They paid us… to hang around a TV station, to watch Tom & Jerry cartoons, to appear on Duck Duck Goose, while eating a piece of birthday cake that seemed to be around on any given day. They paid us… to be an eyewitness to turbulent events in America’s most turbulent city, during its most turbulent decade. We met exciting people, shared exciting times, and grew up a little with each passing year, and yes, they paid us for it. That’s one way to look at it.
If I put away the Kool-Aid and the rose colored glasses, I can see the not-so-fabulous flip side: the long hours, the six-and-seven-day weeks, being just a name on a schedule, having to sweat out the latest round of cutbacks, the egos of our bosses, understaffed newscasts, and endless critiques of every minor “discrepancy” we were a part of. Let’s face it, it was hard. We worked our butts off. We earned our fun!
I’ve talked about some of the ways in which we blew off steam, but really, the possibilities were endless. Personally speaking, I loved getting together with the guys for softball, and occasionally basketball (though I could never really keep up with Fess, Lucious, or Cisco). As a little guy with no power, I was the perennial bit player at our early 80s softball games, but I really enjoyed getting out there and doing my best. And yes, I really did play catcher.
(Click images to view them full screen)
The film that follows was shot in 1979, before my time at the station. I managed to save this from the trash heap during the great film purge of 1985. Notice how everyone in this footage is having a blast, even reporter Harlan Levy. And no, I’m not sure who the chicken dancer is, but I’m hoping somebody will recognize her.
(Channel 6 vs. Channel 2, August 25, 1979. By the way, Channel 2 beat us.)
And yes, I still have my rather faded WCIX softball shirt. It still fits.
Nowhere was the talent of our employees more apparent than in our often vulgar, yet often poignant Christmas skit reels, which the public at large never had the privilege of seeing. If it was WCIX Channel 6's most creative product, it was also, for obvious reasons, its best-kept secret.
I was blown away by the first skit reel I saw, at our 1980 Christmas party. Whoomp, there it was: our serious and self-absorbed bosses making fun of themselves, and allowing us to make fun of THEM. Behind-the-scenes folks stepping in front of the camera, mixing comedy, music, and sardonic satire. And people who may have been underestimated, throughout the course of the year, stretching out and showing just what they’re capable of doing, given half a chance.
Caution: baseball metaphor ahead!
Let’s say you’re a catcher, and you’re trying to get your coach to give you a chance to get on the mound and pitch. But several others want to pitch as well, and nobody else wants to wear a mask and squat for nine innings. So no matter how hard you try, and no matter how well you play, your team needs you to don the “tools of ignorance”, and get out behind the plate. It’s not just your job, it’s your identity. It’s what you do, and because you’re a team player, you do it, even though you know you have a killer fastball and can do a lot, lot more to help your team win.
I was that catcher, but in my case, I was a potential producer stuck behind Chyron IV. Since I could type (call the pitches) and spell (block the plate), there were those who would have loved for me to be a lifer on that super-generating contraption. After two-and-a-half years of electronic graphics, I finally had a chance to produce something: two segments for the 1982 Christmas skit reel. It was also a chance for my videotape editor, Gary Slawitschka, to show that he had skills that had not yet been displayed. People were surprised. By the following Christmas, I was a news producer. A good thing, because the chest protector and shin guards were getting awfully heavy!
The video that follows is “The Boys From Brickell”. Some of the lines may seem outdated now, and some of the inside jokes probably won’t resonate with many. (“Tanger’d Up In Blue”, for example, spoofed General Cinema Vice President Al Tanger. Trust me, it was funny at the time.) Still, I hope you get a kick out of seeing this. I even had a chance to sing one of the songs (“Tainted Lunch”). You’ll hear Jim Hayek and Mike Medrano among the vocalists, along with the inimitable Keith Moore performing “The Theme From Taft”. Makes me want to send $11.11 to 1111 Brickell Avenue. Void where prohibited!
It was almost like seeing Santa Claus. To see Big Wilson, all 320 pounds of him, laughing merrily in his red jacket could make anyone a believer. The WIOD disc jockey and WCIX late-night movie host did his one-man show from behind his keyboard, night after night, from our humble Channel 6 studio. It was camp. It was corny. It was addictive.
