THE DAY I GAVE JACK BAUER SOME BAD NEWS

 24 premiered on FOX Broadcasting 20 years ago today. I have written about 24 previously, once when it was ending its run

https://revengeofthemaskedscheduler.blogspot.com/2015/11/and-on-ninth-day-jack-rested.html

and the time John McCain visited the set

https://revengeofthemaskedscheduler.blogspot.com/2018/08/the-day-i-met-john-mccain-on-24-set.html

but I don't think I ever told you all this tale of when I thought Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland) was going to kill me.

In  November 2007 the Writers Guild went on strike which meant all shows were shut down with only a few episodes in the can. Every network was scrambling to put together a schedule which would be made up of repeats, some international shows and a lot of reality.

Fortunately, for FOX, we had Mike Darnell, Gordon Ramsay and American Idol so we weathered the storm until the strike was settled in February. I kept asking Peter Chernin when the strike would potentially be over and he was always vague so we were flying blind and had to keep revising our plans.

As the shows were going back into production we needed to make some tough decisions about delivery and number of episodes needed for the season. Once everything was resolved we would sit down with the show runners and go over our plans. Of course many showrunners were not going to be happy with our decisions so the onus of telling them fell to me. I did not have very brave bosses at that moment.

The toughest decision was what to do with 24. We were starting the show in January and ending it in May with no breaks. We would have to push back the premier and run the show through the summer. We did not want to do that. We discussed breaking up the show running 12 in the 2007-8 season and 12 in the fall. For me, I felt that we had made a pact with the viewers to give them a full non-stop season so the only solution was to pull 24 from the schedule for the entire season. Fortunately my bosses agreed with no paralysis by analysis. The burden of telling the producers and the studio (20th) was left to me.

Before alerting Joel Surnow and Howard Gordon, the 24 Executive Producers, I asked Gary Newman and Dana Walden, the heads of 20th Television if I could come over and walk them through our plan for the show. They told me that Kiefer Sutherland would be joining us. By then Kiefer was an Executive Producer.

Now there are certain actors who are so connected to a character that they become the character. James Gandolfini WAS Tony Soprano. One summer the family was back east and we had dinner at an Italian restaurant in the Village and Gandolfini showed up. Although the restaurant was crowded they accommodated him and set up a table next to us. A hush came over the place when he entered with his family. Everyone was respectful. No one came over and asked him for a selfie or an autograph. Tony Soprano was in the building.

Kiefer was Jack Bauer and here I was sitting across from him, with Dana and Gary on the sides, telling him his show would not be on the air that season. He got agitated, asked a bunch of questions. I swear to you I was expecting him to jump over the coffee table separating us start choking me and screaming "THE SHOW IS COMING BACK THIS SEASON!!!!!" I was sweating, really scared for my life. Fucking Jack Bauer was going to murder me. I know it was irrational but I felt like I was in a scene from an episode of 24. I escaped with my life.

I left and went over to the HOUSE set to discuss plans for that show. It went a lot better.

Anyway, thought I would share that one and it was an honor to be part of getting 24 on the air and keeping it going for 8 seasons. It's ironic that today is daylight savings time. I always felt it would be cool to do a season that took place over 23 hours because the clocks moved forward and that would be a critical element in the story. Oh well.