Las Vegas Weekly

May 24, 2010 · 5:40 AM

Will Las Vegas play host to ABC’s new three-year deal with Miss America?

By Robin Leach

Host Mario Lopez watches as 2009 Miss America Katie Stam crowns Miss Virginia Caressa Cameron the 2010 Miss America at the 2010 Miss America Pageant in Planet Hollywood on Jan. 30, 2010.

Photo: Scott Harrison/Retna/www.harrisonphotos.com

Miss America Pageant officials arrive in Las Vegas this morning celebrating today’s news of a new three-year broadcast-rights deal with ABC and to hopefully wrap up preliminary negotiations to remain here as the host city.

The first pageant under the new network contract will be held Jan. 15 and mark its 90th anniversary. Miss America Chairman Sam Haskell hopes that as many of the 60 winners who are still alive will be featured.

“We are so happy and excited about all of this,” Sam said this morning. “We are confident that Miss America has reunited with the perfect network partner. ABC shares many of our same ideals and tradition.

“It’s perfect timing to move back to network television as we celebrate our special 90th anniversary and look ahead to reach new heights and create a new path for the future of Miss America. Our brand is so rich in both philanthropy and history, and this new multi-year partnership will not only preserve this great institution, but it will also mark a new milestone in television with our ABC friends.”

ABC last aired the Miss America Pageant in 2004, and the new contract calls for the ABC telecasts to air through 2013. For the past five years while headquartered here in Las Vegas at Planet Hollywood, CMT (2005 and 2006) and TLC (2007, 2008 and 2009) have broadcast the two-hour special and advance reality show TV programming.

TLC executives were thrilled with the ratings but didn’t want to exercise a continuing three-year option. They wanted only a two-year deal and to cut the production budget.

Miss Virginia Caressa Cameron was crowned 2010 Miss America in January, and the telecast won its highest-ever ratings on cable television with more than 4.5 million viewers, 1 million more than the previous parade of princesses. Pageant officials predict that ABC ratings this winter will surpass that record.

Vegas DeLuxe first learned the big news last Thursday but agreed to keep it embargoed until early this morning and tipped initial hints with our Friday posts. We had already set an interview with Miss America President Art McMaster and Sam as he arrives in Las Vegas today.

Art stated: “Miss America will maintain and oversee the creative direction of the pageant. Miss America is one of this country’s great enduring institutions, and creatively we are introducing new ways to honor the pageant’s rich tradition while also producing a spectacular show that will offer true entertainment appeal to ABC’s viewers.”

The Miss America Organization, which began with humble beginnings as a bathing beauty contest in Atlantic City in the 1920s, is today one of the nation’s leading achievement programs and the world’s largest provider of scholarship assistance for young women.

ABC Senior Vice Presidents Vicki Drummer and John Saade, who run alternative series and specials for ABC Entertainment Group, said: “We’re thrilled to have the pageant back on ABC and for the opportunity to be a part of this historic tradition. We look forward to working with the Miss America Organization for years to come.”

Miss America officials arrive here this morning in the hope of finalizing discussions and negotiations with the Las Vegas Visitors and Convention Bureau and Strip hotel executives. They hope that Miss America will continue to embrace Las Vegas as its host city for at least the next three-year run of the new ABC contract.

Check back to Vegas DeLuxe later today when we’ll update this story with our first one-on-one interview with the Miss America officials that we arranged last week.

Photo: TVT

From left, Miss America Organization President and CEO Art McMaster, TLC's Brent Zacky and Miss America Organization Chairman Sam Haskell III.

Updated @11:21 a.m.: Art spoke with me while en route to his two days of scheduled meetings just after he landed at McCarran Airport this morning. He said: “We love Las Vegas. We want to stay here and make it our home again for the next three years with our new ABC network contract. Everybody involved with Miss America likes working here in Vegas and having the pageant headquartered here.

“At this moment, we do not have a contract, but I am hopeful that following our meetings with the LVCVA board, along with Planet Hollywood executives Robert Earl and Bill Feather, we will wrap that up in the next 48 hours before I head back to meet with Prince Edward and Miss America in North Carolina on Wednesday. We couldn’t extend the contracts when we were here in January because we didn’t have the new TV deal in place.

“We had top ratings in January, and that prompted several other cable TV offers when TLC decided not to renew its three-year deal and we parted ways. But getting back on the ABC network makes us so happy. I am thrilled and ecstatic because I was there sadly when we parted ways five years ago in Atlantic City. So it’s great to be reunited and return home. Even though we were No. 1 on cable in January, this will now broaden our scope even more. We expect it to do even better than the 6.5 million viewers we had when we left ABC in 2004.

“This was the best deal that we could imagine, and ABC says they will be very happy for Miss America to continue on in Las Vegas. If we start talking about a new look to the show or a new host, we’re getting a little ahead of ourselves. We’ve still got to have those initial planning meetings with ABC. The first thing to do is hopefully walk out of Las Vegas with our host city and hotel all locked up.

Photo: Tom Donoghue/www.donoghuephotography.com

Robin Leach with Miss Nevada Christina Keegan and Miss America Organization President Art McMaster.

“The Jan. 15 show will be a huge event for us -- and hopefully for Las Vegas. There are 66 living former Miss Americas, and our sincere hope is that we have all or as close to all of them as we can right here on the Strip. I can promise that will help make for great ratings.”

Caressa, Prince Edward and Art are promoting this week the June 4-6 Children's Miracle Network Telethon, which was started by Flamingo headliner Marie Osmond.

Sam added: “There’s a big difference between our Miss America Pageant and the Miss USA glamour contest. We are all about scholarship, community service and talent. It’s very simple Miss America is part of the country’s very tapestry.”

Robin Leach has been a journalist for more than 50 years and has spent the past decade giving readers the inside scoop on Las Vegas, the world’s premier platinum playground.

Follow Robin Leach on Twitter at Twitter.com/Robin_Leach.

Follow Vegas DeLuxe on Twitter at Twitter.com/vegasdeluxe.

Follow VDLX Editor Don Chareunsy on Twitter at Twitter.com/VDLXEditorDon.

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