I was one of two people whose first day at WCIX was March 24, 1980. The other was Carlos Lima, who became Big’s camera operator. My shift lasted until 2AM, so if I wrapped up my work a little early, I would sometimes go into that 4th floor studio where Big and Carlos did their thing night after night. On nights when Big was showing “Ride The Wild Surf” or one of our many rock ‘n roll themed films, I would sometimes help him come up with trivia questions. But mostly, I just enjoyed sitting and talking to the veteran broadcaster, whose radio career had brought him from upstate New York, to Philadelphia, Cleveland, to New York City, and finally to Miami. (Click here to listen to a short excerpt of the Big Wilson Show on WNBC in New York, from March 1974.)
Big moved on to WIOD in Miami, and a few years later was hired to host Night Owl Movies on WCIX. The tinkling piano, the stuffed owls, and the hokey commercials for Franco’s Pizza, The Pink Pussycat, and Malibu Grand Prix all became synonymous with Channel 6 overnights. It was only natural that those of us who produced segments for the annual Christmas skit reels would enlist the help of this gentle giant. Big taped a segment for my 1983 K-Tel album spoof, The Brickell Hillbillies. He and his Night Owl Movies cohorts, Sonny Fox and Chuck Zink, lampooned themselves in several other memorable Christmas reel skits, including “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”, which was produced by Robin Plitt in 1983.
(For additional Christmas reel spoofs featuring Big Wilson and his Channel 6 colleagues, check out the SAY SIX! group on Facebook.)
Celebrities would sometimes pop in to visit Big. Grammy winner Henry Mancini (“The Pink Panther”, “Moon River”, “Peter Gunn”, “Love Theme From Romeo & Juliet”) stopped by one night, for a chat about some of his classic movie themes. Another time comedian Gallagher made himself at home, smashing watermelons and making an incredible mess in the studio. Big apparently didn’t know what he was in for that night, and was not very amused by the celebrity’s shenanigans!
In 1984, Big moved on to WDZL Channel 39, where he hosted the slightly retooled “Big Big Movie”. (Big exchanged his owls for teddy bears, more proof WDZL was just a cheap imitation of Channel 6!) You’ll see a lot of former WCIX staffers in this cheesy but fun video for “Club 39”, which aired during the Big Big Movie.
Big lost both his radio and TV jobs in 1987. He moved on to Channel 33, but the station ran out of money, and Big was out of a job once again. On August 15, 1989, he and his wife Jody sold their home in Miami, and left for a trip across the United States. Two weeks later, his health began to fail, and the couple briefly leased a home in North Carolina. The Wilsons wanted to return to Miami, but never made it. While staying overnight at a hotel in Salem, North Carolina, Big Wilson suffered a heart attack and passed away. He was 65.
Younger viewers don’t remember Malcolm John Wilson Jr. But those who loved B-movies, or who craved a Franco’s Pizza at 4 in the morning, will never forget the big man and his piano. Neither will I.
So the Hollywood Police Department says compulsive liar Ottis Toole did, in fact, kill 5-year-old Adam Walsh back in 1981. Even though Toole recanted his confession, is known to tell tall tales about his killing sprees, and even though the best evidence in the case has… ahem… disappeared, the book is closed on the case. Next!
That announcement last month reminded me of WCIX’s first live remote, and the days when the station not only had no live capabilities, but was all-film. There was no such thing as rushing a tape back to the station, cueing it, and getting it right on the air. Film had to be developed! Every other station in town had made the conversion to tape, but not Channel 6 – not until February 12, 1982, that is, when we finally left the ‘70s behind. (Channel 10, I believe, was the first to make the all-tape move. Who could forget the infamous “you don’t have to take the film and develop it” promos, back in the Ron Hunter years?)
So while everyone was putting crisp, clear pictures on the air, we had… film flutter! The young’uns in the news biz have never heard of film flutter… or super slides… or 35-millimeter key shots! And you know what? They’re lucky! We may not have been technologically advanced in those days, but we all worked very hard to try to put a decent hour-long newscast on the air. Very hard! And we had to be super-diligent. Just look at what the associate director, and the audio operator, had to deal with.
(Click images to view them full size)
The notations on the left side were the A-roll. On the other side was the B-roll. Somehow we had to hit the B-roll at just the right point. At 27 seconds in, the audio operator had to turn the pot up, for the sound on film (SOF), then turn the pot down, then up again. There was so much going on in this 1979 Harlan Levy reporter “wrap” (we didn’t call them “packages” back in those days. They weren’t really “packaged”, like they later were on videotape.) The associate director (usually Rod Kerrison or Bob Rossicone) really had to be on his toes.
