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WorldLink TV aspires to be the
anti-network. So it's operating as a
nonprofit and setting out to become
the first national channel dedicated
to providing Americans with global
perspectives.
Jane Ganahl, Chronicle Staff Writer
Monday, June 30, 2003
A production meeting has been going on for more
than two hours in the small conference room of
WorldLink TV on Battery Street. The sandwiches
are long gone, the room is starting to get
uncomfortably warm, and the team is only halfway
through reworking the script for the next night's
taping of the new satellite network talk show, "The
Active Opposition."
Peter Coyote, the actor/author/activist and now TV
host, reads aloud from a script he's written for
himself. "Back to Washington, to Arjun Makhijani.
As a scientist and specialist in nuclear fission, what
is the public not being told about the dangers we
face?"
David Michaelis, a respected Israeli television
journalist of many decades, dryly notes: "That
question could result in a five-minute lecture."
Coyote responds in semi-mock indignation. "Well
what's wrong with that? We want to save the world
from imminent destruction, but it has to be catchy!
And in sound bites no longer than 30 seconds!"
The group chuckles. They know that while this may
be true of network TV talk shows, where experts
are trained to make points in vociferous sound bites,
quite the opposite is true of "The Active
Opposition." On this 90-minute, no-
commercial-interruptions talk show, guests are
allowed, as producer Stephen Olsson puts it, "to
speak freely, to actually develop and explain a
thought, idea or position."
"The Active Opposition" is the second from-scratch
program produced by the nonprofit WorldLink
channel, which went on the air 2 1/2 years ago on
DirecTV Channel 375, and Dish Network Channel
9410, after raising a modest $3 million in grants. Its
lofty aim: "to introduce American viewers to voices,
nationalities, and perspectives not available in the
U.S. mainstream media."
But it was WorldLink's first original program --
"Mosaic," a daily half hour of selected news reports
from the Middle East, uncensored and translated - -
that put it on the media map. During the early days
of the war in Iraq, the channel was discovered by
those who were hungry for the perspective that
could only be found in the war zone, and its
viewership rose to an estimated 4.5 million a week.
ABC's Peter Jennings, in a recently filmed story
about WorldLink, called it "television without
borders."
"The Active Opposition" was hatched as an idea
after a chance meeting in a Marin restaurant
between Coyote and Olsson, who has produced
documentaries around the world for 20 years,
including the Emmy-nominated "Last Images of
War." Funding was sought and quickly granted by
the John and Geraldine Cusenza Family Foundation,
which is devoted to "cross-linking humanity."
This is the fifth show so far; one show is taped each
month, played live at first and then rerun several
times, and streamed on the Web site,
www.worldlinktv.org. The show's have included
"Iraq: Eyewitness Reports," which featured Sean
Penn's first major interview after his fact-finding trip
to Baghdad, and "Your New$ and the Bottom
Line," an exploration of the impact of media
consolidation, featuring a powerful diatribe against it
by none other than Walter Cronkite.
Needless to say, this show would be like mother's
milk to fans of Utne, "All Things Considered,"
Mother Jones and Alternet.org -- and would drive
fans of Michael Savage and Bill O'Reilly up the
wall.
Olsson resists slapping a left-wing label on it.
"We're simply committed to presenting information
and points of view that are often censored or
marginalized by our government."
Adds Michaelis: "These subjects are not the bread
and butter of the mainstream media."
This month's bell-ringer: "The Nuclear Lullaby:
What We Are Not Being Told. " Within 15 minutes
of listening to the explosive (no pun intended)
material presented, an eavesdropping reporter
wants to go and build a bomb shelter. Still, the team
haggles over the wording, aiming for just the right
balance of inflammation and information.
"I think 'What We Are Not Being Told' might sound
too National Enquirer," offers co-producer Toni
Whiteman.
Coyote sighs, grinning. "Well, civility is over. But
we're trying to save the f --ing world, people!"
Coyote provides the idealistic passion for the
production team; it takes the rest of them to balance
his charismatic zeal with cool-eyed journalism.
"It's hard to wait for the experts to say some of the
things I want to say, because I'm a total bigmouth,"
Coyote says, laughing. "But it's good, because no
one would listen to me, and no one should listen to
me -- I'm just an amateur student of all this."
But whomever the spokesman is taken to be, it's a
formula that seems to be working. "The Active
Opposition" is garnering fans -- including a famous
one named Willie Nelson, who called Coyote to
express admiration and ask if the producers would
devote a program to the crisis of America's farmers.
They are considering it.
By the end of the four-hour meeting, the team is
getting seriously punchy. There is a debate as to
whether nuclear weapons held by Israel should be
called "a Jewish bomb." Michaelis wonders if they
should call George Bush's weaponry "a born-again
Christian bomb."
And when Coyote utters the last line in his script,
"Good night, from WorldLink television," Olsson
adds dryly, "and have a nice day!"
The following night, after a minor crisis that erupts
when author Jonathan Schell ("The Unconquerable
World") says he can't stay until the end of the taping
-- 11:30 on the East Coast -- all seems in
readiness.
Coyote must juggle a guest in the San Francisco
studio (Dan Fahey, conscientious objector from the
Gulf War), three experts in the WorldLink
Washington studio (Rep. Lynn Woolsey,
D-Petaluma; Jonathan Granoff, president of the
Global Security Institute; and Makhijani, president
of the Institute for Energy) and one in New York --
Schell, who has to get up early to teach a class.
Coyote runs through his intro before the camera to
get sound levels. Impassioned yet even, he exhibits
no rattled nerves.
It's a surprisingly sophisticated operation,
considering WorldLink's staff numbers only 27. But
up until 10 minutes before show time, there is no
transmission from Washington. At all.
Finally, with a burst that draws a cheer, the three
panelists appear onscreen and are asked to get
miked up.
Olsson turns and with a war correspondent's glint in
his eye, tells the troops, "This is where it gets fun." |
