TGIF! Brian Stelter here at 9:30pm ET Friday with a look ahead at Saturday's big stories, Sunday's interviews, and the music industry's biggest weekend of the year...
Building the tunnel
Light is visible at the end of the Covid-19 tunnel, but it's not by accident. As Evan Osnos said on CNN yesterday, "we're building the tunnel," through the vaccine rollout and continued safety measures. We're building the tunnel "to get out of the predicament we're in," he said. I found that to be a really useful, optimistic way to think about the pandemic at this one-year point.
Greater normalcy, but not normal
Brian Lowry writes: "We're seeing a sort-of red carpet at the Grammys this weekend, and the start of March Madness, with the entire men's tournament being played in Indiana. These are steps toward pre-pandemic normalcy. But the Grammys will be missing most of the customary fanfare. (The AP's Marcela Isaza wrote about the 'hyper-cautious scene' at the awards site.) And some basketball teams are being forced to pull out of conference tournaments because of Covid-19 cases. Our American pasttimes, our distractions, are showing our progress in the proverbial tunnel, but that we're clearly not out of it yet."
Is the media getting this balance right?
"There is real reason to be hopeful right now. And I say this as someone who was really pessimistic, you know, at the end of January," Ezra Klein says on the latest edition of his NYT podcast.
Klein observes that "hope is a scary emotion to feel right now. A lot of us don’t want to let ourselves believe it’s going to get much better, only to be back in lockdown in two months. And to be sure, I can't tell you the future. But I think it's easy right now, particularly in the media, where we don't want to repeat the mistake of being insufficiently alarmed, to endlessly focus on what could still go wrong, to just tell you all the caveats and the maybes and the way it could go off the rails. But I think hope is an important emotion, important also as a policy emotion, so people know that if they hold on a little bit longer, there is an end in sight." His guest is Dr. Ashish Jha... Here's the pod and the transcript...
TV networks talking about how to "re-emerge"
A wide variety of TV networks are deep in discussions about when and how to restore some pre-pandemic features like in-studio guests. Variety's Brian Steinberg recently wrote about these talks at the "Today" show. Tom Mazzarelli, exec producer of the first three hours of "Today," told him: "We are in conversations with everybody we need to be in conversations with – with NBC, with local officials and state health officials – about how do we re-emerge."
Take the "Today" show plaza for example -- it's "an iconic part of New York," Mazzarelli said -- "people standing in that Plaza, cheering us on, waving to friends at home. We can't wait to get back to that and as soon as we are allowed to, as soon as we feel comfortable, we are going to do that. We will mark it and it will be a big occasion."
Friday's milestone: 100 million vaccine doses administered
Via CNN's Deidre McPhillips: "More than 101 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine have been administered in the US," per Friday's latest CDC update.
And there's this: "More than 2.9 million more doses were reported administered since yesterday, marking a new daily record..."
Lisa's reflections
Lisa Respers France writes: "Three weeks to the day Covid-19 took my father's life, I received my first dose of the Pfizer vaccine. The nurse administering it saw my grief and when I explained why she said 'I'm so very sorry. Please know that I am praying for you and your family.' I don't even know her name, or even what she really looks like because of the mask, but I so desperately wish I could have hugged her. On Friday I was honored to be on Dr. Sanjay Gupta's "Coronavirus: Fact vs. Fiction" podcast talking about grieving -- and the experience of planning my father's service from a distance. Though I wish with all I have that I did not have to learn the lessons it taught me." 🙏
FOR THE RECORD, PART ONE
-- Happy birthday to CNN's Jake Tapper, who helmed a primetime special called "Back to School: Kids, Covid and the Fight to Reopen" on Friday...
-- On Friday afternoon President Biden held the first Rose Garden event of his presidency to celebrate the Covid-19 relief measure. "It's critical to demonstrate that government can function," he said... (CNN)
-- Biden's Thursday night address reached at least 32 million people via TV. Several news outlets noted that Biden outperformed Donald Trump's first primetime address, in August 2017, which scored about 28 million viewers... (Deadline)
-- ABC was the #1 network overall during the speech. Fox News was #1 on cable. "Maybe it was the Tucker Carlson Reaction Cam," Marisa Sarnoff wrote... (Mediaite)
-- Speaking of Fox, Geraldo Rivera now says he's not exploring a run for Senate. According to Rivera, when he tweeted about the idea, "Fox freaked out, said, 'Pick a lane. Are you a journalist or a politician?'" (TheWrap)
Friday's top story: Gov. Cuomo
The deafening calls for New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo's resignation -- from Democrats across the state -- were the lead story across the Big Three evening newscasts on Friday. There were new developments almost every hour, even as Cuomo vowed not to resign, so check CNN.com's story for the very latest.
