| | | | | Exec summary: Scroll down for Oscars #'s, ESPN intel, Jay Solomon's column, Brian Lowry's latest review, and much more... | | Sam Nunberg likes to talk with reporters. Talk and talk and talk. "Sam is a character. He's always been a character inside Trumpworld," Katy Tur said on MSNBC Monday night. Tur said the same thing Ryan Lizza said on CNN: Nunberg is helpful to reporters, but "he is not someone you would trust without confirming, let's just say."
Nunberg was interviewed by Robert Mueller's office late last month. Then he went on Ari Melber's MSNBC show and said he was "happy to cooperate with them."
That interview was on February 28. At some point afterward, Mueller's office sent Nunberg a subpoena. Nunberg or someone close to him leaked the subpoena over the weekend. Axios and NBC published stories about it. Tur said she spoke with Nunberg about the subpoena on Sunday night, "and he said he was going to comply with it. He never gave any indication that he would not comply with it. I was talking to him at about 10:30, 11 o'clock last night."
Then something happened. "Starting Monday morning," Nunberg told friends that he was going to refuse to cooperate, The Daily Beast reported. Some of those friends "worried Nunberg had been drinking." | | | Nunberg spoke with the WashPost's Josh Dawsey, the NYT's Maggie Haberman and others. His first TV interview was with Tur around 2:45pm. He called in to Tur's show... then taped an interview with CNN's Gloria Borger... then Jake Tapper... then NY1's Josh Robin... and I'm sorry if I missed other interviews. He went on camera with Melber at 6pm and Erin Burnett at 7pm. By the end of the Burnett interview, camera crews were camped outside CNN's NYC bureau. At the moment, more interviews are possible on Tuesday morning... I called Nunberg to find out, but his voice mailbox is full... | | | In the 7pm hour, he suggested to Burnett that he'd be willing to cooperate. In the 8pm hour, off-camera, Nunberg told Tur and the AP's Jill Colvin and The Atlantic's McKay Coppins that he'll probably eventually cooperate with Mueller. "He just doesn't want to make it easy," Tur tweeted... | | Have you EVER seen anything like this? | | A witness handing his subpoena to a news anchor on live TV?
"Sam Nunberg seemed to be imploding before everyone's eyes," Hadas Gold writes in this CNNMoney story. She points out that Nunberg even asked anchors for legal advice...
--> Per Jill Colvin's Monday night story, "Nunberg appeared pleased by his performance, telling the AP that he was 'doing something I've never seen...'" | | "Nunberg TV is guaranteed to do two things" | | | NYT's Maggie Haberman tweeted: "Nunberg TV is guaranteed to do two things -- aggravate Mueller and infuriate Trump." | | Now an ethical debate is raging in journalism circles. If your source seems drunk or drugged or just plain out of his mind, what is your responsibility? Several of the interviewers expressed concern about Nunberg's personal welfare on Monday... asking if he wanted to reconsider his position... asking if he'd consulted his lawyer... asking about his family... and, in Burnett's case, even asking if he was under the influence. She said at the end of the interview that she smelled alcohol on his breath. But he denied drinking and said "anti-depressants" were the only meds he was on.
What do you think? Where's the line in a breaking news situation like this? Here are a few of the reactions I've spotted on social media:
Rick Wilson: "Nunberg is building an insanity defense."
Jody Avirgan: "I think the networks should stop putting Sam Nunberg on television."
Tom Nichols: "He's being subpoenaed by a grand jury looking into the president, shows up at their doorstep, and wants to talk. What are they supposed to say? No?"
Kai Ryssdal: "Cable news is debasing itself today."
Paul Farhi: "Unless they had clear indications that the dude was impaired somehow, a live interview is kosher. It's not like he didn't agree to be interviewed. He did. So bring on the questions."
--> What's your view? Email me here... | | Meanwhile, over on Fox... | | Fox's newscasts covered the Nunberg news, but the pro-Trump talk shows in prime time focused on the Oscars instead. Mark Steyn, filling in for Tucker Carlson at 8pm, led with Oscars outrage (of course) and celebrated the award show's ratings decline. Later in the hour, he downplayed Nunberg's claims by saying "nobody's heard of this Mr. Nunberg." (False.)
At 9, Sean Hannity began and ended his show with "HOLLYWOOD HYPOCRISY." Lots of Clinton talk, etc. And Laura Ingraham's lead at 10? "America's resistance media has lost all touch with reality..."
