SAG Awards 2011 Seating Assignments: First look at who’s sitting where — EXCLUSIVE

The new Hollywood Reporter goes deep inside the war room with cast and execs to look at the forces that have made Fox’s hit show a half-billion-dollar franchise, as they also open up about looming cast salary negotiations, that Kings of Leon snub (everyone’s mad!) and an eventual future without creator Ryan Murphy.

The note was practically a high “A-sharp”; the cacophony of voices blended perfectly to form an instantly recognizable tone, striking the right balance of volume and shrill while conveying contagious enthusiasm. There  were big smiles, hearty applause and a collective pat on the back. Only this chorus wasn’t singing on the set of Glee; it was 16 cheering department heads seated around a conference table at the Los Angeles offices of 20th Century Fox Television, the studio that produces the hit Fox show. Piped in via video: another eight team members from Columbia Records in New York.

Welcome to the “Gleekly meeting,” a pep rally during which the many tentacles that tend to the nearly half-billion-dollar brand convene to discuss the latest strategies for what has become the network’s No. 2 priority. Averaging 14 million viewers this season, Glee still trails American Idol by a good 10 million, but it’s inching closer to the juggernaut with each passing day. To wit: By the next morning, Jan. 20, hours after Idol’s premiere ratings would show a season-over-season 13 percent decline, the most prominent ad on the Fox lot facing busy Pico Boulevard suddenly had been switched from Ryan Seacrest and company to the Glee gang.

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