If you don’t have HBO, now’s a very good time to subscribe. No, this ain’t a paid endorsement. It’s just a fact.
Even if it’s the only thing you’ll watch on the channel, their new show, The Newsroom, from creator Aaron Sorkin (West Wing, A Few Good Men, etc.) is worth the price of admission. As a matter of fact, by the time we got to Episode 3 last night, I’ve gotta say, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing on my television. (Yeah, I know, “It’s not TV, it’s HBO.”)
They’ve posted the complete Episode 1 on YouTube here if you’d like to give it a look. There doesn’t seem to be any clips from this week’s Episode 3 unfortunately, but that episode in particular, along with 1 and 2, are well worth your time.
Here’s the first scene from the first episode, which might just be enough to make the case…
If you need more convincing, see below…
Again, Episodes 1 and 2 are not to be missed. But Episode 3 was extraordinary, for too many reasons to describe here, not the least of which are any spoilers I might accidentally offer. Suffice to say the Tea Party (the fake, corporate, astroturf one, not necessarily the real Ron Paul one which predates it by at least two years), very specifically, and by name, will despise this show. So will the Koch Brothers. By name. (Just two of the reasons I wish I could pull some video from this Episode!) Oh, and Jane Fonda’s character appears for the first time in Episode 3. Along with Jeff Daniels, who plays “News Night” anchor Will McAvoy, are both absolute shoe-in for Emmys this year. Place your bets now.
While there’s a bit of occasionally cloying, trademark Sorkin Soap-Opery throughout, and a character or two I’m not yet convinced by, given everything else we’re being offered, it’s pretty easy to overlook those imperfections.
Short of being able to show you video of this, the text is the next best thing. This is the opening of Episode 3, after McAvoy’s “News Night” program has determined to become “News Night 2.0” — to present actual news, with actual context, without phony balance, rather than whatever might pull in ratings. It opens with a clip from former Counter-terrorism Adviser Richard Clarke’s 2004 Congressional testimony, wherein he openly apologized to the families of the victims of 9/11, on behalf of the U.S. Government, for having failed them.
Then, comes this…
Let me be clear that I don’t apologize on behalf of all broadcast journalists, nor do all broadcast journalists owe an apology. I speak for myself. I was an accomplice to a slow and repeated and unacknowledged and unamended train wreck of failures that have brought us to now. I’m a leader in an industry that miscalled election results, hyped up terror scares, ginned up controversy and failed to report on tectonic shifts in our country, from the collapse of the financial system to the truths about how strong we are to the dangers we actually face. I’m a leader in an industry that misdirected your attention with the dexterity of Harry Houdini, while sending hundreds of thousands of our bravest young men and women off to war without due diligence.
The reason we failed isn’t a mystery – we took a dive for the ratings.
In the infancy of mass communication, the Columbus and Magellan of broadcast journalism, William Paley and David Sarnoff, went down to Washington to cut a deal with Congress. Congress would allow the fledgling networks free use of taxpayer-owned airwaves in exchange for one public service. That public service would be one hour of airtime set aside every night for informational broadcasting, or what we now call the evening news.
Congress, unable to anticipate the enormous capacity television would have to deliver consumers to advertisers, failed to include in its deal the one requirement that would have changed our national discourse immeasurably for the better – Congress forgot to add that under no circumstances could there be paid advertising during informational broadcasting. They forgot to say the taxpayers will give you the airwaves for free and for 23 hours a day, you should make a profit, but for one hour a night, you work for us.
And now those network newscasts, anchored through history by honest-to-God newsmen with names like Murrow and Reasoner and Huntley and Brinkley and Buckley and Cronkite and Rather and Russert…now, they have to compete with the likes of me, a cable anchor who’s in the exact same business as the producers of “Jersey Shore.â€
And that business was good to us. But News Night is quitting that business right now. It might come as a surprise to you that some of history’s greatest American journalists are working right now. Exceptional minds with years of experience and an unshakable devotion to reporting the news. But these voices are a small minority now and they don’t stand a chance against the circus when the circus comes to town. They’re over matched. I’m quitting the circus, switching teams. I’m going with the guys who are getting creamed. I’m moved. They still think they can win and I hope they can teach me a thing or two.
