UPN

**UPN** (originally an abbreviation for United Paramount Network) was an American broadcast television network that launched on January 16, 1995. The network was originally owned by Chris-Craft Industries' United Television; Viacom (through its Paramount Television unit, which produced most of the network's series) turned the network into a joint venture in 1996 after acquiring a 50% stake in the network, and subsequently purchased Chris-Craft's remaining stake in 2000. In December 2005, UPN was spun off to CBS Corporation when Viacom split into two separate companies.

CBS Corporation and Time Warner jointly announced on January 24, 2006 that the companies would shut down UPN and competitor The WB to launch a new joint venture network later that year. UPN ceased broadcasting on September 15, 2006, with The WB following suit two days later. Select programs from both networks moved to the new network, The CW, when it launched on September 18, 2006.

Former owners Chris-Craft Industries' United Television announced plans of relaunching the network using the UPN abbreviation. Although Paramount's (now owned by ViacomCBS) name is in the name of the network, Paramount doesn't own the network.

## History

### 1949–1993: Origins of the network

Paramount Pictures had played a pivotal role in the development of network television. It was a partner in the DuMont Television Network, and the Paramount Theaters chain, which was spun off from the corporate/studio parent, merged with ABC in a deal that helped cement that network's status as a major network. The Paramount Television Network was launched in 1949, but dissolved in the 1950s.

In the wake of the successful Universal Studios *ad hoc* syndication package *Operation Prime Time*, which first featured a miniseries adaptation of John Jakes' novel *The Bastard* and went on to air several more productions, Paramount had earlier contemplated its own television network with the Paramount Television Service. Set to launch in early 1978, it would have run its programming for only one night a week. Thirty "Movies of the Week" would have followed *Star Trek: Phase II* on Saturday nights. Plans for the new network were scrapped when sufficient advertising slots could not be sold, though Paramount would contribute some programs to *Operation Prime Time*, such as the mini-series *A Woman Called Golda*, and the weekly pop music program, *Solid Gold*. *Star Trek: Phase II* was reworked as the theatrical film, *Star Trek: The Motion Picture*, absorbing the costs already incurred from the aborted television series.

Paramount, and its eventual parent Viacom (which bought the studio's then-parent, Paramount Communications, in 1994), continued to consider launching their own television network. Independent stations, even more than network affiliates, were feeling the growing pressure of audience erosion to cable television in the 1980s and 1990s; there were unaffiliated commercial television stations in most of the major television markets, even after the foundation of Fox in 1986. Meanwhile, Paramount, which had long been successful in syndication with repeats of *Star Trek*, launched several first-run syndicated series by the 1990s, including *Entertainment Tonight*, *The Arsenio Hall Show*, *Friday the 13th: The Series*, *War of the Worlds*, *Star Trek: The Next Generation*, and *Star Trek: Deep Space Nine*.

In 1993, Time Warner and Chris-Craft Industries entered into a joint venture to distribute programs via a prime time programming service, the Prime Time Entertainment Network (PTEN). Chris-Craft later became a partner in UPN, and Time Warner launched The WB in a joint venture with the Tribune Company at roughly the same time.

### 1995–1999: Launch and early years

The UPN colorful shapes logo, used from 1995 to 1997, and in various iterations from 1997 to 2002 (though the "primary colors" variant continued on some affiliates and in print advertising until 2002).

Paramount formed the Paramount Stations Group in 1991 when it purchased the assets of the TVX Broadcast Group, which owned several independent stations in major markets. This was not unlike the purchase of the Metromedia stations by News Corporation five years earlier, which were used as the nuclei for Fox. In another parallel, 20th Century Fox (the News Corporation subsidiary behind the Fox network, which was spun off with the company's other entertainment assets to 21st Century Fox in July 2013), like Paramount, had long been a powerhouse in television syndication. All indicators suggested that Paramount was about to launch a network of its own.

On October 27, 1993, Paramount and Chris-Craft announced the formation of a new television network, later to be named the **United Paramount Network**, with initial plans to run two hours of programming in prime time for two nights per week. The new network would be owned by Chris-Craft Industries, while most of its shows were to be produced by Paramount Television.

