Word: networks
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Dukakis challenged his rival to a debate on election eve during the hour of network television time purchased by the Democratic and Republican campaigns for last-minute appeals to voters. A moderator would be present, but the candidates--not reporters--would ask the questions...
...days, and not just on Murder, She Wrote and Miami Vice. A fresh burst of nonfiction programming -- news shows, pseudo news shows and other "reality" fare -- has rediscovered those old reliables of tabloid journalism, sex and violent crime. America's Most Wanted, the highest-rated show on the Fox network, and Unsolved Mysteries, which joined NBC's schedule this month, solicit viewer help each week in tracking down fugitives. The syndicated magazine show A Current Affair, drawing good ratings on 125 stations, goes for the gut each night with stories on crime and celebrity scandal. Typical subjects...
...know sensationalism is back in style when Geraldo Rivera, network TV's original advocacy reporter, is riding high. After getting dumped from ABC's 20/20 in 1985, Rivera started an improbable comeback by opening Al Capone's long-sealed vault on live TV. The cupboard was bare, but ratings were huge, and Rivera followed up with melodramatic specials on such topics as drugs and death row, as well as with a daytime talk show. This week he returns to network TV with a two-hour special on NBC, Devil Worship: Exposing Satan's Underground. The sometimes graphic show dwells...
...reason why TV should not have its own version of the New York Daily News or even the National Enquirer, alongside World News Tonight and The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour. "I see myself as an alternative vision," says Rivera, "not one dictated by the suits on Sixth Avenue ((Manhattan's network row))." Although his antics often seem self-aggrandizing and overwrought, Geraldo finds the TV universe is big enough...
Still, once sex and violence start drawing ratings, the slope can be slippery. NBC is the only network not to have a weekly hour of news programming in prime time; yet it had no trouble finding two hours for Geraldo's devil special (being produced under the auspices of the entertainment division, not news). TV's new fascination with real-life crime, moreover, has the whiff of pandering. The correspondents on 60 Minutes have been called prosecutorial, but they at least come armed with sheaves of evidence. The hot-button journalists of The Reporters and other tabloid shows pursue their...