>> WaPo's team wrote: Friday's rapid shift "ended weeks of hesitation by Democratic leaders, who had held out hope that a full investigation of Cuomo’s actions could be completed before a verdict was passed on his term in office."
>> Rebecca Traister spoke with numerous people who worked for and with the Cuomo admin for NYMag's next cover story. Title: "The Cruelty and the Casualties."
>> Also on Friday, Jessica Bakeman, a former beat reporter in Albany, penned a first-person piece for NYMag and alleged multiple instances of sexual harassment.
Coming up this weekend
Fox's Greg Gutfeld helms the final Saturday edition of his late-night talk show ahead of his move to weeknights next month...
We "spring forward" and lose an hour of sleep Sunday at 2am ET as Daylight Saving Time takes effect...
Tapper's guests on "SOTU" include Larry Hogan and Stacey Abrams...
The Grammy Awards air on CBS at 8pm...
This Sunday on "Reliable"
We may add a surprise or two, but the current guest list includes David Zurawik, S.E. Cupp, Erik Wemple, Jennifer Morrell, Marc Elias, and the first TV interview with Alec MacGillis about his extraordinary new book "Fulfillment." RS was the #1 live program on all of cable news last Sunday in the 25-54 demo, so let's do it again this Sunday at 11am ET on CNN...
Looking ahead to next week...
Biden will travel to Pennsylvania and Georgia to keep selling the benefits of the relief bill...
On Monday Oscar nominations will be announced on a live-stream starting at 8:19 a.m. ET...
Some movie theaters in L.A. are aiming to reopen on Monday...
On Tuesday Don Lemon's book "This Is the Fire" hits bookshelves. Lemon was on Thursday's "Tonight Show" with a preview...
Virtual SXSW starts on Tuesday...
Previewing Sunshine Week on the "Reliable Sources" podcast
Sunshine Week kicks off Monday. The annual initiative is supported by the News Leaders Association to promote open government and access to public information. For this week's RS podcast, I spoke with three journalists who are shining a light on local and federal government: LA Times DC bureau chief Kimbriell Kelly, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel editor George Stanley, and Katie Townsend, legal director at the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. "There's a lot more that needs to be done to increase transparency to government at both a federal level and at a local level," Kelly said.
You can hear the conversation via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you get your podcasts...
FOR THE RECORD, PART TWO
-- "The fallout from Oprah Winfrey's jaw-dropping interview with Harry and Meghan this week has been extraordinary and layered," Max Foster and Lauren Said-Moorhouse write... (CNN)
-- CBS said Friday that Oprah's special "has now delivered 21.3 million viewers," up from 17.1 million, with the addition of time-shifted #'s. The interview "has also surpassed 61 million viewers around the world..." (Deadline)
-- Also on Friday the UK media regulator Ofcom confirmed Wednesday's reports that Meghan filed a complaint about Piers Morgan's comments on ITV... (BBC)
-- Harry and Meghan's Archewell Foundation announced "new support" for several groups on Friday: Color of Change, Mind, The PressPad Charitable Foundation, and URL Media. The couple is "investing in the next generation of young, diverse journalists," Bianca Betancourt wrote... (Bazaar)
Recapping Friday's House hearing about news and tech
Kerry Flynn writes: "I liked the way Ted Johnson summarized it all in this sentence of his writeup. 'The question that seemed to hang over Friday’s hearing,' he said, 'is whether the answer to the big power of the platforms, a notion that no one of either party challenged, would be to give an antitrust exemption to the news media.' I thought Kate Kaye, over at my former employer Digiday, also had a really good writeup explaining the situation."
>> Flynn adds: "During the hearing, Glenn Greenwald tried to focus attention on the power of 'Big Media.' Beyond his rants, others did express concern that the bill would help larger publishers and weaken smaller ones. To that point of contention, News Media Alliance CEO David Chavern said, 'This bill is not about News Corp first and foremost but the whole industry itself. The largest and the smallest, but particularly the smallest.' NewsGuild President Jon Schleuss said news publishers shouldn't be allowed to accept blank checks from tech platforms, rather they should incorporate 'accountability or transparency to make sure that it goes to jobs...'"
>> Related: "Google and Microsoft openly sparred on Friday" since Microsoft CEO Brad Smith was on the witness list at the hearing. Brian Fung has details here...