From this moment on, we’ll be deciding what goes on our air and how it’s presented to you based on the simple truth that nothing is more important to a democracy than a well-informed electorate. We’ll endeavor to put information in a broader context because we know that very little news is born at the moment it comes across our wire.
We’ll be the champion of facts and the mortal enemy of innuendo, speculation, hyperbole and nonsense. We’re not waiters in a restaurant, serving you the stories you asked for, just the way you like them prepared. Nor are we computers, dispensing only the facts because news is only useful in the context of humanity. I’ll make no effort to subdue my personal opinions. I will make every effort to expose you to informed opinions that are different from my own.
You may ask who are we to make these decisions. We are MacKenzie McHale and myself. Ms. McHale is our executive producer. She marshals the resources of over 100 reporters, producers, analysts and technicians and her credentials are readily available. I’m News Night’s managing editor and make the final decision on everything seen and heard on this program.
Who are we to make these decisions? We are the media elite.
We’ll be back after this with the news…
Can a fictional show on HBO change the way actual news is reported in this nation? That remains to be seen. It’s a long shot, but I wouldn’t call it impossible. I suspect the folks in the real newsrooms — both inside and outside The Beltway — are now watching every single episode of this show, whether they’ll admit it to you or not.
HuffPo’s Howard Fineman, formerly of WaPo and then Newsweek, writes, “After three episodes, I confess that I am all-in on The Newsroom.”
He goes on to say: “McAvoy’s rules are worth thinking about, and, generally, worth admiring and striving to follow. Viewers/readers/voters would be better served if we in the business worked harder to remember and honor the McAvoy rules.”
You’ll have to watch the show yourself for all of those “rules”. But Fineman’s words, in any case, are encouraging.
So go watch it. Or subscribe to HBO. Or whatever you need to do. You can thank me later.
Brad,
You are so right on this one! (Although episode 2 was very uneven, but I’ll forgive them that after episode 3!)
The critics skewered it, but I wonder if they didn’t see this week’s? So much for the “liberal media”!
And as much as Aaron Sorkin and Olbermann might deny it, you’d have to be blind not to see a bit of Keith in Will McAvoy.
Nicole Sandler
radioornot.com
McAvoy’s rules call to mind Bill Moyer’s observations as he exposed “the charade of fair and balanced — by which two opposing people offer competing opinions with a host who assumes the viewer will arrive at the truth by splitting the difference” — a process which he states in Moyers on America has served as a “substitute for independent analysis”:
Keep on rockin in the free world.
I will definitely put this in my schedule.
Thanks Brad.
I cancelled my HBO after 25 years because of hateful distortions like this show and Bill Maher.
it’s always nice to dream..and what a better way to make a hopeful statement about a failed system that through what only a fictional tv show can provide? a false, yet romantic, sense of hope, for sure, but for those of us who see the autumn of journalism dragging into the night, it is nice to find some comfort, somewhere.
Bob @ 4 said:
See? There’s another great reason to subscribe to HBO now. To make up for all of the Tea Bagger loons cancelling their subscription (or claiming they are).
So, what “distortions” are being offered by Newsroom, Bob?
And, for that matter, by Maher?
Once again HBO takes a perfectly good show and ruins it with their screed from the fantasy world of liberalland. Will is a republican? Good one. I’ll keep watching because it is a good soap opera and very instructive about the intellectual gymnastics liberals engage in daily in an attempt to justify their denial of human logic. At least that self important troll Maher hasn’t showed up…yet. That will make me turn it off
Thanks, Brad
Bill: “human logic” is an oxymoron, a chimera, an outcome of magical thinking like that you just displayed.
At first, I didn’t like the show; it was too slow. But week after week I’ve come to enjoy the news topics.
