NBC made the announcement late Monday afternoon, just hours after the CNN documentary was shelved because the director, Charles H. Ferguson, said he could not gain access to people who would speak about Mrs. Clinton.
That would not have been the issue with the mini-series, which would use actors to tell the story of Mrs. Clinton; the Oscar-nominated Diane Lane had already signed on as the star.
But the NBC project drew opposition from the moment it was announced in July, both from the Republican National Committee, which accused the mini-series — though not yet written — of being a bouquet to Mrs. Clinton that would enhance her chances should she run in the 2016 presidential election, and from NBC’s own news division.
NBC News was reacting to the threat from Republicans that they would not allow any debates among their 2016 candidates to take place on NBC networks if the entertainment division went ahead with the project.
However, NBC Entertainment did not cite those complaints as a reason for abandoning the project. Instead, the move was explained as a basic programming decision made by the network’s top entertainment executive, Robert Greenblatt. Mr. Greenblatt had signaled some reluctance earlier by saying the project was only in development and that its future would depend on a successful script being written.
NBC issued a simple statement on Monday that read in its entirety: “After reviewing and prioritizing our slate of movie/miniseries development, we’ve decided that we will no longer continue developing the Hillary Clinton miniseries.”
Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/01/business/media/nbc-scraps-hillary-clinton-mini-series.html?partner=rss&emc=rss