FOR THE RECORD, PART THREE
-- Elizabeth Kennedy is the NYT's new White House editor and Richard Stevenson is the new Washington editor... (NYT)
-- Vivian Salama, a national security correspondent for CNN, is returning to the WSJ. She said "print is where my heart is..." (Twitter)
-- Eamon Javers, Kayla Tausche and Ylan Mui have new political reporting roles at CNBC... (TVNewser)
Keilar calls out Fox's military hypocrisy
Oliver Darcy writes: "Brianna Keilar on Friday called out Fox for its hypocritical coverage of the military. Keilar noted that Fox allowed its personalities to lobby for convicted war criminals while also allowing Tucker Carlson to attack female members of the military. 'What say you, Fox? You come to the aid of convicted war criminals but denigrate honorable female service members?' Keilar asked. Keilar said that she had posed the question to Fox, but that the network never got back to her..."
>> Related: WaPo's Erik Wemple writes that Biden helped "heal" America by "muting" Carlson..."
"I pray you will not be a journalist for the deep state"
If you haven't read Albert Samaha's piece for BuzzFeed News about his QAnon-believing mother, do so now. Samaha wrote about what it is like being a journalist with a close family member who is an adherent to a conspiracy theory. He said his mother would text him messages like, "I pray you will not be a journalist for the deep state." Samaha wrote, "My entire vocation as an investigative reporter was predicated on being able to reveal truths, and yet I could not even rustle up the evidence to convince my own mother that our 45th president was not, in fact, the hero she believed him to be. Or, for that matter, that John F. Kennedy Jr. was dead. Or that Tom Hanks had not been executed for drinking the blood of children." Read the whole piece here...
>> Related: The #1 story on the WaPo website Friday evening was Jose A. Del Real's story about another family torn apart by far-right disinfo. It is agonizing to read. "They had all thought things would get better after Election Day. Now it felt like this was just how things were going to be..."
Donie on how people get sucked into conspiracies
Donie O'Sullivan appeared this week on the "QAnon Anonymous" podcast and offered some keen insight into how people get sucked into conspiracy theories. Sullivan said that when he feels depressed or anxious, "you're willing to embrace very irrational answers, whether that's about yourself, or your life or relationships." O'Sullivan continued, "As a society we are living through an extremely anxious unprecedented time, with lockdowns, and this virus. And just as I think we are capable, when feeling that angst, to embrace the irrational about ourselves, we are also capable of doing that when it comes to conspiracy theories." Listen to the pod here...
FOR THE RECORD, PART FOUR
-- DC police are "investigating an allegation that conspiracy theorist Alex Jones threatened to push a pro-Trump political organizer off of an event stage in December..." (CNN)
-- Kaya Yurieff is so right: "A year of living almost exclusively online" has "made the internet weird again..." (CNN Business)
AT&T raises expectations for HBO Max
"AT&T CEO John Stankey told CNBC on Friday the company can maintain its dividend payment while still investing in growth businesses like direct-to-consumer streaming service HBO Max," Kevin Stankiewicz wrote.
HBO Max was center stage at AT&T's Analyst and Investor Day on Friday. (AT&T is CNN's owner.) Stankey said the service had "exceeded early projections" in the US. WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar previewed the rollout of an ad-supported tier this June.
AT&T "now expects to reach 120 million to 150 million HBO Max and HBO subscribers worldwide by the end of 2025, well above its October 2019 forecast of 75 million to 90 million," THR's Georg Szalai wrote...
Condé Nast's profitable future?
Kerry Flynn writes: "A very, very difficult year. That's how Condé Nast CEO Roger Lynch described his business in 2020 in an interview with The Information's Tom Dotan. But it could be much better in the year ahead. Dolan wrote, 'Condé Nast isn’t profitable right now, but executives hope it will break even by next year and will have double-digit margins, measured as earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, by 2024.' Lynch also called out turnaround stories among its titles, including Vanity Fair moving away from a reliance on print ads and growing its subscribers. He also spoke about issues with diversity, in particular the scandals at Bon Appétit. More in Dolan's interview..."
>> Related: The New Yorker is leaning into crossword puzzles, Sarah Scire writes for Nieman Lab...