So I wonder if they’ll use this show as a vehicle to retroactively report on some of the self-professed failures? I don’t have HBO, so perhaps they already have? Let me know when they start reporting on Sibel Edmonds, or start sniffing around voting machines or 9/11. That’ll get my attention.
Too bad one has to “subscribe” to HBO, yet you can walk into a restaurant and be bombarded by an endless stream of propaganda from Fox “News.”
No way, zero change, Bryan Cranston has it rightfully wrapped up. Daniels is good in this, but no way.
I love the casting of Jane Fonda, a not so subtle connection to her ex-husband Ted Turner, owner of CNN.
Bill @7–I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, and I’ll keep saying it—you’ve got absolutely nothing there as an argument. You’re a broken record with nothing of substance in your grooves. All you can manage are variations on,”Nyaah, nyaah, you’re stupid, you’re a liberal, you’re a socialist, you’re a fill-in-the-blank.” It’d be really cool if you made even a passing attempt at exercising critical thinking. Do you think you might have that in ya? Or are you just gonna nyaah, nyaah me, too?
clarification of my own comment-
sorry, I didn’t mean to be saying that “Bill” has never said anything of substance. I don’t know if he has or not. I meant that that particular type of comment he was making is the kind I’m so very sick and tired of. I guess perhaps people of various political stripes make that kind of aggressive, insulting non-argument, too. But it is the staple, default, and go to response of Fox News, and I’ve just had it with that shit.
Yes, it’s an excellent show about an impossible dream. About a network news anchor actually trying to do the right thing and inform the public.
Anyone know what “real circumstances” Dan Rather was referring to when, in his episode by episode review, spoke of the arguments between executive producer and owner (Fonda) as really having happened in recent history?
We can only dream that those in the actual newsroom adopt the same rules as HBO’ s show The Newsroom. Or at least I think it would be my dream to hear it as should be reported. It is a great show of what I’ve seen so far and know many talking about it.
Love the show, love the premise. I HATE Jane Fonda. If she’s a regular, they lose me.
One can only hope this will help what’s happened to media for 6 decades (or better). If I might drop in a quick quote:
“There is no such thing, at this date of the world’s history, in America, as an independent press. You know it and I know it. There is not one of you who dares to write your honest opinions, and if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in print.
I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinion out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish as to write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for another job.
If I allowed my honest opinions to appear in one issue of my paper, before twenty-four hours my occupation would be gone.
The business of the journalists is to destroy the truth, to lie outright, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread. You know it and I know it, and what folly is this toasting an independent press?
We are the tools and vassals of rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks, they pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes.”
John Swinton (considered “the Dean of his Profession” by his peers), Chief of Staff, New York Times when asked to give a toast at the New York Press Club in 1953.
Thank you.
Brad, thanks for the heads up on this new series.
Unfortunately, prior to fact-checking, I posted the above quote, which is partially true. You see, Swinton was deceased by 1901. However, for those so inclined, there’s interesting reading on the issue here: http://web.archive.org/web/20020320101635/http://www.snowcrest.net/zepp/History/swinton.htm, which is the best explanation to date.
Thank you.
My most sincere apologies…Lily
Tears were sliding down my face through much of this first episode as I watched it online here. That’s the most extraordinary TV show I’ve ever seen. It’s right up there with Colbert’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner speech, which is really the same sort of performance performed in real life in real time.
One of the many things that got me crying was the presentation of people screaming at each other in the course of interacting about things that matter. I have gotten in quite a bit of trouble over the years for exactly that kind of behavior and have toned it down a bit to accommodate the sensibilities of others over the last few decades. It felt so deeply validating to see so many characters behaving MY way and it not being taken as the end of the world. Just another valid way of expressing oneself.
Haven’t been able to see the 2nd episode yet but did catch the 3rd. In the beginning the main character does mention stolen elections, I think, but then when the show depicts reporting on the 2010 midterms the perspective of electile dysfunction so near and dear to the hearts of so many here, is absent.
