In the case of "Person to Person," the show's creators were the producer and news writer of Murrow's daily radio program (the format of which in 15 minutes minus commercials was 6 to 7 minutes of news summary and five minutes of commentary, pretty much a dead format these days with the rise of all-news radio, five minute hourly newscasts and generally the end of the notion that commentators were their own newsgathering entity beyond a network news department--in this era Daniel Shorr would've had his own 15-minute program on NPR if it had been around instead of contributing to "All Things Considered"). Murrow always said that he wanted his loyal staffers to be making some more money than they could on just his radio program.
Mark Jeffries Saints Spotlight Editor spotligh...@gmail.com On Sat, Jun 10, 2017 at 8:37 PM, Tom Wolper <twol...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Fri, Jun 9, 2017 at 8:48 PM, Kevin M. <drunkbastar...@gmail.com> wrote: > >> Ultimately what caused Katie Couric's downfall (and what seems to be >> happening with Megyn Kelly) is she tried to be the servant of two masters. >> You can succeed at fluffy breakfast-chat interviews OR you can succeed at >> hard news... it is nearly impossible to do both (Barbara Walters might be >> the only longstanding exception, although I suppose one could include Oprah >> if you absolutely must, but I wouldn't). If Kelly is including the fluff >> for the same reason Edward R Murrow included his celebrity interviews... to >> be given the freedom to pursue hard news stories... then more power to her. >> But Murrow did what he did to take down McCarthy and HUAC... does anybody >> believe Kelly has such an agenda, or the ability to follow through with it? >> > > Lesley Stahl might be up there with Barbara Walters. I would vote against > Oprah because she didn't have to do live interviews with little or no prep, > which Walters and Stahl could do. > > The problem for me is that I see TV news as being in its own bubble. Part > of it is structural - the networks are owned by big media companies and the > news operations are accountable to them which keeps them from going too far > afield in their culture or choice of target. But the world is going through > major changes that the network TV news misses. When they air the story the > changes have already happened. PBS's Frontline is an exception, but of > course it is one topic in an hour or an hour and a half. 60 Minutes can > break out of the bubble, but it is becoming rare for them to do so. > > As for Murrow: CBS gave him two prime time shows, See It Now and Person to > Person. See It Now was the investigative journalism documentary show and > Person to Person was celebrity interviews. The news purists say that CBS > made him do Person to Person in order to keep doing See It Now, but it was > also two paychecks for Murrow and he might not have objected. Murrow gets > credit for taking on McCarthy but I don't think he took down HUAC. They > just ran out of targets as the fifties progressed. I think Congress can put > the committee back together if they want. > > -- > -- > TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google > Groups "TV or Not TV" group. > To post to this group, send email to tvornottv@googlegroups.com > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > tvornottv-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "TVorNotTV" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to tvornottv+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to tvornottv@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to tvornottv-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