The individual photographer/editor filled out the film cards, and their writing wasn’t always very legible. CT-SIL stood for cart (which contains the reporter track) over silent film. The audio operator had to alternate between sound on film, and the reporter’s track (on cart), which meant it was crucial to get the outcues just right. Missing it could mean a meltdown for the rest of the story, and likely an angry reporter.
This card was a little more straightforward, and easier to follow. This was a Jill Beach wrap, shot and edited by Ira Lazernik. Since Jill’s track was over silent file footage, there was no half track, and only a sound bite to worry about. There was also no reporter stand-up, leading me to believe this must have been a wire story, turned into a local wrap with nothing but a little file film and one sound bite. Instant news, quick and dirty.
Communication would have been very important with this reporter wrap. The associate director had to communicate that the audio was hot, and that there was no pad at the end of the piece. That means the director had to “punch out” of the film, the very second Harlan Levy did his sig-out. If not, the screen would go to black, and the producer (probably Don Adams) would get louder than a Potamkin car commercial. In the years to come, we would crack down on pieces that had no pad, even going as far as freezing the last shot. Going to black is a cardinal sin in TV news. You just don’t do it!
As I mentioned, we finally went all-tape in 1982, and it would be another year-and-a-half before we had live capabilities. Mayco “Mike” Villafana (the future FPL/Miami-Dade Schools/Convention & Visitor’s Bureau spokesman) was the producer, and John Turchin had the honors of doing the first WCIX remote. The occasion? A news conference by the Hollywood Police Department. The story? A suspect was being named in the Adam Walsh kidnapping and murder. His name?
Ottis Toole.
25 years later, that classic line by the Talking Heads inevitably comes to mind.
(Push the button on the lower left to play the video)
There were dozens of people who made The Ten O’Clock News happen, but on most nights, only the producer and director received on-air credit. Once a week, we would remedy that situation with a credit roll, listing each and every person who worked on the newscast that week (plus the “regulars” who were on vacation).
What you see here is an interesting variation on the credit roll. On December 31, 1981, we sent cameraman George Buigas around the building to shoot film of all the behind-the-scenes folks who were stuck working on New Year’s Eve. We then edited the film, did some preproduction (supers, but not music) and bumped it to tape. The audio track ran live (off of a "cart") and unfortunately sounds sour, but that’s the way it aired, so that’s the way it’s being preserved.
A few interesting points about this credit roll:
1. Note the blackboard behind producer Arlene Ross. In those days the producer put the rundown of the show on a board, and it was everybody’s job to copy down the information. 2. Even Guy Thompson, the custodian, received credit that night. I’m sure it was the only time he was publicly acknowledged. 3. Several of the people in this credit roll are no longer with us, including Bob Hammerly, Ed Rehm, and Jerry Fisher. (Fisher was not acknowledged by name, since she was working as a reporter that night, and had an on-screen presence during the newscast. She can be sitting at her desk, behind Guy Thompson.) 4. The on-air team that night was Larry Klaas, John Loesing (sports), and Dave Corey (weather, substituting for Don Franklin). Corey was normally a booth announcer at the station. 5. It’s good to see Larry Wallenstein (Larry #3) in his role as assignment editor. He would exit in January 1984, only to return a few years later as news director. 6. Was that a space ship, or a news set? Beam me up! 7. I sure needed a haircut.
I hope you enjoyed viewing this rare artifact. Leave me some positive comments and bribes, and perhaps I can be persuaded to post some more clips from my Channel 6 archives. Send the bribes care of J. DeLaTorre (bad inside joke). Have a happy and safe 2009!
Just ten days after being named “news managing editor”, Larry Klaas decided to show us all who’s boss. Presenting: the infamous “chain of command” memo.
I know what Larry was trying to do. He was sending a message to the producer, assignment editor, and director that what he said GOES. He urged all members of the news staff to keep a copy of this chain of command on file for reference. Disagree with Larry? Unless you happened to be the news director, you didn’t stand a prayer. It’s right there, on an 8 ½” by 11” piece of paper.
The producers hated this! Not because of having to answer to Larry, but because in the Klaas command chain, they had no more authority than the assignment editor, and the nebulous “other”. The directors hated this, because under Larry’s law, they were equal to the assistant directors… the assistant producers… and, ahem… INTERNS!