Originally, the network was to simply be called "U", but the "U Network" trademark was held by the now-defunct National Association of College Broadcasters (NACB), which had been operating a satellite television programming network featuring largely college student-produced programs since 1991. The founder and first head of UPN, Lucie Salhany, approached NACB with an offer of US$50,000 to transfer the name. Due to the costs related to rebranding the student network, and under the advice of its then-volunteer legal counsel, Mr. Cary Tepper, the non-profit association countered with a request of $100,000, which Ms. Salhany refused. Ultimately, the "U" in UPN stood for Chris-Craft subsidiary United Television, which owned the network's two largest stations, WWOR-TV in New York City and KCOP-TV in Los Angeles; the "P" represented Paramount Television, the studio that formed a programming partnership with Chris-Craft to create the network. Chris-Craft and Paramount/Viacom each owned independent stations in several large and mid-sized U.S. cities, and these stations formed the nuclei of the new network.

Warner Brothers announced plans to launch a similar network, which would become known as The WB, in close proximity to UPN. The belief that a new broadcast network could grow to be competitive was predicated on the idea that the network in question would not have a fledgling rival to contend with. With the change in landscape, the joint understanding of assured defeat prompted executives from Viacom (UPN's parent company) and Time Warner (now WarnerMedia, a subsidiary of AT&T) to discuss the prospect of merging the networks together.[7] Both sides reached an agreement on the division of affiliates, but Chris-Craft expressed extreme skepticism and declined to proceed with the merger. A merger would ultimately come in 2006 with the creation of The CW.

UPN launched on January 16, 1995, initially carrying programming only on Monday and Tuesday nights from 8:00 to 10:00 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time. The first telecast, the two-hour pilot episode of *Star Trek: Voyager*, was an auspicious start, with 21.3 million viewers; however, *Voyager* would never achieve such viewership levels again, nor would any of the series debuting on UPN's second night of broadcasting survive the season. In contrast, The WB debuted one week earlier, on January 11, with four series – only one of which, *Muscle*, would not survive its first season. The first comedy series to debut on UPN were *Platypus Man*, starring Richard Jeni, and *Pig Sty*, with both shows airing Monday nights in the 9:00 p.m. hour; both received mixed reviews, and neither lasted long.

Other early UPN programs included the action series *Nowhere Man*, starring Bruce Greenwood and *Marker*, starring Richard Grieco; the comic western *Legend* starring Richard Dean Anderson; the science-fiction themed action series, *The Sentinel*; and *Moesha*, a sitcom starring Brandy Norwood. Of the network's early offerings, only *Star Trek: Voyager*, *Moesha* and *The Sentinel* would last longer than one season. As a result of the lack of viewership, UPN operated on a loss and had lost $800 million by 2000.

Within nearly two years of the network's launch, on December 8, 1996, Paramount/Viacom purchased a 50% stake in UPN from Chris-Craft for approximately $160 million. Like Fox had done nine years earlier, UPN started with a few nights of programming each week, with additional nights of primetime shows gradually being added over the course of several seasons. Because of this, UPN's affiliates were basically independent stations for all intents and purposes during the network's early years, with these stations airing either syndicated programs or movies during primetime on nights when the network did not provide programming. The first expansion of its prime time lineup came with the addition of programming on Wednesday nights on March 6, 1996 (during the second half of the 1995–96 season); that expansion also saw UPN assume the broadcast rights to the Blockbuster Entertainment Awards, which aired its inaugural broadcast on CBS the year prior.

UPN ordered 36 science fiction films to air as part of its weekly movie presentations beginning in 1998; the films were supplied by four production companies, with most of the titles coming from Paramount. Some titles would be shown on Showtime first, which allowed the premium cable channel to cooperate in advertising the movies.

UPN completed its prime time expansion in the 1998–99 season, with Thursdays and Fridays as the last nights of programming to be added to the network's evening slate. That season saw the debut of *The Secret Diary of Desmond Pfeiffer*, a sitcom set during the Civil War that centered on a black English nobleman who becomes the valet to Abraham Lincoln; even before its debut, the series was riddled by controversy and protests from several African American activist groups (including the Los Angeles chapter of the NAACP, who picketed outside Paramount Studios one week before the originally scheduled pilot episode) and some advertisers for its perceived lighthearted take on American slavery in the 19th century, protested against the premise of the series. Despite what publicity *Desmond* received from its controversial topicality, the series suffered from low ratings (with the first episode on October 5, 1998, placing 116th out of 125 programs aired that week on network television) and was cancelled after four episodes.

