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Posted on 09/30/2002 11:32:27 AM PDT by Tumbleweed_Connection
Mike Wallace says that "60 Minutes" no longer appeals to the 18- to 34-year-old audience and that because the long running hit show has dropped out of the top 10 ratings for the first time, he is now hearing talk about its profitability and cost for the first time since the show began in the 1960s.
Speaking as a member of a four-person panel on the future of journalism at the Michigan Journalism Fellows Reunion on the University of Michigan campus in Ann Arbor, Wallace disclosed that among 18-to-34 age group executives consider important because advertisers target that market, the show ranks a dismal 90th in ratings.
The 84-year-old TV veteran says he's being told that foreign stories which are the most expensive to produce, no longer appeal to the younger audience.
"'60 Minutes' has made incredible sums of money for CBS," Wallace said, according to the Ann Arbor News. It's a different situation today, he added with the show's high production costs and low revenues.
Under any circumstances, Wallace is ready to cut back on the grinding schedule he's followed for years and says he plans to do fewer interviews on the spot this season. At his age, he says, it's "sensible" to pare his workload.
After a report on Saudi children who have not been permitted to see their mothers living in the United States Sunday, Wallace's appearances will dwindle from the 20 he did last year to 10 this year, according to Newsday.
Wallace doesn't shy away from admittng he's getting on in years. "I came to the conclusion that perhaps I was getting a trifle long in the tooth," he told an interviewer recently. "I know it's the sensible thing to do, and I would love to be doing a full 25 pieces next season. But it's the right thing to do right now."
Wallace's contract has two years to run. He says he doesn't know what he'll do when the time comes to leave CBS.
"I don't know," he told Newsday. "I have spent a lot of the summer thinking just exactly about that question. I have 11 grandchildren, and I adore them, and they love each other, and they come in staggered groups to the [Martha's] Vineyard. I have no desire, certainly at this point, to go to Florida.
"I've been working in this business, which I love, for 63 years, and so I've got to find what I'm going to do. I have not yet found what I'm going to do, and by that I mean, Morley loves to paint, and Bradley likes ... jazz, fly fishing, Aspen. I've got to find a path, find what it is that I really want."
Which, Newsday suggests, is doing exactly what he does now.
Both the old bag & his lousy, Liberal-Socialist muck-raking show sound depressed, FGS. <>Short of a full frontal lobotomy, ol' Mike should try doubling the dose of Prozac.
Might even consider washing the junk down with a (large) snifter of Brandy.
As for the show's depressed ratings?
I'm afraid nothing's going to help that.
...save for a swift, merciful cancellation.
The 84-year-old TV veteran says he's being told that foreign stories which are the most expensive to produce, no longer appeal to the younger audience.
Research indicates that many young adult viewers think that "60 Minutes" is actually a children's program, having mistaken the aging reporter for a gigantic demented talking prune.
Who watches 60 Minutes anyway?
WHO am I? (LOL!)
What; you trying to raise his IQ? Just what's the problem with these people; they can't get enough of themselves? This old socialist has 11 grandkids and he's lookin' for something to do? Good grief! If I were him, I'd spend the rest of my days trying to debrief the little people in an effort to make amends for his contribution to the socialization of America. But then, he probably doesn't know how...
FGS
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