2 out of the market now and announce plans for a completely restored version, or else tell fans that this version is it, period.

 

[Jeff Willis]

Michael,

I'm wondering about this as well....a possibility of a completly restored series set being released down the road which would affect all of the buyers of the single-season releases.

At the present time, I'm passing on the S3 sets if they're the same as the S2 sets (music content). I was able to get the S2V2 set free as a gift so that one was a no-risk for me.

 

[Jack P]

I think we should in all fairness just see what happens with S3 because this will be the first set CBS/Paramount will have done without any 100% Heyes insertions at first (as I think we can assume was done first with S2V2 initially), and we also don't know if they have contractual langauage that will make replacement impossible as was the case with S1.

 

[Sam Favate]

I'm opposed to music substitutions, and I was among the first to send in for the corrected discs when they were offered. But I'm watching season 2 now, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't enjoying the hell out of it.

 

[TravisR]

Never say never but I think there's a zero chance of that happening. The most they'll do is a set that combines all the volumes into one box and maybe a bonus disc. Outside of Star Trek, Paramount doesn't seem to be re-releasing TV shows and, as good as The Fugitive is, it doesn't have the large fanbase (that buys everything over and over) like Star Trek does.

 

[Jeff Willis]

Travis, I think you're right But I guess I'll remember that Bond movie title ("Never Say Never Again"). I'd be very surprised if CBS/P re-issued the Fugitive in a complete original music box set. But if it happened, that's one I'd buy on release day.

 

[michael_ks]

Agreed, Jeff. Somewhere in an alternate/parallel universe vintage fans are enjoying a complete series set of "The Fugitive" in the manner of "The Definitive 'Twilight Zone'" with 100% intact soundtrack and all the extras the series so richly deserves.

 

[Harry-N]

I was contacted a few weeks ago by a writer for the Wall Street Journal (Joanne Kaufman). She got my name from the Amazon review I'd written and wanted to talk to someone knowledgeable of the situation.

Her article is posted today on the Wall Street Journal:

DVDs' Fugitive Music - WSJ.com


It's a somewhat simplistic view of the situation, and I don't totally agree with her conclusions on everyone being satisfied with CBS's solution, but at least the problem has gotten another airing out in the press.

Harry

 

[Hollywoodaholic]

It sounds like she took Ross' word for it that the music was completely restored and there were no more issues with it.

Nevertheless, it's good coverage for the topic; published in a newspaper that reaches the ears of people making these financial decisions; and Ross is now on record admitting he had to listen to fans and do something.

Nice going, Harry.

 

[Gary OS]

Unfortunately she definitely didn't have the entire story about The Fugitive issue. Or if she did, she chose to condense everything. The bottom line is that while the crux of the article is true, when it comes to The Fugitive she didn't really get the story straight. The studio was never held hostage by music rights people trying to get a piece of the proverbial pie. Ross makes it sound like CBS/P went to bat and did some hard core negotiations or something to get music cleared. And from all indications that was never the issue and not the case. With this show it was CBS/P's boneheaded decisions in the first place that made this a bad situation.

Again, let's be clear. There were only a scant few cues (Capitol Library cues) that CBS wasn't sure about. Yet they gutted the entire backscore. That was never necessary and they know it. Even the reissued dvds have way too much backscore gutted. That's obvious.

I can only hope the slight delay we are seeing with Season 3, V.1 means that CBS is once again rethinking the issue and we will see a return to Season 1 standards.

Gary "and I'm still not sure 'My Three Sons' really had music rights issues either - I think that was another example of CBS/P being overly cautious and gutting backscores when it wasn't necessary" O.

 

[Jeff Willis]

Harry, thanks for the post on the article. How does it feel to be famous?

As for the article, it's good to see that the issue got press coverage as Wayne said.

My take on the issue is still the same; I can't give CBS/P a good grade for doing the job they did and leaving some of the library que's out of the DVD releases. I give them a for responding the the fanbase and implementing the exchange progam.

I guess I'm one of those guys that wants to watch this show as it originally aired with the music intact. The que's were a big part of the show, imo.

 

[Steve...O]

Harry - congrats!

I agree with the previous posts that the article's conclusion was perhaps not entirely correct but this was still good coverage of an issue that deserves some attention (not just Fugitive per se but the broader music rights issue).

Speaking of Fuge fans - I haven't seen any Carab posts in quite awhile...hope he's ok and just taking a break from posting. He, along with Harry, Gary, DVP and the other Fuge fans, always made these discussions interesting and informative.

 

[Neil Brock]

Agree 100%. An overreaction and just a lack of logic. Not to mention hubris in not wanting to involve any outsiders who are experts on the show. For the price of a lunch they could have brought in a couple of experts on the show who could have told them exactly what they needed to know as to which music was which. But that would have meant going out of house, which apparently they wanted to avoid at all costs. So they cost themselves a huge amount of money, got a ton of bad publicity, both for their company and the industry as a whole and badly damaged their company's reputation. And for what, just to show that they wouldn't stoop so low as to involve outsiders?