aTypical Joe: a gay New Yorker living in the rural South

Friday, January 13, 2006

CBS, Katie & the evening news

This Romenesko post caught my attention today:

Matthew Felling asks CBS News: “Simply from a ‘capital J’ Journalistic standpoint, how can you designate as ‘anchor’ someone who hasn’t been a newsperson in over a decade? There. I said it. Has Katie Couric been a morning show host? By definition. But that’s not the same thing. ...The tone and skills she has honed perfectly on the ‘Today’ show would never work on the ‘CBS Evening News.’”

So I read the whole article. Unlike Felling, I’m not in the target demographic. And I haven’t watched the evening news for decades. But Couric is absolutely a newsperson. I watch her interviews and she’s darned good. She’s on 10 hours a week, how many other newspeople are? Of course he can find 8 examples of her bringing herself into the story (though I didn’t really get the point of half of them).

And even Felling says:

In case I’ve been a tad strident, I want you to know I think Katie Couric’s schtick works perfectly on the “Today” show. She’s the right woman in the right studio at the right time slot. It’s merely my contention that the tone and skills she has honed perfectly on the “Todayâ€Â� show would never work on the “CBS Evening News.”

Murrow did both See it Now and Person to Person. I bet Katie could too. But then just yesterday we heard she’s throwing cold water on the rumors.

LATER: Did I really put Murrow and Couric in the same league???

At first I backed off and changed it to Barbara Walters (the obvious choice) who got a raw deal with the evening news from ABC. But then I put Murrow back. I’m thinking she has it in her. In my book, she’s hard-working, smart, seasoned, and stands out from the crowd that we call television journalists. (Elizabeth Vargas?)

Last April Reomenesko quoted former ABC News producer Paul Friedman’s advice to CBS News execs: “Summarize the news of the day in five minutes or so; spend a big chunk of time—10 minutes or so—on covering one really good story; and give people even more to think about by ending with opinion.”

Adopt that format with Katie in the anchor seat and I’d watch. Nightline’s over, 60 Minutes had its day, the newsmagazine format is tired and worn, the evening news has been flailing about forever - there’s an opening for a breakout news program. Come on CBS, break out from the yellow-bellied network pack and do it!