--> Flashback to Sunday's "Reliable Sources:" The "more Mueller discovers, the more Trump's TV boosters have to deny/deny/deny. The worse things look for Trump's inner circle, the worse the deflections get..". | | | CNN's Chris Cuomo tweeted just now: "Saying you won't comply with a subpoena is foolish but easy. Actually facing the music is hard. This Nunberg will comply..." | | Bob Mueller is "gearing up" | | | I wonder if President Trump was watching "The Story" at 7pm? If so, he heard Martha MacCallum ask Andrew Napolitano what these developments meant for the Mueller probe. The judge's answer: "It is not going to be over soon. Bob Mueller is not only NOT winding down, he's gearing up. And I think more indictments should be expected." | | Trump is holding a joint presser on Tuesday | | | President Trump will hold a joint news conference with the Swedish prime minister at 3:30pm ET Tuesday... | | Late night comics are laughing | | | Colbert to Nunberg on Monday's "Late Show:" "You know Mueller CAN arrest you, right?" This is "like saying EAT ME to Hannibal Lecter. Doesn't work out well." | | | Jimmy Pitaro, chairman of Disney Consumer Products and Interactive Media, is the new president of ESPN, effective immediately. He was Burbank-based in his last job, but he'll be in Bristol in the coming days. Recode's Peter Kafka had the jump on the news... After he called for comment, Disney confirmed the hire in a Monday afternoon statement... | | "Some of the best experiences of my professional career were working with the sports business. I always knew in my heart I would return. This is a dream come true," Pitaro told the NYT's Kevin Draper.
Per Draper, Pitaro "did not lay out a new strategy for reversing these declines or for finding new revenue streams," but "praised what ESPN had done in recent years, including a plan to launch a redesigned ESPN app..." | | The always-plugged-in James Andrew Miller pointed out via Twitter that Bob Iger offered to send Pitaro to Bristol "several times during the past several years," but John Skipper "politely passed." Now Skipper is out and Pitaro is in.
While some in-house candidates, like Connor Schell, lost out on the top job, "this is as close to an 'in house' selection without being from within current ESPN ranks as one could get," Miller tweeted. "Pitaro may not know where all the bathrooms are at Bristol HQ but he knows company's past and current challenges extremely well..." | | Suit alleges sexual harassment at ESPN | | | "Former ESPN host and legal analyst Adrienne Lawrence sued the network in federal court on Monday, claiming the company is 'rife with misogyny' and asserting that she was fired after complaining about being sexual harassed by a senior anchor," NBC's Tim Stelloh reports. ESPN rejected the claims in the 84-page complaint, saying it conducted a "thorough investigation" and found her allegations to be "entirely without merit..." | | NYT's new politics editor | | | Patrick Healy, currently deputy culture editor at the NYT, is returning to the political arena as politics editor. He will report to Matt Purdy, per Monday's internal memo. Healy -- who is also a CNN analyst -- tells me: "Really excited to collaborate with my colleagues in D.C., New York and across the country to cover the most important political era of my lifetime, and to build a great team of reporters and editors to get the story right in 2018 and 2020..." | | -- Lots of new details about Rolling Stone mag in Joe Pompeo's latest piece: "Ryan Lizza is writing, Jann and Gus Wenner are still kicking around, and Jay Penske is the media tycoon du jour..." (VF)
-- Facebook is working on a new approach to "classifying satirical news pieces," so they're not mistaken for truly "fake news," Erik Wemple reports... (WashPost)
-- Cox Media Group is shutting down its conservative-leaning viral content site Rare.us... It seems related to Facebook's algorithm changes... (Axios) | | | Frank Pallotta emails with his latest story: Sunday's Oscars averaged 26.5 million viewers, the award show's lowest viewership ever. This was a year-over-year decline of about 20%. Conservatives are blaming Hollywood's political bent. Media experts are citing a wide variety of factors. Here's a big one: "This year's best picture nominees weren't huge box office draws," Jill Disis writes... | | Five changes that would improve Oscar ratings | | Brian Lowry emails: If the Academy and ABC are serious about trying to fight the forces of gravity pulling down broadcast TV events, they have a few -- albeit mostly unpalatable -- options:
-- Hold the show to three hours
-- Spice up the hosts
-- Nominate some blockbusters
-- Tighten up (or eliminate) the lowest-profile categories
-- Phase out some of those other made-for-TV awards
Read his full column here... | | "Ladies night?" More like "boys club" | | | The NYPost's Monday headline was "LADIES NIGHT," alluding to all the talk on stage about empowering women and achieving gender equality. But let's get real: The telecast also illustrated persistent inequality in Hollywood. This stat says it all: Of the 39 people who won Academy Awards on Sunday night, only 6 were women. Here's my full story... | | Via Lisa Respers France:
-- Frances McDormand challenged Hollywood to start demanding "inclusion riders." Here's what they are...
