How to succeed in broadcasting without really trying.
The TV news industry has been caught in a downturn brought on by the flagging economy and an increase in advertisers’ use of the World Wide Web. With less money being spent on television advertising, stations have had smaller budgets to work with, and for a little more than a year now, reports of layoffs and increases in the use of “one-man band” reporters have been commonplace.
Not even major market stations were safe from budget shortfalls and a need to downsize as a result. KTTV, the Los Angeles FOX affiliate, resorted to massive layoffs at the end of June. More than 100 people were shown the door, and the station may be working with a lot of backpack journalists in the near future.
Jillian Barberie Reynolds is a valuable broadcast journalist who is serious about her job and very tasteful.
But take heart, broadcast journalists! There is a way to make yourself layoff-proof. It isn’t easy, but it can be done. All you have to do is be vapid, annoying, obviously uninterested in your job and able to attract a sizable chunk of the 18-to-49 demographic with your childish on-air antics or at least with the constant, unsolicited display of your breasts.
In other words, all you have to do is be Jillian Barberie Reynolds, and you’re fine.
The “Good Day L.A.” weather and lifestyle anchor – if you’ve ever seen the show, you know that title is used loosely – isn’t going anywhere. It doesn’t matter that she doesn’t really do anything on the air but stir the pot. Apparently, all that matters is that she boosts ratings.
Not even questionable behavior off the air sticks to Reynolds. She spilled her sexual history on Howard Stern’s show? KTTV and KCOP General Manager Kevin Hale told the L.A. Times’ James Rainey Reynolds “adheres to” guidelines for professional conduct on the air. She wants to do a Playboy spread? Well that might be unacceptable if she did it. But Hale’s sit-down with Rainey wasn’t a time to comment on personnel matters. Funny that it suddenly wasn’t time to talk about personnel matters after talking about the layoffs.
Of course, Reynolds isn’t the only one who is safe from the receiving end of a pink slip at KTTV. A FOX representative told Rainey there won’t be any on-air talent leaving. But the fact that Reynolds gets to stick around after all her on-air misbehavior, bad-mouthing of coworkers, boundary issues and dedication to other projects while many talented people were let go is mind-boggling.
Then again, FOX set itself up for this by running those promos talking about how hot all KTTV’s female anchors are, all of which show more of Reynolds than anyone else. (Focus on that and not the fact marketing was trying to drum up viewers by talking about how sexy the women on the news are.) You get what you paid for. KTTV paid for Reynolds, and now 100-plus employees are out of a job.