The show has just started. And what an explosive start is was. I’ll keep watching. It’d be great if they can keep up this level of substance and integrity. And maybe even expand into our left(out) field.
Wouldn’t it be the greatest, and orgasmically satisfying, to see Brad with a little cameo as the election integrity expert? Yeah!!!
Once again a very biased approach and one sided opinion declare war on the American people public opinion. The battle lines are drawn but not for the common good but derived from an ultra egoist frantic temper tantrum from adults portraying themselves as children. The divide and conquer simplistic approach is obviously well funded and in good standing to continue the veil of manipulation upon this land.
Scott Holmes @24–Time to look in the mirror.
Pray, tell us Scott, who you see as adults in the media, Washington, the national discourse.
Pray, tell us, who is NOT presenting a biased approach in the media, Washington, or anywhere else for that matter.
Pray, tell us, who IS fighting for the common good, in your view.
For me your comment is biased, draws battle lines, does nothing for the common good, seems egotistical, angry, childish, simplistic and manipulative. The only thing I can see that you might NOT be, among all the things you’re complaining about, is well funded. But who knows, maybe you’re that, too.
For me the reason this new HBO series is heroic is because it presents, FINALLY, a strong depiction of what many of us see as reality(let’s call it a Howard Zinn compatible view)but which to date has gotten precious little air-time. What little national air-time this progressive, reality based view HAS gotten has been provided primarily by two comedians. But the fact that our voice is just about NEVER heard and is in competition and in general overwhelmed by the noise and nonsense of promoters and enablers of the status-we’re-going-right-off-the-fucking-cliff-quo, that in my view represents EXACTLY what you’re complaining about, is not enough for you. No, you would seem to need/prefer to have COMPLETE SILENCE from the truly progressive view. How enlightened. How bold. How fear-based. How un-American.
OK HBO. Good One.
Now, how about you producing a REAL news show that tells the facts and names the names.
You could do it. Continue to operate on subscriptions and don’t ever give in to doing ads. Once you do that, they’ve got you.
Hello,
Here is the thing, from the outside world this is a good show. Without following real life politics or inside show business politics, this is a well written, witty, entertaining show. But given that Will is a republican who is deciding to not follow either party, but pretty much only rips on republicans, I.E bashing Rush Limbaugh, even though Rush is extreme, it is still pretty obvious. One thing republican broadcasting, leans to the right, but also examines both sides of the aisle no matter what is going on. Even Bill O’reilly almost ALWAYS has both sides of the issue on to represent the topic and he ways weighs in on both sides fairly, and lets logic decide.
As for the entertainment industry insides, it does a good job of capturing that the ambiance of the work environment. I use to work at a Los Angeles agency/ studio, and there are a ton of parallels in the show about the life of working in entertainment. High stress, high reward work. Mixed with very tense character/people interactions. As for all of that, I still think this is a hidden message left wing show. And it uses a “fallen” republican to do it. By doing that it attracts republicans and then attaches them do this good show, but also rewrites history in the news, by the way the left wing news would have wanted it aired. They can not go back, and make it seem like they got the news right.
So a good show from an entertainment perspective, and amazing dialogue, but a big time hidden agenda in there or not so hidden depending on how you see it. Any one against this concept cant dispute because Will says he wants to report the news fair and honest, and since then its been ANTI “big business”, with republican bashing stories and ideologies. There is a vey democratic feel to the show between the characters and the stories, and I think as usual its extremely bias. And that is one thing all democratic networks and media does. They never report fairly, and then complain or make shows about media not being reported fairly. Another point in case when he use Rush’s statistics against him, there are so many points that democrats would rips republicans for and make a no issue a issue, but when democrats break the same rule, the media never covers it. Just like will is doing right now. Like Mitt Romney getting boo’d at the NAACP speech for saying that Obamacare may be repealed. First he was invited to speak there, so booing the man is ridiculous. And second, if the otherside booed Obama, it would NEVER leave the media for a month. They would try and ruin his credibility just on that alone. But the left based media never reports fairly. And this is a perfect example. I would assume this would not get posted, But I hope it does.
