The Entertainment & Culture section of today’s Wall Street Journal features an article from columnist Dorothy Rabinowitz entitled, “The Other Letterman Show”. (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122420423963143201.html) The topic of the piece is talk-show arrogance . . . which there is no shortage of in today’s mass media.
The majority of the article focuses on David Letterman’s vindictive response to John McCain’s last-minute cancelation of his scheduled Sept 24 appearance on “The Late Show”. Apparently Letterman’s ire was further stoked when he discovered that, conversely, McCain honored a scheduled appearance for that same day with Katie Couric. Here’s a snippet of Rabinowitz’s commentary:
“In the course of his complaints, Mr. Letterman lurched from fury to fervent wonder at John McCain's wartime heroism, to jibes that somebody had been putting something in the candidate's Metamucil -- a joke consistent with the Letterman show's now standard brand of comedy. It was impossible, needless to say, to mistake any of this for joking -- nothing in Mr. Letterman's tireless emissions on the subject spoke for anything but his rage.”
Arrogance is virtually a prerequisite in Hollywood, so Letterman’s response was typical. Rabinowitz relates how Arthur Godfrey attempted to bury young singer Julius LaRosa in the early 1950s because LaRosa—a regular on Godfrey’s popular variety show—had the audacity to hire his own agent: “Godfrey informed the audience that they had just heard LaRosa's swan song. In response to the tide of public hostility that followed, Godfrey announced that the problem was that the singer had ‘lost his humility.’”
Don Imus is also mentioned in the piece. Prior to his eating crow for calling the Rutgers’ women’s basketball team “nappy-headed hoes”, Imus had a reputation for personally attacking anyone who disagreed with him: “Over a decade ago, one of the most legendary names in broadcasting told me of the dangers of making any public criticism of Imus. ‘He'll never stop,’ he warned. ‘He'll go on and on, to attack every day. He won't care what he says.’”
Amusingly, it’s not uncommon to have a clash of egos among co-hosts themselves. Chris Matthews and former ESPN Sportscenter anchor Keith Olbermann—perhaps the king of blowhards—were both bumped from their MSNBC presidential election anchor chairs because of their rabid anti-conservative views and their personal animosity toward each other. So ridiculous had their spats become that former MSNBC anchor Connie Chung slammed both in the Wall Street Journal stating, “My reaction to that is: 'Grow up!' They have to just grow up." (http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB121989105850778775.html?mod=blog) In a laughable example of delusional self-importance, Olbermann allegedly demanded that the network provide him with bodyguards since he feared his life was in danger. Sorry, Keith, but the only protection you need is protection from yourself.
Lest anyone think talk-show arrogance and clashes of egos are solely a male phenomenon, let’s not ignore The View: a talk show dominated by four self-absorbed women who argue amongst themselves daily and who “view” the program as their personal soapbox from which to pontificate. It’s no wonder the show has replaced its hosts as often as the New York Yankees replaced managers in the 1980s.
Truthfully, it doesn’t matter who the host is or the genre of the talk show. Once a personality starts believing his/her own press clippings—watch out. Magically it becomes their world and the rest of humanity is merely permitted to live in it.
Donald Tremblay
