A LITTLE TALE OF TWO DUDES WHO IMPACT THE NEWS

Yesterday I promised my Masketeers on Twitter a story that involved both Andy Lack and Jeff Zucker who run CNBC and CNN respectively and, under the guise of news, support the current administration as both news channels attempt to maximize their ratings. I have called them ratings whores which they are but this is just a fun story about the biz. Enjoy

Where to begin? OK let’s start here. Sometime in February 1993 NBC’s DATELINE decided that it would be cool to blow up some GM trucks and claim that they were unsafe. Let’s say that didn’t work out too well for them. To no one’s surprise heads rolled including the Executive Producer of DATELINE and the President of NBC NEWS.

One of my roles as head of scheduling at NBC was to be the liaison between the news division and entertainment. As part of that gig I was sort of the unofficial DATELINE program exec. Jeff Diamond, the Executive Producer of DATELINE, and I would talk quite often.

I still remember calling Jeff up the day after this happened and before the admission that this was ‘staged”. GM was insane and I suggested that we rent out Madison Square Garden and do a “two out of three fall” event where we ram cars into the trucks. Loser donates a million dollars to the winner’s charity. . I’m always thinking like a wrestling promoter. Jeff  was not buying it.

Michael Gartner was replaced by Andy Lack as President NBC News and Neal Shapiro was the new Executive Producer of DATELINE. My friend Jeff Gaspin was the NBC News executive in charge of prime time programs and, when he was looking for an executive producer for a news magazine, interviewed Andy for the gig.  Jeff told him he was not qualified so he was was gone pretty soon after Andy arrived. That’s how things work.

I don’t remember if Neal called me or I called him but, regardless, it was the beginning of a fantastic partnership. We liked each other as human beings and, with so many DATELINEs on the schedule, we would try to match the stories to the surrounding entertainment shows so as to maximize ratings (never said I wasn’t a ratings whore).

We had names for DATELINE depending on where they played. LAW&DATELINE was paired with LAW&ORDER. TOUCHED BY A DATELINE was on a night with softer programming and WHEN DATELINE ATACKS played Sunday at 7 following sports. News and Entertainment worked in perfect harmony to make DATELINE a valuable and profitable franchise for the Peacock. Then there was this young whippersnapper Jeff Zucker.

Zucker had been overseeing THE TODAY SHOW where he was always more interested in razzle dazzle than news. A little while after I left NBC Scott Sassa fired Garth Ancier (Entertainment President) and Jeff came in to run Entertainment. This was the height of the reality era and I guess Bob Wright (the head of NBC) felt someone with Jeff’s background was what the network needed. Things unraveled pretty fast under his leadership but Jeff kept failing upward.

Anyway, back in May 1993 we were told by New York that we were adding another news magazine to our schedule. The magazine would not be called DATELINE but rather NOW WITH TOM BROKAW AND KATIE COURIC and wunderkind Jeff Zucker would be executive producing. I think we were even told where it would go on the schedule but I could be wrong about this.

Don Ohlmeyer had come to the party as President, NBC West Coast. Don was a very competitive and intimidating dude which was just fine with me and some other execs like my pals Vince Manze and John Miller in marketing. Don was fine with all these news magazines on the schedule as long as they delivered ratings and he was aware that there was a strong channel of communication between Neal and I. Zucker on the other hand wanted no input from Entertainment.

This is all a setup for an incident that happened sometime in the 1993-94 season. It was either in November or February I don’t remember but we were at the start of a sweep and, at that time, sweeps were very important to the networks and especially the network affiliates. I don’t remember why but I was working from home on the day of “the incident”.

Bill Clinton had appointed some controversial figure to head the Justice Department’s Civil Rights division, if my memory serves me, and it started a bit of a tiff in DC. Brokaw or Couric (I think in was Tom) got the individual for an exclusive interview for NWTBAKC. News magazines were entertainment first and news second (kind of the way all news is now) so featuring this lengthy interview in the center of both the show and a night surrounded by scripted series was guaranteed to be a ratings disaster. It was.

We get the ratings and Ohlmeyer immediately calls me.

“What the fuck was that motherfucker (referring to Zucker) thinking putting that interview on in a sweeps period”

I calmly explained to Don that Jeff was working with the biggest star at NBC News and I’m certain that Brokaw would do whatever he wanted to do. I told Don that Jeff is a very competitive person and I’m sure he feels terrible about this but his hands were tied. I tried to defend Jeff to Don but Don did not want to hear it.

“I want you to call him and ask him what the fuck he was thinking and tell him how upset we are.”

“Don I’m pretty sure he feels terrible about this and nothing is gained by calling him.”

“You call him and get back to me with what he has to say about this.”

I was sitting at my kitchen counter (ironically where I am writing this right now) and I call Jeff.

Here is the conversation:

Me: “Jeff I…………

Zucker: “What the fuck do you want me to tell you…………………and he proceeded to go all Donald Duck on me for at least ten minutes.

I put down the phone and let him rant. At some point the Masked Wife passed by. She knew I was calling Jeff and just looked at me and said “Zucker?” and I nodded.

Once there was a lull in the rant I jumped in and tried to calm things down by explaining Don asked me to call. I told him I understood his dilemma and let’s move on. This  just started another tirade.

I called Don back and said that Jeff and I spoke and he understood our concerns. I didn’t go into details. Don seemed satisfied. He got his pound of flesh and I figured I had moved on the next insanity of network television. I was wrong.

About an hour after my “conversation” with Jeff, Andy Lack called me.

“Masked, I don’t want you to ever talk with my people again.”

“OK Andy”

I can only imagine what Zucker told him I said to him.

A few hours later Andy called again to reiterate that he was not kidding and I can no longer talk with his people. I again reassured him I would abide by his order.

I stopped calling Neal. I never talked to Zucker about his show because I knew that was useless. I never told Ohlmeyer or anyone in entertainment about Andy’s call to me. I just didn’t think it made sense to create friction over this.

About three weeks after ‘the incident” Neal called me wondering what was going on. Why wasn’t I calling him. I told him about Andy’s orders. He said that’s bullshit and that we needed to talk and we did.

A few weeks later we were having our usual afternoon meeting with Don and something came up about news. Don asked me to handle it. This was my opening.

“Don, Andy has forbidden me from talking to anyone in News”

He asked why and I reminded him of the Zucker call. After the meeting Don asked me to stay and he called Lack. It was a pretty awesome reaming of the President of NBC News. It was so effective that several years later when we cancelled the Monday Movie and added another DATELINE  to the schedule Andy cowered in a corner during the pretty intense debate between me and Warren Littlefield (pro cancel) and Don who wanted to keep the movie. At one point he came over to me and thanked me for defending news but said if he opened his mouth Don would attack him. It was chickenshit on his part but I got a Tiffany clock from Andy as a thank you.

While we are all quarantined I thought I would give you a little look behind the curtains at two executives who are playing a major role in how many of you are perceiving the reality of the current situation.

Stay safe gang.