The Hotplate v My Kitchen Rules: Seven takes Nine to court

The Seven and Nine networks will face off in court over claims that The Hotplate is a rip-off of My Kitchen Rules.

The Seven and Nine networks will head to court tomorrow amid furious accusations that Nine’s new series The Hotplate is a rip-off of My Kitchen Rules.

In an unprecedented move, Seven has lodged papers in the Federal Court demanding the Nine show be taken off air.

A judge will decide if Seven has grounds to claim Nine and production company Endemol have stolen its intellectual property, infringed its copyright.

A spokesman for Seven said: “Channel Nine’s on-air promotions for its program had a strange sense of deja vu. We then saw it. We believe Nine has appropriated Seven’s My Kitchen Rules original format and related production elements, and contravened copyright. That’s why we’re in court.”

But a spokeswoman for Nine contested the allegations. “The Hotplate format is an original idea developed by Nine and we will rigorously defend the case,” she said.

Seven will claim The Hotplate used almost identical casting, costuming, sets, music, promotion and judging processes to MKR.

The Hotplate has built up a big ratings lead over Seven’s Restaurant Revolution, which could be scaled back to one night a week or even axed if it does not attain a significant ratings lift. Diary hears production staff have already been put on notice. The row has been brewing for some time.

In June, Seven chief Tim Worner blamed aggressive scheduling by rival Nine and a slew of copycat formats for turning off free-to-air television viewers after a rocky start to the first half of the ratings year.

Buckets leads footy fight

Rugby league’s next broad­casting deal has stalled amid a long and laboured process mired in confusion. Like the AFL, the NRL has been throwing around big aggressive numbers, but none of the broadcasters are in the same ballpark.

Even though the NRL started talks before the AFL, observers claim it has less of an idea of its objectives. Except for the commissioners, no one has been involved in a previous rights deal.

No disrespect to NRL boss Dave Smith, but we’d back Nine’s negotiator Jeff (Buckets) Browne every time in a sports rights negotiation. He even knows what clinched the 1896 Athens Olympics TV deal (apparently it involved baby oil). And we would have told Smith if we were the ones who spotted the duo together at a Sydney pub this week.

The NRL consultants are learning as they go and the commission is divided on which nights are important. They are looking for direction from the broadcasters, but they don’t want them to control the process.

Some expect the NRL to issue an official tender document within weeks as they look to inject more urgency into proceedings.

Meanwhile, the AFL has set a timetable of clinching a new deal by the 2016 grand final, which to Diary’s eyes seems a far more considered timetable.

ABC staff on the move

ABC News has confirmed some moves among its foreign bureaus, with Washington DC correspondent Lisa Millar moving to the London bureau, after a short holiday in Australia. She will be joined by political reporter James Glenday. They replace Phil Williams and Mary Gearin, understood to be returning home after a tumultuous period covering Europe.

Williams takes the previously announced role as ABC News chief foreign correspondent. And former Sunday Telegraph journo turned 7.30 reporter Adam ­Harvey has been named the new Jakarta correspondent, replacing George Roberts.

TV shake-ups tipped

Of course, the returning correspondents will have a new ABC News boss with Kate Torney confirming last week her move to the State Library of Victoria.

The interim boss, the ABC head of newsgathering Craig McMurtrie, is considered the leading internal candidate although we hear he might not think the same.

A bigger name being floated is former ABC foreign correspondent Rob Raschke. The appointment last week of Craig McPherson as director of news and public affairs at Seven, next to or above Raschke, currently Seven’s network director of news, changes the dynamics within the normally stable Seven.

The former boss of Today Tonight is on gardening leave from Nine for three months before he rejoins Seven and there’s no suggestion the duo can’t work together; they’ve known each other for decades. And Raschke is sharp. He didn’t respond to Diary’s baiting.

Longoria lashes hack

Journalists always know if they stick their head up, occasionally it will be hit. Goes with the job. But online bullying has taken it to a whole new level, as Fairfax Media’s Jenna Clarke discovered this week.

As she wrote in Sydney’s Sun-Herald yesterday, Eva Longoria “took umbrage at my claims she didn’t wear glasses, yet endorsed a budget eyewear chain on her most recent visit to Australia” and linked it to the Desperate Housewives star being paid to promote a cat food in 2012 despite not owning a cat.

Longoria published, after Clarke’s piece the previous Sunday, an open message on social media pointing out this was incorrect and she has been wearing reading glasses since 2013, a fact Clarke and the SMH clarified the following day.

Clarke didn’t respond to the social media spray — “that’s not my style”, she told Media — although the thousands of Longoria followers who followed with a tirade of abuse did rattle her. Particularly when online bullies spread their social media attack to target Clarke’s family and friends.

“Seeing that first hand was pretty full-on,” Clarke says. “But I’m a big fan of the royal family. Never complain, never explain.” Kudos to Clarke for clarifying and rolling with it, but none to smh.com.au’s Michael Koziol, who led his story about the stoush with: “Longoria is seeing red over claims made in an Australian newspaper’’. Would it be too hard to have written “this newspaper”?

In-house war over Goodes

If you don’t believe News Corp Australia is a broad church, venture to the Adelaide Advertiser and FIVEaa breakfast host David Penberthy’s column on the Adam Goodes saga. He took a full swing at News Corp stablemates, Melbourne Herald Sun columnists Andrew Bolt and Rita Panahi.

Penberthy, a former editor of Sydney’s The Daily Telegraph, wrote: “Andrew Bolt seems to live in fear of being hit with an imaginary spear” while Panahi’s “sneering column … showed how desperate some are to inflame this situation”.

One striking point in the entire brouhaha on social media is the distinction between those who support Goodes and those who justify the booing. The former put their name to it; the latter tend to be anonymous. At least Bolt and Panahi attach their names to their opinions.

The racism debate has fired ­debate throughout News Corp, with The Daily Telegraph’s Miranda Devine and this newspaper’s Chip Le Grand — whose fab new book The Straight Dope Diary is currently enjoying — also trading barbs.

Diary reports this without taking sides other than to note if there is one song sheet to sing from at News Corp, we ain’t seen it.

Packer dodges grilling

And James Packer voiced his forthright opinion in support of Goodes at a function for Crown Resorts’ indigenous employment program in Melbourne on Friday. And good on him. Oops, there’s our opinion on the matter. Anyway, he was brief and to the point before he left primarily because, as business journalists were subtly reminded, the Crown chairman didn’t want to take any questions about his friend ­Mariah Carey.

Megan stars at News bash

News Corp’s second annual upfronts-style presentation to advertisers pulled a huge crowd of business leaders and captains of industry at Fox Studios on ­Thursday night. Australian ­singer-songwriter Megan Washington and a full orchestra performed for guests, including Westpac chief executive Brian Hartzer, Carnival chief Ann ­Sherry, Harvey Norman executive chairman Gerry Harvey and his wife and the company’s boss Katie Page, Tabcorp chief David ­Attenborough, Bank of Melbourne chief Scott Tanner, and Volvo managing director Kevin McCann. Senior News Corp leaders mixed with the crowd, which also included advertising and media agency executives, Clemenger BBDO’s Andy Pontin, Host’s Anthony Freedman, ZenithOptimedia’s Ian Perrin, Match Media’s John Preston, Initiative’s Lee Leggett and Omnicom’s Leigh Terry.