None of that mattered to Larry. The moral of the story was “I am above all of you, and you will listen to me!” But in a newsroom where the producer had to have SOME authority over the assignment desk, and the directors had to call the technical shots during the show, this demonstrated a lack of understanding on several levels. After just ten days, hard feelings were already starting to form. It didn’t mean people didn’t like or respect Larry. They just wanted a little respect in return. By stating they wielded the same power as interns, the implication was the assistant producers, assistant directors, and even the directors were just bit players in the news operation. Of course Larry didn’t really feel that way, but this sure made it look that way, and did nothing for unity, morale, or inspiration in a news operation that needed it badly.
Life in a newsroom has changed in so many ways, and I'm not just talking about news content. In those days, people smoked pot out in the open, even in front of “adults”. Those that didn’t partake, usually looked the other way. Such was the way it was in the late 70s and early 80s.
I was ushered into the WCIX world of weed on my very first day at the station. Before I’d even known my way around that crazy round building, I was shown the ledge on the fourth floor, behind some of the big equipment in the engineering department. People visited that ledge at all hours of the day and night. I tended to wait until after the newscast to partake, but many people did it from the moment they arrived for their shifts. It truly was a different world then!
(Look carefully at the fourth floor. You never know who you’ll see!)
Another favorite spot was out on the dirt road along Biscayne Bay. Cars would park there every night after the newscast was through. It was a favorite way to unwind in those days, but there was always the fear of getting caught by the police. For a long time they turned a blind eye to our activities, but after the Luis Alvarez police shooting gave the department a black eye (and we reported it aggressively), they weren’t quite as accommodating, and we had to be a lot more careful.
Then there was the art room, on the second floor. One night in 1980, a bunch of us went there after the newscast, thinking our illustrious assistant news director had left for the night. You can imagine our trepidation when he walked into the art room, at the same time many of us were passing the pipe around. We thought we were all in big, big trouble! The boss man walked over to us, and without missing a beat, asked (to our surprise), “hey, would any of you like to buy some sinsimilla?” Whew! The “Newser” was a User! I guess that would describe so many people that I worked with. Not Bob Rossicone, though.
Rossicone, the tough associate director with a pronounced New York accent, walked in on security guard Lazaro C. and me one time after hours. Lazaro was paid to watch the building, but spent lots of his time socializing and getting high. With the smell of pot permeating the room, Lazaro was afraid Rossicone would blow the whistle and cost him his job. When asked if he was bothered by what we were doing, we were greeted by one of the funniest lines I’d ever heard. Rossicone just looked at us and said, quote…
“I don’t care if you burn the f*cking place down!”
And so it went in those days. Times changed, the station grew more competitive, and soon drug testing was the norm. Eventually I stopped smoking, and I’m sure so did most of the other Boys From Brickell. But for quite a number of years, lighting up was a big part of my Channel 6 experience. It helped me cope with the pressure and frustrations, and being a shy person by nature, helped greatly in social situations.
Here’s a side of Larry Klaas we rarely got to see around the station. With his contract not renewed, and his career (at the time) hanging in the balance, he found himself able to just let go and enjoy himself at his going-away party, planned and hosted by his close friend, producer Arlene Ross. Here we see Larry and his wife, sharing a quiet moment. It’s the only time I’d ever seen him with his hair messed up.
Larry, opening one of his presents, with producer Jerry Fisher looking on. Jerry was a wonderful person, who a decade later would put up a valiant, but ultimately losing battle against cancer.
Dig the caricature of Larry on the piano, next to then-lovebirds Gary Slawitschka and Wendy Weisbrod. I don’t recall if it was Ron Laffin or Jim Hayek who created the portrait, but it’s a real beauty. To my eyes, it looks like Ron’s handiwork. Gary was a fellow Chryon operator at the time, before venturing into videotape editing. He was my best friend at the station, and is somebody that I think about from time to time. Gary, if you see this, please get in touch!
That’s Arlene Ross with her arm around Larry. These two had a lot of history, and were always very close. The big guy to the left and rear of Arlene is Tom Sedley, our ace (and under-appreciated) sports producer. Richard Chee-A-Tow from the engineering department is to the right rear of Larry.
John Loesing and his wife enjoy a piece of cake, while watching the frivolity unfold around them. John was very nice, but at times he might have been a little too low-key on the air.
I put down the camera for this group shot. That’s me on the far left, next to Arlene Ross, Gary Slawitschka, and Henry Rosenberg (videotape editor). Arlene’s future husband, director Dan Roujansky, is in the front. Can you guess which people in this picture are stoned?
