Simpson project was hot topic inside Fox

Scant details have emerged about the genesis of O.J. Simpson’s book “If I Did It” and how the TV project landed at News Corp.’s Fox television network.

But two things became clear Tuesday, a day after News Corp. pulled the plug on both the book and a two-part TV special on Fox: The project was a source of heated internal debate at Fox and the book may never find a publisher.

“In my mind it’ll end up on the Internet somewhere,” said Michael Viner, a Beverly Hills-based publisher who in the past has published his share of sensational titles.

He said the fact that Simpson stood to profit from any publication made the book -- about how Simpson hypothetically would have murdered Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Lyle Goldman -- untouchable, even to smaller publishers willing to take some risk.

“It won’t be marketed through anybody major, but [by] the same people who do the [Paris] Hilton sex tape. It will be something you can download.”

On Monday, News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch canceled the TV special and the release of the book, calling it an “ill-conceived project.”

The book was to be published by ReganBooks, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, which is also owned by News Corp. Publishing insiders speculated Tuesday that it would have been published on schedule had it not been for the uproar over the TV interview.

When the project was first offered to Fox about three months ago, senior executives at Fox television network nixed the idea of airing an interview with O.J. Simpson linked to the book.

A little more than a week ago, however, as the book’s Nov. 30 publication date neared, the network reversed course, according to a News Corp. executive who asked not to be identified because of the controversy surrounding the project.

Some industry executives say Fox hoped to prop up viewership at a time when it was stuck in fourth place among the four major networks in the ratings. All of its new shows have fared poorly. “Justice,” “Vanished” and “Happy Hour” have already disappeared, and Fox’s ratings during the baseball postseason were poor. The network even pulled a game show, “The Rich List,” after only one episode.

When the firestorm of negative publicity erupted over the planned airing of the interview, Fox tried to salvage it by addressing some of the moral qualms it raised. One of the touchiest: that Simpson -- held responsible for the murders in a civil trial -- would profit.

News Corp. offered to share any profit from advertising with the victims’ families.

“Last week, when concerns were raised by the public that we were profiting from this guy’s story, we tried to work out some arrangement with the family,” News Corp. spokesman Andrew Butcher said.

On NBC’s “Today” show Tuesday, Brown’s sister Denise Brown characterized the offer as “money to keep our mouth shut.”

“They wanted to offer us millions of dollars,” she said. “Millions of dollars for, like, ‘Oh, I’m sorry’ money. But they were still going to air the show. We just thought, ‘Oh my god.’ What they’re trying to do is trying to keep us quiet.”

Butcher said that the offer was not “hush money.”

“Never was there any suggestion of them being barred from talking about it,” Butcher said. “We would never suggest that.”

The idea and the title for the book originated with Simpson’s camp and was presented to Judith Regan, who bought it. On Tuesday, a ReganBooks publicist referred to a statement Regan released last week, in which the publisher said, “I didn’t know what to expect when I got the call that the killer wanted to confess.”

The project was top-secret, never appearing on HarperCollins’ list of fall releases. It was pitched to booksellers as having nationwide interest, without revealing the title, author or subject matter.

Pablo Fenjves, a witness from the 1995 trial, was named Saturday in the New York Daily News as the ghostwriter for the book. Reached by phone Tuesday, Fenjves had no comment.

“A big part of the decision to scrap the project really had to do with problems on the television side,” said Publisher’s Weekly Editor in Chief Sara Nelson. “News Corp. stood to lose more on a TV show that couldn’t get advertising than on publishing books that might not have sold.”

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