The Newsroom
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The Newsroom is a Canadian television dramedy series which ran on the CBC in the 1996-1997, 2003-2004 and 2004-2005 seasons. In the United States, it can be found on some PBS stations such as WLIW. As well, a two-hour television movie, Escape from the Newsroom, aired in 2002.
Set in the news department of a television station (never officially named, but clearly based on the CBC itself), the show -- which was similar to such earlier series as the British Drop the Dead Donkey and the Australian Frontline -- mined a dark vein of comedy from the political machinations and the sheer incompetence of the people involved in producing the nightly news.
Series creator Ken Finkleman starred as executive producer George Findlay, a venal, petty man who cared only about his sex life, his lunch orders and his personal image within the network's bureaucracy. Findlay was exceptionally intelligent, but self-absorbed and utterly unconcerned about anything besides himself. Peter Keleghan starred as Jim Walcott, the similarly shallow but far less intelligent anchorman. Karen Hines also appeared as segment producer Karen Mitchell, who was the news department's rare example of intelligence and professionalism.
Other than Finkleman, Keleghan and Hines, however, each season had a different supporting cast of newswriters, reporters, producers and network bureaucrats. The show also included guest appearances by a number of public figures, including David Cronenberg, Bob Rae, Hugh Segal, Naomi Klein and Noam Chomsky, playing themselves in interviews on the newscast.
The original 13 episodes were meant as a short run, which was never intended by either Finkleman or the network to develop into a multiseason series. Following the end of The Newsroom, Finkleman produced three different short-run series for the CBC, More Tears, Foolish Heart and Foreign Objects, all of which included Findlay as a linking character. (Findlay had also appeared in Finkleman's pre-Newsroom series Married Life.)
However, none of these subsequent series were as well-received by the public or by critics as The Newsroom had been, and the CBC began to express their desire for a new set of Newsroom episodes. Escape from the Newsroom, which included a plot digression in which the characters directly addressed the idea of reviving the series, was meant partly as a sarcastic response to that request. However, Finkleman did ultimately agree to produce 13 new episodes, which aired in the winter of 2004.
A third season of The Newsroom began airing on the CBC on February 14, 2005.
The first two seasons are on DVD.
External links
- Official Page (http://www.cbc.ca/newsroom/)