FOR THE RECORD, PART FIVE
By Kerry Flynn:
-- "When writing about race, abuse follows. Especially for journalists of color and women," The Virginian-Pilot's investigative reporter Gary Harki writes... (Poynter)
-- BuzzFeed's cuts to HuffPost aren't over. Archie Bland reports "16 of 29 full-time journalists at its London-based office received emails this week informing them that they also face losing their jobs" with only four jobs available to them... (Guardian)
-- Kwame Opam, senior editor of digital storytelling at NYT, is joining Jon Stewart's upcoming Apple TV+ series as senior producer of digital strategy (Twitter)
-- Sara Score, deputy editor of PowerPost, is becoming WaPo's London hub editor as the paper expands global coverage... (WaPo)
Weekend reads, part one
By Katie Pellico:
-- "Will Hong Kong's Free Press Survive?" Elaine Yu relays seven stories from journalists in Hong Kong, painting a powerful picture of "eight months of disintegration." While some journalists are "giving in to self-censorship," Yu writes, others "remain defiant, at professional and personal cost..." (CJR)
-- Karen Hao's profile of Facebook AI director Joaquin Quiñonero Candela is a must-read. The senior AI reporter for MIT Tech Review explains her reporting process, and what she learned by pressing Candela on how his team is tempering "the hate and lies on its platform..." (MIT Tech Review)
-- From CNN’s Rachel Metz: "How one employee's exit shook Google and the AI industry..." (CNN)
-- New research from Brandi Collins-Dexter and Joan Donovan shows "how right-wing propaganda machines ensure their disinformation is what you see when you search terms like '1619' or 'critical race theory…'" (CJR)
-- A thoughtful and thought-provoking look at how the "Caliphate" controversy "shows us what performative transparency conceals..." (NiemanLab)
-- Sumana Kasturi cuts through the noise around Meghan and Harry: “As accusations and counter-accusations fly back and forth, what has become clear once more is that misogyny and racism are inextricably linked to Empire, and that the media is complicit...” (The Wire)
-- Logging off: Read about the dawn of the "quaranzine," a "new crop of small printed magazines [that] are the cool alternative to starting a Substack…" (GQ)
Weekend reads part two
-- Charlie Warzel profiled Aron Rosenberg, who "swore off the internet completely" two months before the pandemic began. After he came back online in January, he said "I really underestimated the power of these platforms. I thought I was using the tools, not being used. But I'm seeing the extent to which they're priming me toward particular ends..." (NYT)
-- Read Scott Nover’s profile of Objective editor Gabe Schneider, who at 24, Nover writes, "has become a stalwart voice for change in the journalism space while charting his own path in the industry..." (Adweek)
-- The NYT's Davey Alba showed how Epoch Media Group, "a top purveyor of conspiracy theories and political misinformation," is casting a wider net, with "ties to more than a dozen sites..." (NYT)
-- "Last summer, Disney promised change. Then the first Black 'Bachelor's' season unraveled." Greg Braxton took an in-depth look... (LAT)
Friday night news dump?
Just two days ago, Entertainment Tonight published a story titled "Jennifer Lopez and Alex Rodriguez 'Still Planning on Getting Married,' Source Says." Now the website's lead story is "Jennifer Lopez and Alex Rodriguez Split After 4 Years Together." Seems like ET should reevaluate the motives of that faulty source.
Page Six was the first to report, around 4pm ET Friday, that the couple had called off the engagement. Whether intentionally timed or not, it had the feel of a political Friday news dump, except in the celebrity world. A source close to the couple told CNN's Marianne Garvey that the duo split "a few weeks ago," adding, "It doesn't seem like they will get back together." CNN reached out to reps for Lopez and Rodriguez for comment...
>> Jim Maiella inspired this item -- he tweeted: "A-Rod and JLo with the Friday afternoon breakup media dump. Total pros."
Could Netflix help the Oscars avert ratings disaster?
Brian Lowry writes: "After record-low Emmy and Golden Globe numbers, the Academy Awards could find an unlikely assist -- if not an outright savior -- from Netflix, a streaming service that until now has been a grudging invitee to the party. Why? Because in this pandemic-plagued year, potential viewers will have the easiest time finding Netflix titles if the company makes a strong showing -- as it's expected to -- and throws its marketing might behind them, as it surely will." More...
A time capsule about being young and famous in the '90s
Brian Lowry writes: "Soleil Moon Frye's 'Kid 90,' now streaming on Hulu, is a pretty intoxicating look back at what it was like to be young and famous in the 1990s, in part because the 'Punky Brewster' star toted a video camera with her everywhere, back in the days before cellphone cameras were ubiquitous. It's also a pretty good look at the toll on kids in Hollywood, given the number of her peers who didn't survive the journey." Read on...
SAVING THE BEST FOR LAST...
Pet of the day!
Helen writes: "Mr. Squeekers begs to be excused from this evening’s good read. He is otherwise occupied." Bath time!
Thank you for reading! Send us your feedback and tips anytime. We'll be back here Sunday night...
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