Skip to content
Link copied to clipboard

Ellen Gray: Somehow, the news got through all the gimmicks

TELEVISION, the medium that first divided us into a nation of red and blue states, last night pulled out every crayon in its box to show that map remade.

TELEVISION, the medium that first divided us into a nation of red and blue states, last night pulled out every crayon in its box to show that map remade.

Holograms, virtual rotundas, game show-style sets that cried out for briefcase-toting models - even a fussy set of "drawers" that opened to yield exit-poll nuggets - all served to mark time in the hours before the polls closed on the West Coast.

But for sheer drama, no news division's bells or whistles could compete with the news itself, delivered in the final moments of prime time with none of the ambiguity that marked two previous presidential elections.

If the election of Barack Obama is as historic as everyone from MSNBC to Fox News Channel - and in between - seemed at last to agree it was, it's unlikely to be remembered for the graphics, or even the pundits.

Here's how they passed the time, waiting for news:

You live in a battleground state, you take your chances: Pennsylvanians, and Philadelphians in particular, got their 15 minutes last night.

On Fox News Channel, they couldn't get enough of a complaint by the McCain campaign that members of the New Black Panthers were intimidating voters at 12th and Fairmount, and when Neil Cavuto asked commentator Michelle Malkin about it, she noted that there had been problems here, too, "after the Phillies won" the World Series. And "they won," she said in a tone of disbelief.

Finnigan's Wake got a shout-out on NBC News, whose anchor, Brian Williams, noted that he knew exactly where the bar was, from his days in Philadelphia - where he worked for WCAU (Channel 10).

Best graphic: Tie between the interactive maps wielded by John King on CNN and Chuck Todd on NBC. (Though "Saturday Night Live" 's Fred Armisen had more fun with it a couple of weeks ago).

Silliest: The presidential seal that rose and fell as NBC's Ann Curry tiptoed around it on MSNBC. Even Williams, showing her green screen, called it "the Weather Channel writ large."

Weirdest: CNN's virtual set of "drawers," a stack of data that could be "opened" at a touch and which at one point, noted Soledad O'Brien, looked like a "double funnel."

Distinction without a difference: MSNBC's recasting of Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews as "commentators" rather than anchors probably didn't register with many viewers.

Displays of corporate might: ABC News, which splashed itself all over Times Square, even as NBC News took over the rink outside 30 Rockefeller Center while running Obama and McCain Electoral College totals up the side of the building.

Sentimental gizmo: NBC's "virtual whiteboard" in memory of Tim Russert (whose son, Luke, was reporting on the youth vote).

"Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi" moment: CNN's Wolf Blitzer interviewing Capitol Hill correspondent Jessica Yellin via hologram. What next? "Star Trek" transporters?

Most relaxed anchor: Fox News' Brit Hume, who seemed to actually enjoy the occasional technical glitch, laughing about an erroneous graphic that had appeared to call Ohio early (the check mark was meant for Wisconsin, he said). When a field report seemed to have more than one person talking, he cheerfully explained that it was "an experiment," adding, "You'll tell us how you like it."

Runner-up: CBS News' Katie Couric, calm and collected on a newscast more thoughtful than glitzy. *

Send e-mail to graye@phillynews.com.