TVSquad

Something astonishing happened 20 years ago this week: the Berlin Wall came tumbling down.

Now thanks to the magic of the Internet's never ending series of tubes, you can relive that shocking and happy day when the wall finally fell. Former NBC Nightly News anchor Tom Brokaw went to the former site of the oppressive cement figure over the weekend and filed a brief interview with Meet the Press' David Gregory last Sunday on the momentous anniversary.

Look at this cast list!

President Obama
Katie Couric
Bill Clinton
Tom Brokaw
Les Moonves
Andy Rooney
Nick Clooney
Jimmy Buffett
Mickey Hart
Buzz Aldrin
Bob Schieffer
Wynton Marsalis

What do they all have in common?

They passed the torch on NBC yesterday. After weeks of speculation, it wasn't either Ted Koppel or Rachel Maddow that received the choice assignment. Nope. It's David Gregory who'll take over Meet the Press -- effective immediately. On Sunday morning's broadcast, interim host and NBC anchorman emeritus Tom Brokaw made it official by officially letting the world know it was a done deal by presenting Gregory on air.

Apparently, some at NBC were miffed that this information was leaked last week, spoiling the big surprise today, but really, there wasn't much suspense. Joel wrote about it. The selection of David Gregory is a safe, solid and somewhat staid choice.

Shortly after Tim Russert's death in June, I speculated on who NBC might pick to host Meet The Press. At the time, I figured that David Gregory was the best choice, given his pedigree as White House correspondent and the decent job he did subbing for Russert in the past. But over the summer and the heat of the election homestretch, I came to change my mind about that.

I saw Chuck Todd and His Goatee take a bigger and bigger role in the coverage, stepping into Russert's nightly role of presenting and analyzing the latest blizzard of polls to come out, and I thought he'd make an interesting choice for moderator. Then Tina Brown floated the idea of Rachel Maddow as moderator, and I was also intrigued, given her rise to punditry stardom and her surprising even-handed manner.

But, if a report from the Huffington Post is to be believed, Gregory will soon be named the moderator of the program. Which is too bad, because this gave NBC an opportunity to do something different.

It's over. It's finally over. The talking points, the smears, the empty promises... it's been a fun two-year ride, but it was definitely time for it all to end (at least until December, 2010... heh...). And, just like the other networks, NBC didn't have much of anywhere to go after they called the election for Obama at 11 PM ET.

NBC decided to stick with the tried and true this year -- an anchor, the old sage analyst, and a few other people to help along the way. No real outrageous commentary, no poop-eating grins from any of the anchors (Keith Olbermann stayed on MSNBC) or anything that would be construed as "interesting" or "entertaining."

Thankfully, NBC has decided once again to do different election coverage than their kissing cousins at MSNBC. So instead of David Gregory trying to moderate slap fights between Keith Olbermann, Joe Scarborough, and Chris Matthews, we get the relatively dignified analysis of Brian Williams, Chuck Todd, Tom Brokaw, Andrea Mitchell and Ann Curry. Whew. Looks like I selected the right network.

Some observations from the first couple of hours of coverage:

• Chuck Todd really has to shave his goatee. Yes, it was nice for awhile. But he might be the host of Meet the Press after this election is over; how can any one take him seriously with that "look, Ma, I can grow a beard!" look?
• Ann Curry is doing exit polling in a green room. Not a green screen, mind you, but an entire green room. It's freaky. Williams wanted to assure us that Curry was safe from those flying graphics. Nice of him.
• Does Williams have to remind us of his blue-collar, fire-fightin', hard-drinkin' past at every turn? "It's probably not a good thing that I know where Finnegans' Wake (a bar in Philly that's Obama's HQ there) is" he says to Mike Taibbi. Thanks for the insight into your past, Bri.

As this election season turns into the home stretch, whether you're for McCain or Obama, this is a very exciting time in politics -- and I find myself really missing Tim Russert quite a lot. This point was really driven home for me when I watched Tim Russert's show Meet the Press last week. Tom Brokaw has been a really good anchorman and reporter, but -- I'm sorry -- he's not a good moderator. He's just not. He doesn't get involved in the questioning enough. He doesn't ask the penetrating questions. He doesn't do his homework like Russert did to be right on top of the facts and catch politicians spinning rather than speaking the truth.

Like I said, Brokaw is not in his element with Meet the Press. Fortunately, he's only doing MTP until after the election. I give him credit for stepping in when Russert died unexpectedly and there was a network crisis. However, looking to the future, NBC needs to find the right person to take the big chair. NBC News chief Steve Capus is reportedly thinking about a rotation of hosts, including Chuck Todd (NBC's political director) and David Gregory (host of Road to the White House, MSNBC).