Regards,
Chris
chris @27–
When you start a comment proclaiming Bill O’Reilly to be fair and logical, you immediately lose credibility because that is just not true.
Here are two links. One is to an article that details a few examples of his misinformation. The other is to a whole book of examples.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Oh-Really-Factor-Unspinning/dp/158322601X
http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1108
The real problem, not fully addressed here, is structural.
So long as corporations control the primary means of communications, commercial values will take precedence over democratic values.
Am I mistaken or was the last episode propaganda to continue pushing the repeal of the 2nd ammendment?? This concerns me I love the show but i wonder which direction it will take. Fast and Furious was an obvious false flag attempt to ban the 2nd ammendment.
Leonardo asked @ 30:
“Continue pushing”?? When did it start?!
To whom? Daryl Issa? Rush Limbaugh? George W. Bush (who started the same program? Wonder why Dubya would want to “push the repeal of the 2nd ammendment”? — Which, by the way, has only one “m” at the beginning of it. Home schooled?)
Im sorry for mispelling some words I wrote this comment in a hurry as I was on my break at work. The fact that you are attacking me for mispelling a couple of words is quite irrelevant. And no I was not home schooled however I wish i was. I am a graduate of CSUF and I blame them for the horrible educational system we have in this state of CA le alone the country. Look at the stats we do not come close to being number 1 in literacy, mathematics etc. I don’t own a gun but I feel that our founding fathers put that amendment in there for a very important reason. Have you even heard of the NWO. Did you know guns were confiscated in New Orleans during hurricane katrina and women were raped, the military and police robbed jewelery stores and much much more. Take a look at what has been happening in London after the right to bear arms was taken from them. I have nothing against you or anyone else I just want the best for our country and the constitution and Bill of Rights is in danger.
I’m just voicing my opinion and nobody elses but apparently I am a home schooled idiot. Thanks for putting me down you could have taught me something as I am always willing to learn. What is your opinion on Eric Holder?
I have noticed that I mispelled more words and most likely will be prejudged as an idiot. I apologize I am writing from my iphone andI tend to mess up quite a bit funny thing is english was the subject I excelled the most in lol. I think I have said enough this show is still amazing in my opinion and I hope real news shows emulate this style of presenting the news.
Leonardo asked:
Um, when did London ever have “the right to bear arms”? That said, are you suggesting that the murder, or just gun-violence rate in London is higher than it is in this country? Really?
You’ll have to over some evidence to back up that argument, if so.
I appreciate your points, but the Bill of Rights — well, at least the 2nd Amendment — is in absolutely no danger at all, as far as I can tell. Barack Obama expanded gun rights upon taking office, and I have heard absolutely zero serious talk about regulating them in any way (you remember the “well regulated” part of the 2nd Amendment, right?)
That, even in light of the Tuscon shooting last year, and with some 6 different mass shootings in this country so far this year, including what happened last night in Aurora, CO.
I think he stinks.
By the way, I apologize for the crack at your spelling. It was meant as a joke, if not necessarily a particularly good one.
ignorance and indifferent bliss is obvioulsy well and good dear mr lasagna. you are perpetuating the agenda with your inability to listen to any opposition or opinioon and turn it into some trivial approach. all i am trying to say is that the deliberate seperation of the people is all that both parties and this show are trying to do. please keep thinking that all things are personal and no agenda to divide and conquer exsists.
HBO On Demand has listed all four episodes until yesterday.b episode 3 has been removed. It was there for week. But now you can only watch episodes 1, 2, and 4.
Any chance the Koch brothers played hardball and had the episode taken down?
“Right to bear arms,” Leonardo?
Ouch! That’s gotta hurt.
What do you have against Ursidae?
Scott Holmes @36
I cannot make heads nor tails out of what you’re talking about.