ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, January 22, 1997 TAG: 9701220006
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GAIL SHISTER KNIGHT-RIDDER/TRIBUNE
The real ``X-Files'' cliff-hanger has nothing to do with Scully and Mulder.
It's whether creator Chris Carter will leave Fox's paranormal crown jewel when his five-year contract expires at the end of next season. Carter says he wants out to do movies. His boss says he'll ``do everything in my power to make sure that doesn't happen.''
Next season's other cliff-hanger, meanwhile, will be resolved in a big-screen ``X-Files'' flick in summer '98. Series stars Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny, under contract for a sixth year, would also headline the movie.
``We need Chris to stay on the show,'' new Fox Entertainment Group chief Peter Roth said. ``Chris Carter IS the `X-Files,' so his presence is critically important. I want to make sure he stays with us.''
The crafty Carter, 40, says he might reconsider if Fox kingpin Rupert Murdoch opens his pockets with ```Seinfeld' money,'' a reference to reports that NBC will pay Jerry Seinfeld $1 million per episode to return for a ninth season.
Ball's in your court, eh, Mr. Roth?
``Unlike Chris, I refuse to negotiate in the press,'' he says. ``I think the odds are better than 50-50 that he will stay.'' As for the $1 million-an-episode figure - Fox ordered 24 segments for this season - ``I cannot imagine that, he said hopefully and Pollyanna-ishly.''
``X-Files,'' which moved from Fridays to Sundays this season, is Fox's top-rated series, frequently cracking Nielsen's Top 20. Roth, who developed the show while at 20th Century Fox Television, labels it ``the crown jewel'' for both the network and himself.
In other ``X-File'' tidbits, best-selling horror author Stephen King wants to write an episode, possibly this season's cliff-hanger, Carter says. At first, King pitched himself for ``Millennium,'' Carter's new Fox show, but later switched to ``X-Files.''
``We've spoken on the phone three times now,'' Carter said. ``Like me, Stephen is sort of superstitious about saying too much. I'm not quite sure what I'll be getting until I get it. He's given me some hints. I guess it's a mystery within a mystery.''
Carter and King are not buds, ``but we do the same thing,'' Carter says. ``We scare people.'' The connection was made two years ago, when King and Duchovny competed on ``Celebrity Jeopardy!.'' (King won.)
As for ``X-Files''' post-Super Bowl episode Sunday night, it will not be directed, as originally planned, by Quentin Tarantino (``Pulp Fiction'').
Here's why: The Directors Guild of America - which the maverick Tarantino refuses to join - didn't approve the deal. Last season, the union gave Tarantino a one-shot waiver to direct an episode of NBC's ``ER.''
|n n| Roll over, ``Beethoven.''
Now that Fox's fledgling cable news channel is up and running, it's ``highly unlikely'' that the mother network would again run a movie instead of live coverage on Election Night, Fox News chairman Roger Ailes said recently.
Fox Television boss David Hill, under pressure to raise ratings, approached Ailes with the affiliate-supported plan to go with the family movie about a dog, Ailes said. Because the Nov. 5 election was a foregone conclusion - ``the media announced the winner in August'' - and Fox News Channel ``would have our plate full that night,'' Ailes agreed.
He may have made a different call, Ailes added, if ABC News alum Brit Hume, Fox News' newly named managing editor and chief correspondent, had been on board at the time.
FNC, launched Oct. 7 in 17 million homes, continues to have serious distribution problems. It's still not carried by Philadelphia-area systems or in New York, where Murdoch is in a blood battle with Time Warner and its new vice chairman, Ted Turner.
Because Time Warner carries Turner's CNN, it has refused to pick up FNC.
``I don't know the real reason (Turner's) keeping us off, other than being anticompetitive,'' Ailes said in an interview. ``I think we'll come to some sort of understanding soon.''
Dropping the diplomacy, Ailes minced no words in sizing up his newer cable competitor, MSNBC.
``They appear to be doing talk about news. ... They haven't quite decided who they want to be. In my judgment, America's Talking (the NBC-owned cable network that MSNBC replaced) was a much more creative, broad-gauged effort. Of course, I was personally involved'' as president.
As for MSNBC's contributors, Ailes said: ``They work on three-hour shifts. They come on to talk about nuclear proliferation, and if the subject turns to child care, they're expected to be experts on child care. We try to have people on with expertise to do commentary and analysis, as opposed to just chat.''
LENGTH: Medium: 88 linesby CNB