Union Broadcasting System
Encyclopedia
The Union Broadcasting System (UBS) is a fictional television network
seen in the 1976 film Network
, written by Paddy Chayevsky.
At the time of the film's setting, UBS is in fourth place among the four major networks (NBC
, ABC
, CBS
, UBS) and is considered an industry joke when the network's parent company, UBS Systems, was bought by Arthur Jensen's CCA (the Communication Corporation of America). UBS' luck begins to change when network anchorman Howard Beale becomes a hit after suffering a breakdown
live on the air, or as Diana Christensen puts it, "articulating the popular rage".
UBS has at least 67 affiliates including stations in Albuquerque, New Mexico
; Sandusky, Ohio
; Louisville, Kentucky
; Baton Rouge, Louisiana
; Los Angeles, California
; as well as KGIM (Boise, Idaho
), KTNS (Kansas City, Missouri
) and WCGG in Atlanta, Georgia
. (Interestingly, the Atlanta station's call letters are very similar to Ted Turner
's WTCG - now WPCH-TV - and during one of Beale's on-air rants, the New York offices even field a call from a WCGG employee named Ted.)
UBS is not limited to its television network (it also has an Owned-and-Operated Stations Division) and controls UBS Radio Division, UBS Records Group, UBS Publishing Group, and the UBS Theater Chain.
Television network
A television network is a telecommunications network for distribution of television program content, whereby a central operation provides programming to many television stations or pay TV providers. Until the mid-1980s, television programming in most countries of the world was dominated by a small...
seen in the 1976 film Network
Network (film)
Network is a 1976 American satirical film released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer about a fictional television network, Union Broadcasting System , and its struggle with poor ratings. The film was written by Paddy Chayefsky and directed by Sidney Lumet...
, written by Paddy Chayevsky.
At the time of the film's setting, UBS is in fourth place among the four major networks (NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
, ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
, CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
, UBS) and is considered an industry joke when the network's parent company, UBS Systems, was bought by Arthur Jensen's CCA (the Communication Corporation of America). UBS' luck begins to change when network anchorman Howard Beale becomes a hit after suffering a breakdown
Mental breakdown
Mental breakdown is a non-medical term used to describe an acute, time-limited phase of a specific disorder that presents primarily with features of depression or anxiety.-Definition:...
live on the air, or as Diana Christensen puts it, "articulating the popular rage".
UBS has at least 67 affiliates including stations in Albuquerque, New Mexico
Albuquerque, New Mexico
Albuquerque is the largest city in the state of New Mexico, United States. It is the county seat of Bernalillo County and is situated in the central part of the state, straddling the Rio Grande. The city population was 545,852 as of the 2010 Census and ranks as the 32nd-largest city in the U.S. As...
; Sandusky, Ohio
Sandusky, Ohio
Sandusky is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Erie County. It is located in northern Ohio and is situated on the shores of Lake Erie, almost exactly half-way between Toledo to the west and Cleveland to the east....
; Louisville, Kentucky
Louisville, Kentucky
Louisville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Kentucky, and the county seat of Jefferson County. Since 2003, the city's borders have been coterminous with those of the county because of a city-county merger. The city's population at the 2010 census was 741,096...
; Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Baton Rouge is the capital of the U.S. state of Louisiana. It is located in East Baton Rouge Parish and is the second-largest city in the state.Baton Rouge is a major industrial, petrochemical, medical, and research center of the American South...
; Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
; as well as KGIM (Boise, Idaho
Boise, Idaho
Boise is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Idaho, as well as the county seat of Ada County. Located on the Boise River, it anchors the Boise City-Nampa metropolitan area and is the largest city between Salt Lake City, Utah and Portland, Oregon.As of the 2010 Census Bureau,...
), KTNS (Kansas City, Missouri
Kansas City, Missouri
Kansas City, Missouri is the largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri and is the anchor city of the Kansas City Metropolitan Area, the second largest metropolitan area in Missouri. It encompasses in parts of Jackson, Clay, Cass, and Platte counties...
) and WCGG in Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta is the capital and most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia. According to the 2010 census, Atlanta's population is 420,003. Atlanta is the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta metropolitan area, which is home to 5,268,860 people and is the ninth largest metropolitan area in...
