KMYoung.com » RIP

R.I.P. Andy Rooney

Kevin — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 03:18:41 +0000

I’ve been a fan of Andy Rooney for a long time. Perhaps it was his wit, perhaps his wisdom, perhaps the eyebrows. Mostly, I think it was this: He looked a lot like my grandfather and said things I wished I had the guts to say… not to mention an uncanny ability to see humor and idiocy in the mere mundane. And just perhaps, this was what captured all of our hearts. In many ways he looked like all of our grandfathers and said things that we all wish we had the guts to say.

Whatever the reason, this lovable curmudgeon was always honest and frank, qualities hard to come by—and greatly unappreciated—today. Not to mention his enormous platform. Andy had the honor and good fortune of summing up the greatest news program of all time, “60 Minutes,” every week. Though I have always loved 60 Minutes for its methodical and in-depth coverage of stories, I’d often find myself fast-forwarding through world leaders and stories of heroism just to get to the real brilliance, Andy.

Amazingly, Andy had been writing for television since its birth. There really aren’t any long-timers like him left around. And though time and television passed him by, he remained largely unchanged. There was no shortage of things that annoyed or baffled him and he covered as many as he could.

Rooney retired just a few weeks ago. And then he died. Columnist Froma Harrop penned it well in writing: “It was basically like he said he was through and ‘now I’m leaving.’” Said another reporter: “R.I.P. Andy… I bet God’s getting an earful right now.”

During his last segment, Andy reflected, “This is a moment I have dreaded. I wish I could do this forever…”

So do we Andy. So do we.

Do What You Love

Kevin — Sun, 03 Oct 2010 03:02:49 +0000

Stephen J. Cannell didn’t produce every show on television during the late 1970s and ’80s—it just seemed like he did. The Greatest American Hero, The A-Team, The Rockford Files, 21 Jump Street, etc., etc. For 30 years, beginning in the early 1970s and extending through the 1990s, television viewers could hardly go a week without running into a show written by Mr. Cannell. During his multi-decade career he produced/wrote over 40 television series. For those who grew up on his shows, Cannell and his creations, quite simply, defined television.

As Jeff Jensen so aptly notes: “Cannell produced for an era in which TV success was still measured by total households, not demos or niches. His shows had to work for tens of millions of viewers; as such, he was a master engineer of broadly appealing entertainment. Defining characteristics: Wit, heart, resolvable conflicts, and lots and lots and lots of action.”

“Most of my things strike to the same theme,” Mr. Cannell said in an interview this year in Success magazine, “which is not to take yourself so seriously that you can’t grow.” “I’m generally a very happy guy, because I’m doing what I want,” he said.

Cannell made TV feel larger than it was. Perhaps in large part, thanks to his memorable production logo. There is no one who lived in the ’80s that will not remember it. As Jensen states: “We remember Cannell as he would want to be remembered: As a writer. The vanity credit that concluded many of his shows became as famous as the shows themselves: Cannell triumphantly ripping a page out of his IBM Selectric typewriter; cue upbeat guitar riff.”

As comedian Patton Oswalt tweeted about his passing: “In memory of Stephen J. Cannell, everyone rip a sheet of paper out of your typewriter and let it fall to the ground.”

Stephen J. Cannell Productions Logos

And That's The Way It is

Kevin — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 03:07:44 +0000

He was ending his notable career as I was entering Kindergarten, and yet even at that young age it was impossible to not feel the effects of the man who was notably regarded as the ‘most trusted man in America’. On my grandparents old console TV, which was more a piece of furnature than it was a piece of electronics, I can remember seeing him sign off with his nightly tagline, “And that’s the way it is” He was, for decades, the the voice of unfolding history. Cronkite was not just a newsman; he was — like Edward R. Murrow, who brought him to CBS and television — as close a thing to the idea of a newsman as his age imagined. In high school I fell in love with tv news thanks to a high school teacher named Joe Glowacki and his class, CHS-TV (the first daily high school news broadcast in the country). It was in this class that I came to appreciate Cronkite’s brilliance and pivotal role in the most important national events spanning decades. Later in college, as a Communications major, I came to envy his cool delivery and seemingly unshakeable demeanor. The rolling rise and fall of his voice and the rhythms and pauses he built into his prose gave his reporting the subtle weight of blank verse. He was, and is, the gold standard. In the post-evening news age, he will always stand as the pinnacle of what it should have been. As Robert Lloyd of the LA Times rightly said, “Network news anchors still aim for that mix of eloquence and authority that Cronkite embodied, but they compete, at a disadvantage, with the noise of an ascendant punditocracy and the mountain-from-molehill nattering of cable news organizations that live on crises — it’s not the old voice of reassuring honesty that they cultivate, but one of perpetual anxiety. There are many more rooms in the mansion that is television news nowadays, but they have grown proportionately smaller; they are no longer fit for giants.”