John McCain wanted ten town hall style debates with Barack Obama, but after 22 Democratic debates, Barack said, "Thanks, but no thanks." So now the Republican and Democratic presidential candidates will meet three times: two traditional, one-on-one debates with a single moderator for each, and one townhall-style session with questions from the crowd.

The Commission on Presidential Debates announced that NBC's Tom Brokaw, PBS's Jim Lehrer, and CBS's Bob Schieffer will be the moderators, with Gwen Ifill, the host of PBS's Washington Week handling the chores for the one vice presidential debate.

What's interesting here is that of the big three, ABC is not represented. Among the cable news crowd, Fox News and MSNBC were equally snubbed as was CNN.

I can't say why ABC was left out of the loop. However, George
Stephanopoulos and Charlie Gibson were both roundly criticized for their work on the Democratic debate they helmed.

There's been speculation about who will replace Tim Russert on NBC's Meet the Press. David Gregory, Keith Olbermann, Chris Matthews and Katie Couric were a few of the rumored possibilities. Jovie Baclayon of E! Online reports that Tom Brokaw will be temporarily replacing the tragically-lost news anchor. NBC announced today that the former Nightly News anchor and South Dakota native would take over moderating responsibilities on Sunday mornings. He will guide discussions through the November presidential elections.

Steve Capus, NBC News President, made this statement about Brokaw's decision to step in: "To have someone of Tom's stature step up and dedicate himself to ensuring its ongoing success is not only a testament to his loyalty to Tim, but his enduring commitment to NBC News and our viewers."

After 21 years helming the program, Tom Brokaw retired from NBC Nightly News in 2004.

Tim Russert died of a heart attack last week on June 13th. He was 58.

[via Yahoo TV]

That's the advice the NBC newsman gave Katie Couric when she left The Today Show to take the anchor gig at The CBS Evening News in 2006.

He told her that going from a morning show like Today to a hard news anchor position was "a dive off the high board" and that it's "harder than it looks." Though I wonder if anyone gave that advice to Brokaw when he left Today to do The NBC Nightly News back in the 80s. Or maybe they didn't because he's a guy, right?

"Indecision 2008": Did you know Super Tuesday was on Tuesday? The media did a poor job of making us think that the five to six hours leading up the results were "fascinating". They didn't help their point by hurling numbers every which way. As if to add to the confusion, the news teams goofed around with unnecessary flashy graphics, like that "statistical lazy susan", and FOX News' newest player, Karl Rove. Yes, Rove has joined FOX News. Don't think about it too much or your heart will seize up.

OK, this isn't exactly "Who Shot JR," but it does have people guessing.

NBC Nightly News will have a new announcer starting tonight (longtime announcer Howard Reig retired in 2005), and they're trying to make it a surprise. The only clues from the network is that it's a name we all know, and this person had "an extensive, award-winning theatrical career for nearly forty years." Some of the guesses from fans include James Earl Jones, Patrick Stewart, James Lipton, Morgan Freeman, and ... Tom Brokaw? Yes, he was great in A Streetcar Named Desire.

All this talk about how Katie Couric is single-handedly destroying network news (supposedly) overlooks one fact: she's actually losing less viewers than Brian Williams over on NBC.

Couric lost 287,000 viewers over the first 39 weeks of her show compared to what the show did last year, and during that same time, Williams lost 533,000. He's now in second place behind ABC and Charles Gibson.

Of course, it doesn't mean that everyone who is leaving NBC or CBS is going over to ABC and Gibson. I think it's an indication of what's going on with network news in general (and NBC in particular).

Hey, Brigitte here with TV Squad Daily. I'll be covering the TV stories I find interesting each day, Monday through Friday, in this video blog.

Today on TV Squad Daily:

• Some TV firsts: the one-in-25 million, three-way Jeopardy tie, and hardcore porn hosted by Tom Brokaw.
  
• Reality TV power-couple Rob and Amber were eliminated from The Amazing Race, but promise that their new project is going to blow our minds.
  
• Little House on the Prairie was cheesy enough without Melissa Gilbert and Patrick Swayze making it into a play.
  

The video's embedded below, or you can download the file directly (Quicktime required). You can also subscribe to this podcast via our feed.

An act of sabotage shocked viewers in Phoenix last week when hardcore porn interrupted a health special hosted by Tom Brokaw. It happened on KPPX-TV 51, a PAX affiliate. That's a Christian station, people!

Station managers say someone in master control did it intentionally because, well, there's just not a lot of hardcore porn laying around at the Christian affiliates these days. It sounds like the station isn't sure who did the dirty deed because managers are promising a "rigorous investigation" and termination of whomever is responsible. I'm guessing the person who did it is a tad bit disgruntled with his/her boss and welcomes the firing. Viewers in Phoenix said the porn stayed on the television between five and ten minutes and there was no sound.

Did anybody see this?