. (Interestingly, the Atlanta station's call letters are very similar to Ted Turner
Ted Turner
Robert Edward "Ted" Turner III is an American media mogul and philanthropist. As a businessman, he is known as founder of the cable news network CNN, the first dedicated 24-hour cable news channel. In addition, he founded WTBS, which pioneered the superstation concept in cable television...
's WTCG - now WPCH-TV - and during one of Beale's on-air rants, the New York offices even field a call from a WCGG employee named Ted.)
UBS is not limited to its television network (it also has an Owned-and-Operated Stations Division) and controls UBS Radio Division, UBS Records Group, UBS Publishing Group, and the UBS Theater Chain.
Employees
- Howard Beale (Peter FinchPeter FinchPeter Finch was a British-born Australian actor. He is best remembered for his role as "crazed" television anchorman Howard Beale in the film Network, which earned him a posthumous Academy Award for Best Actor, his fifth Best Actor award from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and a...
): AnchormanNews presenterA news presenter is a person who presents news during a news program in the format of a television show, on the radio or the Internet.News presenters can work in a radio studio, television studio and from remote broadcasts in the field especially weather...
for The UBS Evening News with Howard Beale, age 58. Once "the Grand Old Man of News", his ratingsNielsen RatingsNielsen ratings are the audience measurement systems developed by Nielsen Media Research, in an effort to determine the audience size and composition of television programming in the United States...
have slipped in recent years, his wife has died, and he has started drinking. He has known Max Schumacher for a long time, and it is Max who informs him of his firing two weeks hence. After Beale tells the national TV audience that he plans to kill himself on the air, senior VP Frank Hackett pulls him off UBS, only to put him back on when ratings skyrocket. Beale is clearly not well, but uses the medium to stop a deal between the West World Funding Corporation and CCA. In the end, the network executives plot his assassination, making it "the first known instance of a man who was killed because he had lousy ratings." - Diana Christensen (Faye DunawayFaye DunawayFaye Dunaway is an American actress.Dunaway won an Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in Network after receiving previous nominations for the critically acclaimed films Bonnie and Clyde and Chinatown...
): Head of Programming for roughly six months. Christensen is creative, if soulless, and gains huge ratings by exploiting Beale and creating The Mao Tse-TungMao ZedongMao Zedong, also transliterated as Mao Tse-tung , and commonly referred to as Chairman Mao , was a Chinese Communist revolutionary, guerrilla warfare strategist, Marxist political philosopher, and leader of the Chinese Revolution...
Hour, a show highlighting the activities of a terroristTerrorismTerrorism is the systematic use of terror, especially as a means of coercion. In the international community, however, terrorism has no universally agreed, legally binding, criminal law definition...
group. She is good at her job and becomes almost too excited at the prospect of a hit. Even in her relationship with Schumacher, Diana focuses on work and only pauses long enough to climax during sex. Eventually, she suggests killing Beale on live TV when newsman's ratings slip again. - Max Schumacher (William HoldenWilliam HoldenWilliam Holden was an American actor. Holden won the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1954 and the Emmy Award for Best Actor in 1974...
): The President of the News Division at UBS. Max has known Howard Beale since their days at CBS in the early fifties. He often tells a comical anecdote about shooting a segment from the George Washington BridgeGeorge Washington BridgeThe George Washington Bridge is a suspension bridge spanning the Hudson River, connecting the Washington Heights neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan in New York City to Fort Lee, Bergen County, New Jersey. Interstate 95 and U.S. Route 1/9 cross the river via the bridge. U.S...
. He is told to resign by network president Edward Ruddy for allowing Howard to remain on the air announcing that "life is bullshit", although later reinstated. He is also often at odds with Frank Hackett who eventually fires him. Though he has been married to his wife Louise (Beatrice StraightBeatrice StraightBeatrice Whitney Straight was an American theatre, film, and television actress. Hers remains the shortest acting performance in a film to win an Oscar. In her winning role in the 1976 film Network, she was on screen for five minutes and forty seconds, the shortest time ever for the winner of the...
) for 25 years, he becomes romantically involved with Diana Christensen but ends it when he realizes she is incapable of love. Schumacher is 51. - Frank Hackett (Robert DuvallRobert DuvallRobert Selden Duvall is an American actor and director. He has won an Academy Award, two Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards and a BAFTA over the course of his career....
