Last year at this time, we were reporting that DirecTV, the system via which some of us receive our satellite television programming, was about to drop Trio. This is the eclectic cable channel that runs old episodes of Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, Late Night With David Letterman and many intriguing specials and shows, as well as occasional airings of a "lost" TV series like Cop Rock or The Ernie Kovacs Show. At the last minute, a deal was struck to keep Trio on the satellite, which was fortunate for us but also fortunate for Trio. Trio has never been on a lot of local cable line-ups and was getting more than half of its viewers via DirecTV.
Well, it's happening again: DirecTV has announced that they're dropping Trio, effective at the end of this year. A friend in the business thinks there will be no reprieve this time, and doubts that Trio will survive the massive loss of viewers. NBC Uni (as the parent company is now called) has stated that they're nearing a decision to shut the thing down and this looks like the moment. I'll be sad to see it go. It ran some odd things but that's good. I'm still amazed that with so many channels to choose from, there are still hours when there's nothing on I want to watch, and I wish we had more diversity in the programming.
This morning, I watched a documentary on Trio entitled Final Cut: The Making of "Heaven's Gate" and the Unmaking of a Studio. It is, of course, the tale of how in 1980, writer-director Michael Cimino made a movie that just about bankrupted United Artists. Based on the book by Stephen Bach (one of the U.A. execs fired as a result), it presents a fascinating, albeit one-sided view of the situation. Mr. Cimino declined to be interviewed, which is of course his right but also a shame, in a way. We've heard about how he was a megalomaniac who wanted to make his movie his way and didn't care who or what got trampled under to achieve this. It would be nice to hear the other side of story, assuming there is one.
It was a pretty good documentary and I was going to recommend it to you all. Alas, I see that its next Trio airing is on 12/31, and then it's supposed to rerun often during January of 2005. By then, the channel will probably be off the satellite…and possibly off the air, altogether.