Katie Couric, what are you doing?
If you don’t have a class or something to do at 3:00 pm and you go to watch television, odds are you’ve noticed that nothing is on.
One of the shows on in this vast timescape of nothing is Katie, Katie Couric’s insufferable talk show.
Now make no bones about it, I actually have the utmost respect for Katie Couric – a woman whom I’ve always considered to be one of the great American journalists of our time.
But, for the love of God, I don’t understand why she feels the need to be on such a glib talk show instead of a hard-hitting news show.
I know that when Oprah Winfrey went off-air ABC needed to fill a time gap with someone who could draw ratings and try to match the massive numbers that the former Queen of Daytime brought in.
Couric is a big name and she could probably bring in quite a bit of press and is a name widely recognized (though not nearly as big as the name Oprah).
So the reason Couric was offered the show makes sense and I can even see why she would take the show. I remember when George Stephanopoulos went from working as a correspondent on World News Tonight to working as a co-anchor on Good Morning America.
But, Stephanopoulos still works as a journalist on This Week – ABC’s morning news show. Stephanopoulos is another journalist that I respect and, like Couric, has the respect of many in the country. Hosting GMA, according to Stephanopoulos, gave him the opportunity to interview a multifarious assembly of people.
The same could probably be said of Couric’s choice to also make the move to daytime talk.
I know that Couric is still in the opening credits of 60 Minutes, but seldom do you see Couric on one of America’s most revered news programs.
Look, I may be a fan of Couric, but I am certainly not a fan of Katie.
I don’t want to pick on Couric as I’m sure she approaches every show with great zeal and preparation, but she just seems way out of her element when stepping out onto the soundstage with booming party music playing while always politely telling her audience to sit down from a standing ovation that always greets Couric.
I’ve always put Couric more in a category with people like Mike Wallace, Bill Kurtis and even Walter Cronkite or Edward R. Murrow, not with daytime talk show hosts like Ellen DeGeneres, Oprah Winfrey or Queen Latifah. That’s not a knock on DeGeneres, Oprah or Latifah.
To do a daytime talk show takes a certain kind of personality and openness – one that I frankly don’t think that Couric has.
Now, perhaps Katie could be an interesting talk show- the content is there; Couric gets interesting guests and the daytime format doesn’t necessarily force Couric to cover events that are otherwise stuffy or overly serious.
Couric just doesn’t have the same personality to pull off interacting with the lighthearted topics and fun kind of events that the previous talk show hosts I brought up do have.
Couric is a hardnosed journalist. Her coverage of the 2008 election was some of the most illuminating reporting in recent memory.
(I’m of course thinking of her asking former Governor of Alaska Sarah Palin to name a newspaper…the question that helped bring about the downfall of the McCain/Palin campaign.)
Yet this brilliant journalist has boxed herself into a corner by signing on to be on a show with mostly fluffy (though not without segments with some real journalistic teeth) stories.
I dare you to just watch the first twenty minutes as Couric comes out to her cheering audience to some thumping party music.
You’ll be astounded at how rigid and just out of her element she seems as she tries to cam down her crowd and introduce a human interest segment.
(Unless of course she’s reporting on a serious segment, in which case she’ll come out in some hammy over-the-top way and go into a very depressing monologue for dramatic effect.)
It’s just baffling with me why someone with so much talent and a niche in this world would want to go against the revered image that she has built up over time to be on a hammy talk show that should barely qualify as any sort of entertainment. It’s stilted and awkward.
Couric is robbing the world of her journalistic talent.
She has a gift that she should be using to expose true issues in the world.
Nope…instead of using her genuine talent, she’s aping the natural talents of people who have the knack and have worked to be on such a program.
I’m not saying that Couric can’t improve and that her show can’t become an entertaining daytime show.
I’m just saying it feels unnatural and needs improvement.
But, I do have the ultimate respect for Couric. She’s a brave woman to want to try something new and I don’t try to blame her for wanting to try her hand at omething new. What I don’t grasp is why she would want to.
Why would someone at the very top of their field want to drop that and go into a field in which they’re not necessarily well-prepared for? I just don’t get it…
Brian Laughran
Senior Viewpoints Editor