October 8, 2017

Rachel Maddow describes how she puts her show together as "a bad process."

"It’s impressive in one way," she says (to The New Yorker's Janet Malcolm), about starting the workday "at around 12:30 p.m., when she acquaints herself with the day’s news," meeting with the staff at 2:00, reading until about 6:30, and only then writing the monologue.

It's "reckless," she says.
"It kills my poor staff. They’re so supportive and constructive. But it’s too much to ask. They need to put in all the visual elements and do the fact-checking and get it into the teleprompter. It’s a produced thing and requires everybody to do everything fast. And it’s a broken process. If I could just get it done an hour earlier, I think I would put ten years back in the lives of all the people who work with me."
She can't move the process to start earlier in the day because, she says, "you can only have your brain lit up for that long before it starts to break down and you stop making sense and stop being creative."

I greatly enjoyed the article, partly because I love Janet Malcolm. I particularly loved the description of a correction Maddow once did, which I wanted to find in video. Ah. Here:



ADDED: If the video won't work for you, go here.

40 comments:

Darrell said...

Yes. A bad process, like this--

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBQdhR--cmY

Hagar said...

Creative? With the news?

Unknown said...

"you can only have your brain lit up for that long before it starts to break down and you stop making sense ..."

She makes sense?

zipity said...

And now that she is up against Hannity, her ratings are nose diving....

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Hands up don't shoot.

Bill, Republic of Texas said...

Another abusive prog. Why are leftist so filled with hate.

Unknown said...

She did a triple-twist Irony Max treatment on those mushroom canister call-ins.

You could tell how much she cared about her audience there.

Gahrie said...

Only Deplorables would own mushroom canisters.

Bob Ellison said...

The MSM is in a spiral. The print and news folks can't make much money anymore. The producers of the shows can't do the Fox thing of going for an audience that was under-served. That audience has already left for the Interwebs.

So what does Maddow do? She can only keep spinning to her leftist audience. There's nobody else there. She can't suddenly say "oh, hey, I'm a centrist, and you should watch me!" She must keep spinning leftward to hope for ratings.

Michael K said...

She is fortunate that the Murdoch sons are trying to get Fox to move left.

They even hired Marie Harf, who was an idiot as a State Department spokesperson for Obama/Hillary/Kerry and now is an idiot on Fox.

Yes, I admit I see enough of it to notice.

rcocean said...

Looking at photo:

Austin Powers - "Its a man, baby".

I think she could beat George Stephanopoulos in a fist-fight. And give Bill Maher a beating too.

rcocean said...

So, who's Maddow's Producer? Who *really* writes her scripts? Cause I don't believe for a second that she gets out of her "Meeting" at 330 and BY HERSELF writes the script for the show.

People need to stop being naive. Of course, who goes in front of the camera makes a difference. But 9/10 these "talking heads" are just saying what a TEAM of people have come up with. And if they say anything the Head News Executive doesn't like - they're gone. After all, who hired Rachael Maddow?

This reminded me of someone interviewing an actress on a movie set, and never talking about the Director, the Screenwriter, and the Producer.

Ann Althouse said...

You don’t believe she writes the monologue?

Quayle said...

News shows fact check? You mean they don't start with facts as the basis for news?

How about we all agree to only view news which is, you know, fact triggered and fact reporting. The rest is fluff and spin.

Hey "reporter": If you start with something you want to say and have to check it, leave it out.

Or you could also stop using the internet to find your stories, which requires you to check the validity of your "discovered" "news".

AllenS said...

Hands up, don't talk.

wildswan said...

Maybe Rachel Maddow is afraid a video of her abusing her team will surface - like the video of Lawrence O'Donnell. So she's trying to get ahead of the ugliness by talking about high-pressure working conditions with insufficient time to fact-check and organize production. Probably all true. But unions are supposed to protect the workers against abuse by imposing limits on overworking people and by preventing arbitrary or profane abuse of power. Aren't there unions on the Maddow set?

BTW: What if a video surfaced of the injuries which football players are covering under athletic tape? Injuries which can't heal because of Thursday night football? Why don't the Colts take a knee to protest that? Why don't they burn their jerseys in protest? But what do I know? There are probably millions of reasons I'm not aware of.

rcocean said...

"You don’t believe she writes the monologue?"

I'm sure she CO-writes it.

stevew said...

Never seen her show, never will. Nothing personal, it's just that I've not heard a good reason, ever, why I would be interested in anything she has to say.

-sw

Etienne said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Etienne said...

Rachel Maddow: Trump’s TV Nemesis

What a joke. If Trump were the Joker, there is no way Mrs. Maddow can be Batman.

To bring down the Joker, you're gonna need more than just a picture of a bat on your chest.

Jim at said...

Garbage in. Garbage out.

FullMoon said...

The eleven minute election night Maddow vid on you tube is pretty good. From euphoria in the beginning, to disbelief yet hopeful in the middle to despair at the end. All genuine, no acting involved. If it were a performance, would be Oscar worthy. Poor thing !

traditionalguy said...

She's smart and argues well for some who has to use hoax narratives for facts. She's the best the Enemymeady has.

But that is BORING stuff.

Humperdink said...

I have tried to watch Maddow a few times. I really have. I want to know what the enemy is thinking. But her perpetual snarky on-air persona is a complete turn-off (literally) for me. Too smart by half.

traditionalguy said...

Note that Rachel cannot keep her creative brain lit. Unless she gets to sleep 10 hours a day.. But President Trump gets 10 hours a week unless they hide his iPhone.

Curious George said...

Althouse: I greatly enjoyed the article, partly because I love Janet Malcolm.

Malcolm wrote this. "I sit there mesmerized because Maddow has already mesmerized me."

She's an idiot.

FullMoon said...

Here she is, in all her glory


Maddow

donald said...

That IS awesome. Never gets old.

rehajm said...

I’ve only seen her show once, the episode with the release of Trump’s ‘tax return’. Completely void of any intellectual value. I expect every night is just like that...

David Begley said...

A bad process and a bad show. The looniest of the Left. Did she take any responsibility for inspiring the baseball practice shooter?

n.n said...

Pro-Canister, huh?!

At the twilight's last fringe, the right to a Canister will not be denied.

Gk1 said...

Thats funny It looks like she just talks out of her ass the entire time. You mean there is a script?

Luke Lea said...

Rachel Maddow, Queen of Smug

Ralph L said...

She's admitting she's badly organized her show, but it's really a Bingley boast.

Comanche Voter said...

Only she believes that her brain works for more than two hours--the rest is just babble.

glenn said...

Well, she is the smartest person in the news business. Rachel is so smart she doesn't need to read timelines. If she had read the weinerwaggers timeline she'd have known he was guilty and saved herself that embarrassing "Do you mind if I ask you this question" moment.

mtrobertslaw said...

If Maddow would just remain completely silent during her show and only move her hands back and forth and up and down, she wold arrest her ratings plunge over night.

Biotrekker said...

She may abuse her staff, but let us not forget that Maddow is the victim here!

Quaestor said...

Garbage in. Garbage out.

Just about anything that passes through a garbage container is garbage on the way out.

Bilwick said...

As a "liberal," she doesn't have to both with logical thought, which can slow things down considerably. So that probably speeds up the production process.