Yeah, stoned. In those days, nearly everybody smoked pot, and the ones that didn’t, tolerated it. It was a generational thing that could never happen in this day and age. It was amazingly open, not just at parties such as this one, but all around the station as well. I think that’s going to be the subject of my next post.
Was it Larry Klaas’ ego that got him fired? Was it an alleged demand for more money? Or was it that Dick Descutner (our news director) simply wanted to make a change, and Barbara Sloan gave him just that opportunity? It all depends on whom you ask.
There were mixed feelings around the station when we learned Klaas was being ousted. He had his supporters, led by producer Arlene Ross. There were also people who felt a sense of liberation when word filtered down. Klaas was stunned by the dismissal, and told The Miami News’ Tom Jicha he was considering retiring from broadcasting. Obviously he reconsidered, and made a new start (albeit a little rocky) at KGUN in Tucson
Everyone in the newsroom had a Larry Klaas story to tell. If he was having a bad day, you knew it. In 1981, when my father was dying, I told producer Jerry Fisher that I might need to take a few days off. Klaas sat me down the next day, and in a stern voice, asked me why I told Jerry and not him. (This was before I became a producer. I was still a lowly Chyron operator/film archivist). Well, Larry, it was late and Jerry was still at the station, working on her nightly discrepancy report. You were gone for the night. Sorry I stepped on your toes, big guy. Show a little compassion for a guy whose dad is dying, will ya?
Yet I liked Larry. He was quick to criticize, but unlike a lot of managers, he would also tell you when you did a good job. I wished him well, and I meant it.
You’ll notice in Tom Jicha’s article that Descutner “found” Larry’s replacement, Barbara Sloan, through a five-second lead-in on another reporter’s audition tape. That was sort of how it went down, but it wasn’t Descutner who found her. The reporter on that tape was a former colleague of mine at WNWS, prior to my coming to Channel 6. He and I had something in common: both of our lives changed on March 17, 1980. Someday soon I’ll tell you that story.
One week after taking on the responsibility of Managing Editor, Larry Klaas started a new Channel 6 tradition: critiquing (or was it nitpicking?) the previous night’s newscast. Klaas (who was Larry #1 in a succession of three Larry’s that would be in charge of the news in the ‘80s) usually made an effort to be fair, but everyone who’s ever been around a live program knows that things can, and do, go wrong. All the Monday Morning Quarterbacking in the world won’t change that fact. I would take Larry #1’s critiques over Larry #2’s any day. (Larry #2 was a real piece of work, and even though he’s no longer alive to defend himself, I’m going to have to tell his story eventually.)
It’s nice to see the names of my old friends Nick Bogert (Mr. Cubs fan), Natalie Segal, Marianne Murciano, Dave Levine (who taught me a lot about conversational writing), Frank Lasko, Bill Lobean, and others. I was fortunate to run into both Bogert and Segal in the past few years.
While The Ten O’Clock News may have been a joke on some fronts, we had some talented folks who gave their all day in and day out. That’s why critiques can be so demoralizing. It’s great to get feedback, but you’ll notice there’s no criticism of the anchorman in here. I do agree with a lot that Larry #1 said (and not just his praise of my crafty Chyron work). We did need to pay more attention to things such as half track and match cuts. The best critiques are the ones that offer solutions and not just criticism. Little did we know it at the time, but things would get a whole lot worse, before they’d get any better.
This memo signaled a much-needed change in philosophy, when it came to management of The Ten O’Clock News. With our only newscast being at night, and with News Director Dick Descutner working only daylight hours, something had to be done to strengthen our nighttime management situation. Harlan Levy (the assistant news director) was simply too ineffectual to get the job done, and after yet another Larry Klaas memo complaining about him, Descutner decided to make Klaas the managing editor, and “reassign” Levy.
This, as you’d expect, presented problems. Klaas was both the anchor and the managing editor. When news would break, or when the producer would make any kind of in-show call, it was Klaas who had veto power over those decisions… while the show was on the air! Klaas was smart and quite competent, but he also had a gigantic ego, and many times there was just no reasoning with him. Still, it was a big step-up, news-wise, from what Harlan Levy offered in the evenings.
A year and a half later, Klaas was let go, replaced on the air by Barbara Sloan. Descutner would soon be out the door as well, but that’s a different story for a different day.
