 Disney Backs Down to NFL, Won't Show 'Football Wives'
Disney Backs Down to NFL, Won't Show 'Football Wives'
Posted May 16th 2007 9:28AM by Michael David Smith
The BBC show Footballers Wives is a fictional account of the private lives of soccer players, starring Gillian Taylforth (pictured). It has become a hit in England, and as with just about any hit show in England, American producers are looking to rip it off.
The planned American show will be called Football Wives and will center, this time, around the private lives of American football players. It was initially slated to be broadcast on ABC, but after the NFL raised a fuss, ABC dropped those plans.
You see, the show might possibly have cast pro football players in a negative light. Maybe it would have shown a football player making it rain or doing time on weapons charges or smoking pot or possessing ecstasy or doing something else that we know no football player would do in real life.
So the NFL apparently reminded Disney, the parent company of both ABC and ESPN, that its games are by far the most popular programming on ESPN, and that it doesn't want to see football players -- even fictional players -- shown on screen doing things that make pro football look bad. And just like that, Football Wives doesn't have a TV home.
This isn't the first time something like this has happened: ESPN canceled Playmakers when the NFL objected to its content. It's a little surprising that a huge media company like Disney would be so compliant to the NFL's demands, but the NFL almost always gets what it wants. | 
05-16-2007, 04:32 PM