Goodbye Walter. Rest in Peace.

“I’ve been proud over the years to see Walter become, not just one of the best known people on television but one of the best known people in the whole world of people. He was proud of me, too, and there’s no better feeling in life than that. I wouldn’t trade Walter Cronkite liking me for just about anything I’ve ever had.” - Andy Rooney, “60 Minutes” commentator

“There was a reason why Walter was called the most trusted man in America. Nothing was more important to him than getting the story right and telling it fairly, and he expected the same of us. I’ve learned a lot from wonderful colleagues here at CBS News, but from him most of all.” - Charles Osgood, anchor of “Sunday Morning”

“Radio and television newsrooms all over America are filled with reporters and producers, writers and editors, who got into journalism for one reason: Walter Cronkite. He was a role model for so many of us. I grew up watching Walter on television, and it was the thrill of my life to finally meet him, and a privilege to spend six years producing pieces for him for the”CBS Evening News.” He set standards that we in broadcast journalism still strive to meet today. Walter Cronkite was, quite simply, the best. His legacy and his spirit will always be part of CBS News and wherever good journalism is practiced.” - Rick Kaplan, executive producer, “CBS Evening News:”

Bea Arthur, 86, RIP

Kevin — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 02:59:48 +0000

Beatrice Arthur could get a huge laugh with just a long, hard, silent stare. When she opened her mouth, her ringingly authoritative voice brought forth another wave of laughter. To defy her as Maude Findlay in Maude, or as Dorothy Zbornak in Golden Girls, was foolish: she’d crush you. No one upstaged Bea Arthur, yet no one, performer or TV viewer, resented her for that. Indeed, this was the source of her thunderbolt comic power. Other women may rival her as TV icons (Lucille Ball, Mary Tyler Moore), but no woman ever made so many people so happy by being so imperious, so decisive, so just plain bossy.

Look at Maude, which premiered in 1972 as a spin-off from All In The Family. Its best episodes play out in front of the studio audience like complete little plays; the laughter is frequently so explosive, Arthur has to do that stage-freeze thing, standing motionless until her next line can be heard. A force of intimidation, Arthur made upper-middle-class liberal Maude brayingly noisy. She towered over her TV husband Walter (Bill Macy) and daughter Carol (Adrienne Barbeau). The show’s humor was often rooted in seriousness (the revolutionary 1972 Maude-gets-an-abortion episode) and anger (countless tantrums directed at anyone Maude thought stupid), and Arthur’s innate gravity was her greatest comic weapon: she was fearless about being unlikable, and we liked her all the more for exactly that quality.

On Golden Girls, as Dorothy, Arthur ruled the aging hen house with caustic slashes of sarcasm. For Arthur, Golden Girls was a further refinement of everything she did in Maude. The second series demonstrated how she could modulate her talent to fit into an ensemble of equals… even though she made you know that Dorothy considered herself superior to all she surveyed.

Because we live in a pop culture that thrives on parody and irreverence, Bea Arthur existed in the popular imagination during her final years as the punchline to jokes about her deep voice and her Amazonian stature (try Googling her name and “mannish” and you’ll see what I mean). She had a huge gay following, yet never became a figure of camp ridicule. Whether playing a character or being herself — she was a delightfully clever, articulate, self-deprecating guest on talk and variety shows — Arthur allowed you to both identify with her and to admire her. There was a lot to admire.

reprinted from Entertainment Weekly

Personally, I will never forget watching Bea on the Golden Girls during its original run, and then often in rerun. It was a show that I was not allowed to watch at home, assumedly because of PG humor and sassyness of the women. But as happens with all good grandparents, the rules were more lax at their house and my grandmother, bless her heart, loved the Golden Girls. I loved the sarcasm, wit, and delivery even at a young age. Only later in life did I learn of Bea’s groundbreaking role in Maude and see many of those episodes in rerun as well. As a student of television and a lover of the culture surrounding it, I have an appreciation for the role this show played in the formative years of television. Bea, you’ll be missed.