): Executive Senior Vice President, age 41. His ruthless style of management clashes with Schumacher, who has been in the industry since its inception. Hackett becomes Chairman of the Board after Edward Ruddy dies. Although initially against the idea of keeping Howard off the air, Hackett is persuaded to let Beale editorialize until his ratings go down. He, along with Diana, Nelson, Walter, and Herb plot to assassinate Beale. - Edward George Ruddy (William PrinceWilliam Prince (actor)William LeRoy Prince was an American actor who appeared in numerous soap operas and made dozens of guest appearances on primetime series as well as playing villains in movies like The Gauntlet and Spontaneous Combustion.-Biography:Prince was born in Nichols, New York, the son of Myrtle , a nurse...
): Chairman of the Board, age 67. He demands Schumacher's resignation after he permits Beale to continue a rant about how life is bullshit, but later relents when he admits he's going to need backing from as many friends as possible when he goes up against Hackett. Ruddy later dies of a heart attack. - Nelson Cheney (Wesley AddyWesley AddyWesley Addy was an American actor.He played many roles on the Broadway stage, including several Shakespearean ones, usually opposite actor Maurice Evans...
): Network President, age 52. Uneasy about allowing Beale back on the air, and even more uneasy about killing him. - Bob McDonough (Lane SmithLane SmithWalter Lane Smith III was an American actor. Some of his well known roles included portraying collaborator entrepreneur Nathan Bates in the NBC television series V, Mayor Bates in the film Red Dawn, newspaper editor Perry White in the ABC series Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman,...
): Vice President and interim head of the News Division. Mid-40s. - Harry Hunter (Jordan CharneyJordan CharneyJordan Charney is an American character actor.Many of his earliest roles were on daytime television, with appearances in numerous soaps. Jordan created...
): Executive Producer for The UBS Evening News and The Howard Beale Show. - Barbara Schlesinger (Conchata FerrellConchata FerrellConchata Galen Ferrell is an American actress. She is best known for playing Berta the housekeeper in the CBS sitcom Two and a Half Men, for which she received two Emmy Award nominations in 2005 and 2007.-Personal life:...
): Late 30s, Head of the Story Department. - Bill Herron (Darryl HickmanDarryl HickmanDarryl Gerard Hickman is an American film and television actor, former television executive, and child star of the 1930s and 1940s.-Early life:...
): Unidentified position, UBS West Coast Special Programs Department. - George Bosch (John Carpenter): Age 39, VP Program Development, East Coast.
- Tommy Pellegrino (Michael Lipton): Assistant VP, Programming. 36.
- Jack Snowden (Stanley Grover): UBS correspondent based in WashingtonWashington, D.C.Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
, who later replaces Beale as lead anchor. - Edward Fletcher: A UBS correspondent who reports a story about the price of oil from ViennaViennaVienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
. - Walter Amundsen (Jerome Dempsey): General Counsel for UBS. He is one of five involved with the plot to kill Beale.
- Arthur Zangwill (Mitchell Jason): VP, Network Standards & Practices.
- Joe Donnelly (Ed Crowley): VP, Sales.
- Herb Thackeray (Pirie MacDonald): VP, Affiliate Relations. He is also involved in the plan to kill Beale.
- Milton Steinman (Gene Gross): VP, Public Relations News Division.
- Walter Gianini (Theodore SorelTed SorelTed Sorel was an American actor whose numerous credits included Guiding Light, Law & Order and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. He also appeared in film and Broadway productions.-Biography:...
): VP, Legal Affairs News Division. - Emil Dubrovnik: VP, Owned Station News.
- Michael Sandies: General Manager, UBS News Radio.
- Richmond Kettering: VP, News Sales.
Notable shows
- The UBS Evening News: The network's national news show, anchored first by Howard Beale and later by Jack Snowden. Gained infamy after Beale announced his intention to kill himself and his famous "mad as hell" speech.
- The Network News Hour (referred to as The Howard Beale Show): The retooled news show featuring segments with "Sybil the Soothsayer", "Jim Webbing and his It's-the-EmmesYinglishYinglish words are neologisms created by speakers of Yiddish in English-speaking countries, sometimes to describe things that were uncommon in the old country...
