It has been announced that Michael Jackson's public funeral with be held next Tuesday at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. CBS has revealed that they are going to cover it extensively, with The Early Show broadcasting live from the Staples Center on Monday and Tuesday and Katie Couric doing The CBS Evening News from there as well. No word yet on what ABC and NBC will be doing, though I assume they'll do similar coverage (not to mention the massive coverage we'll see on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News).
But how extensive should the coverage be? Should the news channels cover it all day long? Should the networks report live from the funeral? Should the funeral be televised live on all channels? Should there just be stories of it and no live coverage at all?
If anyone in the press should ever ask you, "What were you doing when you heard the great Michael Jackson was dead?", be sure to answer with: "Reading one of your stories on what a lowlife you thought he was just prior to his death."
There are times when I'm ashamed to be a part of the media. The 48 hours after Michael Jackson's death was just such an epoch. I chose that last word carefully because the endless, maudlin, self-congratulatory coverage the major news networks wallowed in following Jackson's death was as long-winded as it was embarrassingly dramatic.
While that coverage is sure to continue throughout the memorial services, unavoidable custody and estate battles and forthcoming autopsy reports, none of that will compare in sickly sweet sensation to what CNN, Fox News and the others lowered themselves to just following the singer's death.
We've talked about this a lot here at TV Squad, how the word "exclusive" isn't used correctly in TV news these days. In fact I'll go one step further and say that networks often lie when they say something is an "exclusive." They'll say that an interview with a famous celebrity or a politician is an exclusive, but you realize you just watched an interview with the same person on another network the night before, or there's an interview with the same person the next day.
Now, some networks will say they have an exclusive before another interview airs, so in that case I guess we can say they're right (if we give them the benefit of the doubt that they didn't know the other interview was coming, that is), but more often than not they know it's not an exclusive.
At the risk of becoming one of the people of the "blogosphere" that CNBC's Dennis Kneale doesn't like, he does seem a little irritating, doesn't he? He always seems to be yelling at viewers for some reason, or at the very least trying to convince you he's right, really really hard.
In the video below, he talks about how he thinks the economy is getting much better, and talks about various web sites that have called him out on it. (Takes a little while to get to that part but it's worth watching the first couple minutes of dry money talk.)
I get antsy watching CNN's Tony Harris do the news. He always has these uncomfortable hiccups in his delivery and he's always looking off camera, as if the next word in the sentence is floating in the air next to him or on the table and he has to look to see what it is so he can continue.
But I find this funny: Harris is on Facebook, but he told CNN viewers yesterday that he has no idea how to log on to it and finds the whole thing "stalkerish." I'm looking for the video and will post it here if I can find it.
I sent emails to two networks officials to confirm this jarring claim. Jeremy Gaines, MSNBC's vice president of communications, responded that he is certain the entry is a "hoax" and that he and other network officials were working to correct it. The section on Olbermann's death has since been removed from the page.
I know we all grieve in our own way, but isn't this CNN interview with Michael Jackson's dad more than a little odd? First he says that he's feeling "great" when Don Lemon asks how he's doing, then he goes on to plug some DVD company he has. Eh, I don't know. I probably wouldn't even have gone to this event if my son had just died and we hadn't even buried him yet. You can sense Lemon is uncomfortable too.
The stunning news yesterday about the death of Michael Jackson conjured up many memories of the singer for me, as I'm sure it did for most people. For many of us, there was never a time when the Jackson Five and Michael were not part of pop culture. Little Michael and his brothers on The Ed Sullivan Show, their funky outfits when they sang on The Flip Wilson Show (much cooler than the Osmond Brothers!), Michael as the Scarecrow in The Wiz (a hideous movie, but he was quite good).
Well after leaving his brothers to become Michael Jackson, solo superstar, Michael hooked up with Paul McCartney for a couple of songs, "Say, Say, Say" and "The Girl is Mine." The latter was okay, but the former was terrific. They co-wrote it and it reached #1 on the charts in 1983. Those were the times when MTV really showcased music videos and the artists and labels invested in top-notch productions. It was, if you will, the golden age of music videos!
Wow. Busy day in celebrity deaths. First we hear that Farrah Fawcett finally lost her battle to cancer, then suddenly we hear that, after being rushed to a LA hospital in cardiac arrest, Michael Jackson also died. He was only 50, and he was about to embark on a comeback concert stint in London that he hoped would revive his career.
ABC News was already scrambling to move up the Farrah special they had planned to air on 20/20 this coming Friday. That special, where Barbara Walters interviews Ryan O'Neal, will be shown tonight at 10 PM ET. They also just announced that they will be airing an MJ retrospective at 9 PM ET.
