Friday, July 23, 1999
Commentary
Coverage a Senseless Tragedy in
Itself
By HOWARD ROSENBERG, Times Television Critic
f you dare to raise questions about any of
this, you're immediately branded a heartless,
soulless, mindless cretin. However . . .
Now that John F. Kennedy Jr. and his wife
and sister-in-law have been buried at sea on live
television--delivered there Thursday like heads of
state and eulogized by somber celebrity anchors
against a medley of chopper pictures from the
heavens and file footage of a toddling
John-John--doesn't this set a precedent?
The thunderous homage to the late Princess
Diana notwithstanding, these are really
uncharted waters.
It's a grim thought, and of course, here's
hoping it doesn't happen. But holy hypothetical!
What if Ron Reagan Jr.--son and namesake of
another beloved president--should die as
prematurely as John F. Kennedy Jr., and his
family would want to have him buried at sea
too?
Would this spectacle recur? Would we go
through this again . . . and again, with the
cameras, commentators and choppers on call as
the occasion demands? Or would the media say
no, because the Reagan family's record of
suffering doesn't match the Kennedys?
In other words, this is all a bit crazy and
hysterical, don't you think? To say nothing of
manipulative.
Television had already explored to the hilt the
Kennedys' perilous, oft-lethal encounters with
flying. Now, on to something else.
The sea.
"And John Kennedy Jr. goes down to the sea
for the last time," concluded a Thursday profile
on CNN set to melancholy music. To music.
Because their staffs have to shut their yaps
once in a while, some of the networks on
Thursday also reran an audiotape of John F.
Kennedy Sr.'s monologue about humankind
coming from the sea and "going back from
whence we came." In case you didn't catch the
irony--the adult son's death and burial now
giving meaning to the father's words--MSNBC
delivered it with a sledgehammer by
simultaneously showing grainy footage of
2-year-old John-John at the wheel of a boat.
If only some of these TV people would go
back from whence they came, for this was one
more cheap emotional whirlpool in a sea of
them.
Moments later, ever-present New York Daily
News columnist Mike Barnicle, a neighbor and
friend of the Kennedys--as many reporting and
commenting on this story on TV appear to
be--said he was sure that JFK Jr.'s uncle, Sen.
Edward Kennedy, the senator from
Massachusetts, could "hear his family's history
on the wind." That is if he could hear anything
above the roar of inflated rhetoric.
And you wonder why they call the Kennedys
mythic.
The facts are that John F. Kennedy Jr., his
wife, Carolyn, and her sister, Lauren Bessette,
died tragically, delivering an unthinkable blow to
their families and causing much of the nation to
feel very sad about the loss of this trio of
beautiful, accomplished 30-somethings.
It's the shameless litter of the surrounding
coverage that's so maddening.
That includes TV reporters repeatedly asking
the obligatory question: "Who will carry the
Kennedy banner now?" As if JFK Jr. had done
that. And as if his uncle's senatorial career were
chopped liver.
It also includes TV dwelling on long lines of
bouquet-bearing mourners sadly queuing up in
long lines outside Kennedy's residence in New
York's TriBeCa district. As if they represented
mainstream America.
On Thursday, CNN read the signs some had
brought with them, including: "John-John, God
has voted you president in heaven." Now there's
perspective.
You look at these long faces and see, in
essence, the same worshipful pilgrims who travel
annually to Elvis Presley's Graceland mansion in
Memphis to tearfully light candles on the
anniversary of his death. The same ones who
continue to hang out at the graves of James Dean
and Marilyn Monroe. The ones who stand
outside and shout at stars arriving for the Emmy
and Oscar ceremonies. The ones who because of
some internal void find meaning and personal
expression only through the lives of celebrities,
instead of living fully themselves.
If Kennedy was as grounded and
straight-thinking as many now say he was, he
would have despised all of this. That includes the
relentless fawning over his image.
CNN's star reporter, Christiane Amanpour,
who also works for CBS, was on "60 Minutes"
Sunday, being interviewed by Mike Wallace
about her close friendship with JFK Jr. since
college. And her easy, relaxed way of recalling
him as someone she adored, without elevating
him to divinity, was not only full of intimate
insights, but also departed refreshingly from the
swollen verbiage of many other newscasters.
Yet her appearance also symbolized a media
phenomenon of the last couple of decades that
may explain some of TV's detail-by-detail
obsession with JFK Jr. as a person who
transcends his family's long litany of personal
tragedies dating to World War II. One that
transcends, also, the high ratings that this
coverage is drawing.
Publishers and network owners have always
rubbed shoulders with the high and mighty. But
now, through television, has come the wealthy
celebrity journalist, the Diane Sawyers, Barbara
Walters, Tom Brokaws, Peter Jennings, Dan
Rathers and Mike Wallaces, who find themselves
covering the same VIPs they live near, socialize
with and bump into at swank restaurants. In
effect, they're reporting on themselves, royalty
covering royalty.
It happens even on the lower rungs, indicated
by Thursday's introduction granted Jonathan
Alter, the Newsweek writer who also works for
NBC and MSNBC: "You're a journalist, but you
also have friends in the Kennedy family."
Meanwhile, the burial of the plane victims and
journalistic standards continued.
"When you think of how much the Kennedy
family loves the water," a CNN anchor said
gravely, "it all makes sense." Actually, none of it
makes sense.
Copyright Los Angeles Times |
