tom brokaw

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).

• 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.
  

• How can you tell if an actor is funny? Ken Levine has the answer.
• If case you haven't heard, Peter Jennings died and Tom Brokaw retired.
• Screech stills wants to do things with his penis, this time on Celebrity Fit Club.
• Aaron Barnhart doesn't think Isaiah Washington is leaving Grey's Anatomy anytime soon.
• Yahoo plans to launch 100 entertainment sites by the end of the year.
• Sienna Miller swore on the Today Show this morning.
• Here's a cool toy for all you Doctor Who fans.

The first thing I thought of this morning when I heard that former President Gerald Ford had died was this Saturday Night Live sketch from 1996. It features Dana Carvey as NBC newsanchor Tom Brokaw, taping a "Gerald Ford is dead" story ahead of time (which the networks and news outlets sometimes do). They cover all the bases, since they don't know how Ford will eventually die, including getting shot ("Gerald Ford shot dead today at the senseless age of 83"), suicide, mauled by wolves, and killed by zombies. They also do a take where Brokaw comes out of the closet, because that story combined with Ford dying would be a big ratings grabber.

If you haven't heard, Ford really did die last night, of natural causes, at age 93. Video after the jump.

[via Best Week Ever]

It's not often that TV news executives are well-known, but Gordon Manning was one of those people.

Manning was with NBC and CBS news for several years, involved in many of the top news stories of the 20th century, including the student uprising in Tiananmen Square in 1989 for NBC, CBS' Watergate and Nixon's trip to China coverage in 1972, and even set up an interview between NBC's Tom Brokaw and Mikail Gorbachev in 1987, just before his meeting with President Reagan.

Manning was famous for something else we all see now: the color-coded election night map! NBC first did that in 1976.

Manning died Wednesday in Westport, CT of a heart attack.

• At 6, TCM has The Maltese Falcon.
• At 7, CBS has a new 60 Minutes, followed by a new Big Brother All-Stars.
• NBC has a new Tom Brokaw Reports at 7, followed by a new Dateline and the 2006 Miss Universe Pageant (starts at 7 on CMTV).
• AMC has The Last Samurai at 8.
• At 9, USA has new episodes of The 4400 and The Dead Zone.
• HBO has all new eps of Deadwood, Entourage, Lucky Louie, and Dane Cook's Tourgasm, starting at 9.
• At 10, Showtime has a new episode of Brotherhood.
• TV Land is showing a Brady Bunch marathon all weekend, and at 10 they repeat the reunion special Still Brady After All These Years, hosted by Jenny McCarthy for some reason.