Other networks are following suit with their own specials, according to THR.com.
It's interesting how most news outlets aside from Fox didn't confirm MJ's death even though our friends at TMZ had the news first. I guess it wasn't legitimate enough for them. Either way, it's a shockingly sad day in the entertainment biz, no matter what you may have thought of Farrah or Jackson.
Perez Hilton says he got a black eye from The Black Eyed Peas.
According to shrill gossip blogger and almost celebrity Hilton, the manager of the Black Eyed Peas planted a "boom boom pow" in Perez's puss this weekend. That roar you almost heard was grateful, repressed applause coming out of Hollywood.
A faux journalist (nee: rumor mongering hack), Hilton jumped onto the TV viewers' radar last month when he served as a judge for the Miss USA Pageant and started a war of words with Miss California over her stance in gay marriage.
The storyline featuring Donald Trump "buying" Monday Night Raw from World Wrestling Entertainment's Vince McMahon lasted all of one week. On Monday's commercial-free Raw from Green Bay, Wisc., McMahon bought the show back from Trump for "double the original price." Trump took the deal and smacked McMahaon across the chops for his trouble.
The show capped a day-long publicity festival for the WWE in which local network news affiliates flocked to the Green Bay airport to shoot Trump arriving and to hear speeches from him and McMahon. It was the first time any media set foot in that airport without Brett Favre being involved.
You can complain about CNN or Fox News or MSNBC, but I don't know if they've ever been tricked to this extent (mentions of Howard Stern don't count). A Bolivian TV station and a Dutch radio station both reported that photos were found (somehow) from the last moments of Air France 447 as it broke up over the ocean. Actually, the photos are from a popular TV show titled Lost which runs on ABC. Ahem.
According to James Poniewozik, this isn't a done deal or even close to being a done deal, but it is certainly one of the moves that ABC is thinking about: Nightline might move to 10 PM from it's current 11:35 slot.
It would certainly be a lot cheaper than running dramas (which are usually the scripted shows the networks have at 10PM), and it could signal a change in the way that networks schedule their shows. This would also mean (in all likelihood) that Jimmy Kimmel Live would move into the 11:35 slot.
Though David Letterman officially apologized last night for his controversial Sarah Palin joke, it's not stopping Palin supporters from calling for his dismissal.
It's the latest chapter in a story bearing an uncanny resemblance to herpes. It never goes away, and you're never sure when it's going to pop up again. In an attempt to end the furor, Letterman took a moment during his Monday night broadcast to apologize directly to Palin and her family.
"It's not your fault that (the joke) was misunderstood. It's my fault," Letterman said. "So, I would like to apologize, especially to the two daughters involved, Bristol and Willow, and also to the governor and her family and everybody else who was outraged by the joke."
He added, "I understand, of course, why people are upset. I would be upset myself. I'm sorry about it, and I'll try to do better in the future."
Chris Hansen and Dateline have become so embedded in the popular culture that even the people that get arrested talk about it. Tonight at 10 on NBC, Hansen and his crew go to Las Vegas for their "Vegas Undercover" investigation, and when a guy gets arrested, it turns out that he watches the show too!
It has been announced that Michael Jackson's public funeral with be held next Tuesday at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. CBS has revealed that they are going to cover it extensively, with The Early Show broadcasting live from the Staples Center on Monday and Tuesday and Katie Couric doing The CBS Evening News from there as well. No word yet on what ABC and NBC will be doing, though I assume they'll do similar coverage (not to mention the massive coverage we'll see on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News). 
If anyone in the press should ever ask you, "What were you doing when you heard the great Michael Jackson was dead?", be sure to answer with: "Reading one of your stories on what a lowlife you thought he was just prior to his death."
We've 
I get antsy watching CNN's Tony Harris do the news. He always has these uncomfortable hiccups in his delivery and he's always looking off camera, as if the next word in the sentence is floating in the air next to him or on the table and he has to look to see what it is so he can continue. 
Keith Olbermann! Come on down! You're the next TV celebrity whose death has been falsely reported on the Internet!
Perez Hilton says he got a black eye from The Black Eyed Peas.
That didn't take long.
According to James Poniewozik, this isn't a done deal or even close to being a done deal, but it is certainly one of the moves that ABC is thinking about: 
Though David Letterman officially apologized last night for his controversial Sarah Palin joke, it's not stopping Palin supporters from calling for his dismissal.
TV Squad previews NBC's new shows (part 1)
TV 101: How ESPN controls the world and what the other networks can learn from it
TV Squad previews CBS's new shows
