NBC's `ER' is under the knife.(Knight Ridder Newspapers) From: Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service | Date: March 4, 2002| Author: Lambert, Brian | COPYRIGHT 2002 Knight-Ridder/Tribune News Service. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan.  All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group.Copyright information

NBC is operating on `ER,' removing unneeded characters, stitching up plot holes, trying to save a very profitable patient.

You don't have to be a Beverly Hills accountant to understand why NBC agreed, four years ago, to pay the producers of "ER" $13 million per episode.

The show pays off. Big time, as Dick Cheney would say. Always has, since it premiered in 1994, and always will, or so the show's creators are betting and NBC's otherwise godless programmers are...