\n<\/p>\n
Jamie Kellner, a media executive who helped build Fox Broadcasting into a thriving television network with shows such as \u201cBeverly Hills, 90210\u201d and \u201cThe Simpsons\u201d \u2014 and who went on to create the WB network, known for the angsty \u201cDawson\u2019s Creek\u201d and \u201cBuffy the Vampire Slayer\u201d \u2014 died on June 21 at his home in Montecito, Calif., near Santa Barbara. He was 77.<\/p>\n
The cause was cancer, said Brad Turell, a family spokesman.<\/p>\n
Mr. Kellner was one of the most successful television executives of his generation, whose knack for capturing young viewers \u2014 first men at Fox, then women at WB \u2014 lured viewers away from the Big Three networks that had ruled television for nearly 40 years.<\/p>\n
Mr. Kellner believed ABC, NBC and CBS were ignoring viewers under 35 and were hamstrung by middle-of-the-road taste. Rupert Murdoch, Fox Inc.\u2019s owner, and Barry Diller, its chairman, recruited Mr. Kellner from the television syndication business in 1986 and installed him as president of the Fox Broadcasting Company.<\/p>\n
Its aspiration to be the first new TV network since ABC in 1948 was broadly derided. But from the debut in 1987 of its first series, the lowbrow family sitcom \u201cMarried \u2026 With Children,\u201d which was shown on six Murdoch-owned stations and a string of independent ones that Mr. Kellner helped stitch together, the new network began stealing the Big Three\u2019s audience.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
By 1992, with shows like \u201cMelrose Place,\u201d about the social lives of 20-somethings, Fox was No. 1 with viewers 18 to 34. \u201cWe don\u2019t really need anyone over 50 years of age to succeed with our business plan,\u201d Mr. Kellner told The New York Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n He resigned in 1993 after seven years at Fox. By then, Mr. Diller had left, and Mr. Kellner and Mr. Murdoch had clashed over Mr. Murdoch\u2019s desire to pivot to older viewers and more mainstream shows.<\/p>\n Within months, Mr. Kellner was conjuring up WB, officially the Warner Brothers Network. He brought with him former Fox colleagues, including two rising programming executives, Garth Ancier and Susanne Daniels.<\/p>\n \u201cHe was a visionary in the television business,\u201d Ms. Daniels, who went on to become president of MTV and head of original content at YouTube, said in an interview. Mr. Kellner \u201cfelt that Rupert Murdoch was making a mistake trying to, quote-unquote, \u2018grow up\u2019 the Fox network,\u201d she added, \u201cand that was an opportunity for the WB network to establish a strategy of attracting a younger audience who Fox was abandoning.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Within just a few years, Tuesdays in prime time on WB, anchored by \u201cBuffy the Vampire Slayer\u201d and \u201cDawson\u2019s Creek,\u201d had become \u201ca cult night on television for teenagers and 20-somethings,\u201d Lawrie Mifflin wrote in The Times<\/a> in 1998.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Although Mr. Kellner\u2019s main job at the networks he built was to reel in advertising to pay for shows, and to corral affiliate stations to broadcast them, he could also be hands-on in encouraging promising writer-producers and in shaping content.<\/p>\n He helped ignite the careers of J.J. Abrams (\u201cFelicity,\u201d \u201cStar Wars: The Rise of Skywalker\u201d) Kevin Williamson (\u201cDawson\u2019s Creek,\u201d \u201cScream\u201d) and Joss Whedon (\u201cBuffy the Vampire Slayer,\u201d \u201cThe Avengers\u201d).<\/p>\n Mr. Turell, who was part of Mr. Kellner\u2019s brain trust at WB, recalled Mr. Kellner suggesting to the producer Aaron Spelling<\/a> (\u201cBeverly Hills, 90210\u201d) that a series about a preacher and his teenage daughter could capture the underserved audience of religious viewers. By that point, Mr. Kellner was himself the father of a teenage daughter.<\/p>\n The series that resulted, \u201c7th Heaven,\u201d with Jessica Biel, ran for 11 seasons and was WB\u2019s highest rated show.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Mr. Kellner, who owned 11 percent of WB, cashed out after the network\u2019s parent company, Time Warner, merged with America Online in 2000. He became chairman and chief executive of the new behemoth company\u2019s Turner Broadcasting System, succeeding Ted Turner. Besides continuing to oversee WB, Mr. Kellner now also ran CNN and other properties. He moved from California to Atlanta, where Turner Broadcasting was based.<\/p>\n In a profile<\/a> that year, the Times reporter Jim Rutenberg described Mr. Kellner as \u201csquare-jawed and street tough even though he now lives luxuriously.\u201d<\/p>\n At CNN, which was struggling against the upstart cable news channels Fox News and MSNBC, Mr. Kellner rehired the financial anchor Lou Dobbs, brought on Anderson Cooper as a morning anchor and installed a respected journalist, Walter Isaacson of Time magazine, as chief executive.<\/p>\n But a rapidly shifting media landscape undermined some of Mr. Kellner\u2019s ambitions. \u201cGive us six months to a year,\u201d he boasted in 2001, \u201cwe will be well ahead of Fox.\u201d Roger Ailes<\/a>, the head of Fox News, hung Mr. Kellner\u2019s words in large letters as a taunt on the wall of his newsroom.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The changes Mr. Kellner brought to CNN did not arrest the onslaught of Fox, which carved out a niche with conservative viewers. A proposed merger of CNN with ABC News that Mr. Kellner favored was called off in February 2003.<\/p>\n That month, he announced he would step down when his contract ended and return to California. He retired from television at the age of 57 in 2004.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n James Charles Kellner was born on April 18, 1947, in Brooklyn, one of five children of James Kellner, a commodities broker, and Jean (Mahan) Kellner, a librarian.<\/p>\n Early on, Jamie aspired to be a teacher. Eventually, however, he entered the TV industry through an executive training program at CBS.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n He first struck programming gold in his mid-30s, teaming with Lorne Michaels, the creator of \u201cSaturday Night Live,\u201d to cut early episodes of \u201cS.N.L.\u201d to 30 minutes, then sell them in syndication to independent stations. It was that track record that led to his recruitment by Fox.<\/p>\n Mr. Kellner\u2019s first marriage ended in divorce.<\/p>\n His survivors include his wife of 38 years, Julie Smith Kellner; their son, Christopher Kellner; a daughter from his first marriage, Melissa Kellner; two brothers, Thomas and Ronald;and three grandchildren.<\/p>\n In retirement, Mr. Kellner left the entertainment world behind for personal passions. He sailed his ketch, the Irishman, around the world, and started a winery, Cent\u2019Anni, in the Santa Ynez Valley.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n