### 1999–2005: Viacom era and decline

Six months after the company announced its $36 billion merger with (the original) CBS Corporation, in March 1999, Viacom exercised a contractual clause that would – within a 45-day grace period – force Chris-Craft to either buy Viacom out of UPN, or have the former sell its ownership stake in the network to Viacom. Three days later on February 8, Chris-Craft subsequently filed a lawsuit against Viacom in the New York Supreme Court to block the latter's merger with CBS, claiming that a pact signed between the two partners in 1997 had prevented either from owning "any interest, financial or otherwise" in "any competing network," including CBS, for a four-year period through January 2001. On March 17, New York Supreme Court judge Herman Cahn ruled against Chris-Craft's move for a permanent injunction to curtail the Viacom-CBS merger and the enforcement of Viacom's ultimatum.

Unable to find a suitable partner, on March 20, Chris-Craft allowed Viacom to buy out its 50% stake for $5 million, giving Viacom full control of the network. This gave UPN the rare distinction of being one of the only broadcast networks to not have had owned-and-operated stations (O&O) in the three largest media markets, New York City, Los Angeles, and Chicago (with The WB – the only network never to have had an O&O – being the only other, as minority owner Tribune Broadcasting owned most of its charter affiliates including those in all three markets, while majority owner Time Warner only owned an independent station that originated then-superstation TBS). With Viacom taking full ownership control of UPN, KCOP-TV and WWOR-TV lost their statuses as O&Os and automatically became affiliates of the network, with the network's largest owned-and-operated station becoming Philadelphia outlet WPSG (now the flagship station of The CW). In addition, neither Chris-Craft or Viacom had ever held ownership of Chicago affiliate WPWR-TV, which had been the largest UPN station that was not owned-and-operated by the network prior to the Viacom buyout.

Shortly afterward, Viacom shortened the network's official name from the "United Paramount Network" to the three-letter initialism, "UPN". Viacom also proposed a rebranding of UPN into the "**Paramount Network**", using a prototype logo based on Paramount Pictures' mountain logo, which served as the basis for the "P" triangle in the network's original logo that was used until September 2002. This idea was abandoned after many affiliates protested, citing that the rebranding might confuse viewers and result in ratings declines, along with the costs of rebranding their stations with a new image and new network (and possible call sign changes).

Viacom's purchase of CBS a few months before (which resulted in the merger of that network's owned-and-operated stations into Viacom's Paramount Stations Group unit), created duopolies between CBS and UPN stations in Philadelphia (KYW-TV and WPSG), Boston (WBZ-TV and WSBK-TV), Miami (WFOR-TV and WBFS-TV), Dallas–Fort Worth (KTVT and KTXA), Detroit (WWJ-TV and WKBD-TV), and Pittsburgh (KDKA-TV and WNPA). Viacom's purchase of CBS was said to be the "death knell" for the Federal Communications Commission's longtime ban on television station duopolies. Further transactions added San Francisco (KPIX-TV and KBHK, the latter of which was traded to Viacom/CBS by Fox Television Stations) and Sacramento (KOVR and KMAX-TV, the former of which was sold to Viacom/CBS by the Sinclair Broadcast Group) to the mix.

At the time of UPN's launch, the network's flagship station was Chris-Craft-owned WWOR-TV in Secaucus, New Jersey (which serves the New York City market). Even after Chris-Craft sold its share in the network to Viacom, WWOR was still commonly regarded as the flagship of the network since it had long been common practice for this status to be associated with a network's New York station. For this reason, some doubt was cast on UPN's future after Fox Television Stations bought most of Chris-Craft's television stations for $5.5 billion on August 12, 2000, which included several UPN affiliates (including WWOR and West Coast flagship KCOP). Fox later bought the third-largest UPN affiliate, Chicago's WPWR-TV, through a separate deal with Newsweb Corporation for $450 million in June 2002. Despite the uncertainty of the network's future following the Fox purchases, UPN reached four-year affiliation agreements with Fox Television Stations' nine UPN affiliates on September 24, 2003.

