You've heard of "softball" interviews? You've heard of puff pieces? You ain't seen nothing! Check out this Toronto Star profile of CNN's Paula Zahn that has all the velocity and substance of a single piece of air-popped popcorn flung at mommy by a two-year-old:
Keeping her musical skills intact, she graduated with a journalism degree in 1978 and got her first job with a Dallas TV station, where she worked from the ground up. "I have some not-so-fond memories of probably one of the best news directors I ever worked with, who would, when dissatisfied by one of my scripts, rip it into 40 little pieces in front of everybody else in the newsroom," she says. "I'd take another stab at it and rarely would he rip up the scripts in as many pieces the second time."
Over the next 10 years, she moved to San Diego, Houston, Boston and Los Angeles, rising through the ranks of local stations. Throughout that time, she says she never had her eye on a national spot.
"I had worked with enough jaded veterans that, from Day One, I heard everybody preach to me: `Just as quickly as doors open, doors close behind you, so don't get too set on the dream. The best thing you can do is go out into some of the smaller markets and earn as many reporting stripes as you can,'" she recalls.
"The truth is, from the day I got my first job, I never had hard-and-fast goals about where I ultimately wanted to end up. I was so happy moving from city to city, re-establishing myself and switching my job. I was a happy vagabond.
"There really wasn't a reason to dream beyond that, because, in terms of the historical news business, I had already worked at some very well-respected markets, some of the largest markets in the country."
Ok, now this is hilarious: it's another way of saying "hey, it doesn't matter that my performance in the demo eats it, hard. I was a big fish in some very little ponds, once upon a time. Isn't that enough? It should be!"
At any rate, the woman the Canadians call a prima-time diva will be lecturing tonight in Toronto as a part of the Toronto Star-sponsored Unique Lives & Experiences lecture series. I don't see what's so unique about bad ratings at a Jon Klein-led CNN, but maybe I just don't have that unique Canadian perspective.
