'Dancing With The Stars' Season 14 Dream Casting
'Happy Endings' Scoop: James Wolk On Being Max's Valentine
Does anyone under 40 watch CBS Sunday Morning ... besides me?
by Joel Keller, posted Apr 7th 2006 5:50PM
As much as I'd like to wake up at 11:30 AM on
Sundays and go straight to a plate of corned-beef hash and eggs, I'm noticing that my body doesn't agree with that
view; as I get older, I get up earlier. So, when I flick on the TV at around 9 AM, my choices are limited. More often
than not, I chose to watch CBS Sunday Morning, hosted by Charles Osgood.Why? Because they talk about interesting topics and interview interesting people. And the subjects are not chosen because of their newsworthiness; they're chosen because there is something interesting about their lives that no one seems to explore. For instance, if they decided to interview a newsworthy guy like Brad Pitt, they wouldn't ask him about Jen or Angelina; they'd ask him about his love of architecture. I mean, who even knew that Pitt was an architecture buff?
This interesting article by Jon Friedman at Marketwatch sheds some light on how the show, which has changed little since its debut in 1979, picks its topics, and how it tries to keep an upbeat tone (not "happy talk," mind you, which is what irritates me about most morning news shows. They just have an optimistic tone to most of their stories).
Indeed, that's one of the things I like about the show; also, as a "journalist", I seem to be saying more often than not as I watch the profiles, "Damn, I'd love to interview that guy!" But I also like the informational pieces, David Pogue's tech stories, David Edelstein's movie reviews, and Bill Geist's pieces about quirky Americans; heck, I even like Ben Stein's and Nancy Giles' commentaries, even if I tend to disagree with both of them.
(By the way, during a "opinion-off" about illegal immigration last week, Stein and Giles took views that were opposite what regular viewers would expect, but still couched those views with reasons that reflected their usual political stances. Both did a very nice job of stating their cases.)
The show really does come off as a TV version of the Sunday paper, very relaxed and informative, which is exactly what I'm looking for on Sunday mornings. What I wonder about as I watch, though, is if I'm the only person my age (34) who watches this program. The ads seem to be geared more towards viewers my parents' age, and it seems like bloggers under 40 (hello, Gawker!) like to make fun of the show, saying it's an "old people's show" that "no one watches."
Gee, I dunno... I'd much rather watch Osgood and company than the irritating frat boys on ESPN, any number of silly televangelists, creepy children's shows, or yet another fashion show on GMA or Today.
So can you under-40 Sunday Morning watchers come out of the closet and help a brother out? Leave a comment and help me feel like less of an old man.
51 Comments