In 2001, UPN entered into a public bidding war to acquire two series from The WB, *Buffy the Vampire Slayer* and *Roswell*, from producing studio 20th Century Fox Television. UPN eventually outbid The WB for the shows and aired them together on Tuesday nights until *Roswell* ended its run in 2002, *Buffy* ended its run the following year. In January 2002, Viacom President and COO, Mel Karmazin restructured the network, resulting in UPN being taken out of the ownership of Paramount Television, and being placed under the oversight of CBS Television, with CBS President Leslie Moonves being given responsibility for the network. Under CBS, new shows began to breathe life into the network starting in the fall of 2003 with *America's Next Top Model* and sitcom *All of Us* (which was produced by Will and Jada Pinkett Smith), followed up by the fall 2004 premiere of the mystery series *Veronica Mars* and the fall 2005 premiere of the Chris Rock-produced and narrated sitcom *Everybody Hates Chris*.

### 2005–2006: CBS era and network closure

On June 14, 2005, Viacom announced that it would be split into two companies due to declining performance of the company's stock; both the original Viacom – which was renamed CBS Corporation – and a new company that took the Viacom name would be controlled by the original Viacom's parent National Amusements (controlled by Sumner Redstone), which also controlled the new CBS Corporation. UPN became part of CBS Corporation, while the new Viacom kept Paramount Pictures among other holdings each company acquired in the deal. The split took effect on December 31, 2005.

On January 24, 2006, UPN parent CBS Corporation and Time Warner, the majority owner of The WB, announced that they would shut down the two respective networks and launch a new broadcast network that would be operated as a joint venture between both companies, The CW, which incorporated UPN and The WB's higher-rated programs with newer series produced exclusively for The CW. The new network immediately signed 10-year affiliation agreements with 16 stations affiliated with The WB (out of 19 stations that were affiliated with the network) that were owned by that network's part-owner, the Tribune Company – including stations in the coveted markets of New York City, Los Angeles and Chicago – and 11 UPN stations that were owned by CBS Corporation.] Fox Television Stations' nine UPN affiliates were passed over for affiliations as a result, and two days later, those stations removed all UPN branding from those stations and ceasing promotion of the network's programs. One month later on February 22, Fox announced the formation of MyNetworkTV, a new network that would also debut in September 2006 that would use the company's soon-to-be former UPN affiliates as the nuclei.[35] Over the next eight months, determinations were made as to which shows from the two networks would cross over to The CW, as well as which of UPN and The WB's affiliate stations would be selected to become affiliates of the new network. Programming-wise, six UPN shows – *America's Next Top Model* (which was the last surviving series from UPN that remained on The CW's schedule until it moved to VH1 in 2016), *Veronica Mars*, *Everybody Hates Chris*, *Girlfriends*, *All of Us*, and *WWE Smackdown* – were chosen to move to The CW for its inaugural 2006–07 fall schedule.

UPN quietly went off the air on September 15, 2006, at 9:59 PM EDT, ending the network's existence after 11 years. Unlike The WB, which closed its operations two days later with a special called *The Night of Favorites and Farewells*, there was no promotion of UPN's signing off; rather, the network merely faded to black at the end of a *WWE SmackDown* telecast without any fanfare. However, the Fox-owned UPN stations disaffiliated from the network on August 31; as a result, UPN's last two weeks of programming did not air in ten markets where Fox owned a UPN affiliate that was set to become an owned-and-operated station of MyNetworkTV, when that network launched on September 5, along with other markets where the local UPN station affiliated with MyNetworkTV or terminated their UPN affiliation during the summer. *WWE SmackDown*, however, aired in those markets on Tribune's WB stations, including those that would join The CW shortly afterward. Nevertheless, with the exception of *SmackDown*, all of the programs that aired during the network's final three months were reruns. After the network's official closure, UPN's website was redirected to The CW website, and then to CBS's website.

### Relaunch

Former owners Chris-Craft Industries' United Television announced plans of relaunching the network using the UPN abbreviation. Although Paramount's (now owned by ViacomCBS) name is in the name of the network, Paramount doesn't own the network. The network was relaunched on Sept. 21, 2015 (9 years after the original UPN shut down).