1. Beginning in 1970, Howard Cosell and his ABC colleagues transformed NFL Monday Night Football into theater without really needing to reference the games involved.  The drama on the field, after all, was erratic, sporadic, and unpredictable; the drama in the booth had a script.  Part of that script was Cosell’s famed catchphrase:  “Telling it like it is.”

2. CBS’s 60 Minutes dates from the same period, with its innovative use of confrontational news packages squeezed into prime time, liberally sprinkled with close-ups of Mike Wallace.  Occasionally, the drama of the confrontation colored the facts.  But ratings remained high.

3. In December 1980, NBC broadcast a meaningless NFL game between the New York Jets and the Miami Dolphins with no announcers.  No play-by-play.  No color.  No drama.

NBC never repeated the experiment.

4. In 1980, Walter Cronkite announced his retirement.  Walter Cronkite’s popularity paralleled that of network television and, during the 1960s and 70s, it was Cronkite, as anchor for the CBS Evening News, who was the voice, face, and heart of broadcast journalism.

Cronkite’s well-known tagline: “And that’s the way it is.”

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I’d like to think we’ve had enough drama, enough dramatists, enough teasing, enough teasers, enough taglines, enough catchphrases.

Enough stories and enough storylines.  Enough storytellers.

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