-Truth-department", "Miss Mata HariMata HariMata Hari was the stage name of Margaretha Geertruida "M'greet" Zelle , a Dutch exotic dancer, courtesan, and accused spy who was executed by firing squad in France under charges of espionage for Germany during World War I.-Early life:Margaretha Geertruida Zelle was born in Leeuwarden, Friesland,...
and her skeletons in the closet" as well as "Vox PopuliVox populiVox populi , a Latin phrase that literally means voice of the people, is a term often used in broadcasting for interviews with members of the "general public".-Vox pop, the man on the street:...
". The show also opens with an editorial by Beale, who goes on ranting and raving until he passes out.
- The Mao Tse-Tung Hour: Hour-long drama focusing on the activities of the Ecumenical Liberation Army urban guerrillas. The show opens with authentic footage of the Ecumenicals committing a terrorist act, with the remainder of the show being the fictitious story behind the footage. (The terrorist group is obviously based on, but in the movie is specifically said not to be, the Symbionese Liberation ArmySymbionese Liberation ArmyThe Symbionese Liberation Army was an American self-styled left-wing urban militant group active between 1973 and 1975 that considered itself a revolutionary vanguard army...
.)
- The New Lawyers: One of three shows pitched to UBS by UniversalUniversal TelevisionUniversal Television is the television production arm of the NBCUniversal Television Group, and by extension, the NBC television network...
which have the possibility of going into development. "Set in a large eastern law school, presumably HarvardHarvard Law SchoolHarvard Law School is one of the professional graduate schools of Harvard University. Located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, it is the oldest continually-operating law school in the United States and is home to the largest academic law library in the world. The school is routinely ranked by the U.S...
, the running characters are a crusty but benign ex-Supreme Court Justice, presumably Oliver Wendell HolmesOliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. was an American jurist who served as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1902 to 1932...
by way of Dr. ZorbaBen CaseyBen Casey is an American medical drama series which ran on ABC from 1961 to 1966. The show was known for its opening titles, which consisted of a hand drawing the symbols "♂, ♀, *, †, ∞" on a chalkboard, as cast member Sam Jaffe intoned, "Man, woman, birth, death, infinity." Neurosurgeon Joseph...
. There is a beautiful girl graduate student and the local district attorney who is brilliant and sometimes cuts corners." (The real TV drama Storefront Lawyers was presumably the inspiration for The New Lawyers.)
- The Amazon Squad: Another candidate for development from Universal. Running characters include a crusty but benign Police Lieutenant who is always getting heat from the commissioner; a hard-nosed, hard drinking detective who thinks women belong in the kitchen; and the brilliant and beautiful young girl cop who is fighting the feminist battle on the force. (This would seem to be a cross between The Mod SquadThe Mod SquadThe Mod Squad is a television series that ran on ABC from September 24, 1968, until August 23, 1973. This series starred Michael Cole, Peggy Lipton, Clarence Williams III, and Tige Andrews...
and Charlie's AngelsCharlie's AngelsCharlie's Angels is a television series about three women who work for a private investigation agency, and is one of the first shows to showcase women in roles traditionally reserved for men...
, with a dash of Get Christie Love!Get Christie Love!Get Christie Love! is a 1974 made-for-television film starring Teresa Graves as an undercover female police detective who is determined to overthrow a drug ring. This film is based on Dorothy Uhnak's crime-thriller novel, The Ledger...
)
- Untitled Investigative Reporter Show: The third show pitched to UBS by Universal, this one involving yet another crusty but benign character. At this point, Diana cuts Barbara off.
- The Dykes: Homosexual soap operaSoap operaA soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...
following the heart-rending saga of a woman hopelessly in love with her husband's mistress. Mentioned by Diana during sex.
Other shows
These show titles can be seen on the network schedule board behind Diana.- Celeb Canasta (Sundays, 9:00 PM)
- Grand Guignol (Sundays, 10:00 PM)
- Shirley, Pedro, and the Putz (Mondays, 9:00 PM)
- Holy Mackerel (Mondays, 10:00 PM)
- 2 Plus 2 (Tuesdays, 9:00 PM)
- Death Squad (Tuesdays, 10:00 PM)
- Celeb Mah-Jongg (Wednesdays, 9:00 PM)
- The Wilsons (Wednesdays, 10:00 PM)
- Bad Lands (Fridays, 10:00 PM)
- The Poco Poco Show (Saturdays, 8:30 PM)