A black-and-white photograph of Fred Savage and Danica McKellar, the teen-age stars of "The Wonder Years," hangs on a wall behind Ted Harbert's circular desk.
Harbert, the fast-talking, 35-year-old executive vice president of ABC Entertainment, explains why Savage and McKellar deserve space alongside pictures of his wife and 1-year-old daughter, Emily.
For the Record
Los Angeles Times Friday August 17, 1990 Home Edition Calendar Part F Page 12 Column 1 Entertainment Desk 1 inches; 20 words Type of Material: Correction
Wrong creator--An Aug. 5 article about ABC-TV misidentified the creator of the sitcom "Full House." The series was created by Jeff Franklin.
He turns to Savage's Boy Scout visage. "I was 13 years old in 1968, the same age Kevin Arnold is supposed to be, and I kind of identify with that character."
Harbert, along with Stu Bloomberg, who also holds the title of executive vice president, and their boss, ABC Entertainment President Bob Iger, are three-fifths of the team that has led ABC's turnaround of the prime-time schedule over the last three years. The other two-fifths, former ABC Entertainment President Brandon Stoddard and his ex-aide Chad Hoffman, have moved on to other jobs.
Called Teddy by his friends and co-workers, Harbert talks with the velocity of a machine gun emptying a magazine clip. "That show reminds me what it was like to grow up in the 1960s." So Kevin Arnold is really Ted Harbert? "Yeah, that's me."
Harbert's identification with the fictional Kevin Arnold is an apt metaphor for the improving fortunes of ABC's prime-time schedule, which last year accounted for half of the network's $2.4 billion in revenues. The erstwhile Kevin always seems to act more adult than his parents, who often appear overwhelmed with the rapidly changing mores of the Middle America world around them.
Such is the case at ABC these days, which if not yet the overall ratings leader, is in many ways acting wiser than the competition on the prime-time programming front. Last season ABC's prime-time ratings were flat compared to the previous season (CBS' and NBC's were down), but that is actually considered progress in today's overheated race among the three networks, Fox, dozens of cable channels and home video for the viewer's attention.
ABC now gets much of the critical praise once reserved solely for NBC. The network has begun again to gush profits after several years of losses and barely breaking even. While top-ranked NBC is seen by many to have strayed from the creative lead it held during most of the 1980s, and CBS looks to find its way out of a bottomless ratings hole, ABC is attracting top producers and writers who only a few years ago wouldn't go near the place.