-- Which stars were left out of the "In Memoriam" segment? Adam West and Glen Campbell, among others...
-- Macaulay Culkin had an epic Oscars night because he live-tweeted the awards show... without actually watching... | | | Brian Lowry emails: Regarding the Oscars' "moral confusion," as the LAT's Robin Abcarian put it, it should be noted that the Oscars certainly don't mark the end of the #MeToo, Time's Up movement. This is very much a work in progress. But the end of awards season does spare the industry from the awkward juggling act of trying to publicly address those issues while they go about the incompatible process of congratulating themselves for all the great work they've done... | | -- Re: Twitter's TV ad during the Oscars: "Twitter's tribute to women rings hollow for some targets of abuse," Sara Ashley O'Brien writes... (CNNMoney)
-- The Daily Beast's Ben Collins and Brandy Zadrozny are jumping to NBC News... (Poynter)
-- Matthew Henick is leaving BuzzFeed and joining Facebook's media partnerships team... (THR)
-- Three promotions at CNN Politics: Kyle Blaine is senior campaign editor, Rebekah Metzler is senior W.H. editor, Jedd Rosche is senior Congress editor... (Twitter) | | Jay Solomon's side of the story | | Hadas Gold emails: Remember Jay Solomon, the WSJ star who was fired when the paper found evidence that he was involved in a prospective business arrangement with a man who was also one of his sources? Solomon is now out with his side of the story. In a column for the Columbia Journalism Review, Solomon says that while he never was in any actual business relationship with the magnate, he recognizes that he may have not managed his source relationship correctly.
Those were "serious mistakes," he says. And "I also blundered my initial conversations with the Journal... I was scared and defensive, and lost my job as a result." Read the rest here... | | Reddit investigating Russian propaganda | | | Donie O'Sullivan reports: Reddit is investigating Russian propaganda on its platform and is cooperating with congressional investigators, CEO Steve Huffman said in a post on the site Monday. Reddit has removed a "few hundred" accounts that were sharing Russian propaganda, Huffman said. He acknowledged that there's been frustration with the site's silence on the matter... But he said "we also want to be careful to not tip our hand too much while we are investigating..." | | | In case you missed it, Dylan Byers' morning newsletter PACIFIC officially launched on Monday... Sign up here for Tuesday's edition... And check out his editors note here... | | | For the record, part three | | | -- Here's John Koblin inside Radhika Jones' VF Oscar party... (NYT)
-- Two corrections: In my post-Oscars daze, I said Gary Oldman had never been nominated for an Oscar before. He was previously nominated in 2012. I also misidentified the winner of the Oscar for best short. It's "The Silent Child." My apologies!
-- Megan Thomas emails: Looks like Jay-Z and Beyoncé may have dropped a hint that they plan to tour together this summer... (Variety) | | "CBS This Morning" is turning this TV segment into a book | | | When "CBS This Morning" launched in 2012, it had an occasional segment called "Notes to Self," where "prominent figures write letters to their younger selves." The morning show -- through its sister company Simon & Schuster -- is compiling these notes in a book. "Notes to Self" the book was announced on Monday... It will be out in May... | | "Black Mirror" will be back | | | "The Netflix anthology from Charlie Brooker will return for a fifth season, Netflix announced Monday," THR reports. No word on a premiere date or episode count yet... | | Lowry reviews the "Star Wars Rebels" finale | | | Brian Lowry emails: A door closed on the "Star Wars" galaxy on Monday night, as the animated DisneyXD series "Star Wars Rebels" concluded with a 90-minute finale. Those mining the universe with live-action features could learn a few things from the work that's been done on Lucasfilm's animation side... Read more here... | | Four ways to catch up on Sunday's "Reliable Sources" | | -- Jeff Greenfield's concern: "In this avalanche" of news, "what's being crowded out?"
-- With Hope Hicks on the way out, will relations between the press and the president deteriorate even further? It's possible, Olivia Nuzzi said...
-- Nuzzi added: "I see these reports that he's become 'unglued.' If he's been glued until now, I think that's a pretty remarkable fact for us to consider..." | | My question on Sunday's "Reliable Sources:" President Trump is now being described -- by his allies -- as unglued, unraveling, uncontrollable. Where are reporters getting these quotes from?
Josh Dawsey's answer: "We speak to, you know, dozens of people in and around the White House for our stories." Sometimes, he said, "when we're pursuing stories about problems in the White House -- personnel churn, chaos, not following policy procedures -- folks in the White House say to us, you know, 'You're being a little hyperbolic, it's not that bad, don't be overdramatic.' In this story, my colleagues and I, none of us could find folks in the White House who were really saying things were going well..." | | | Steven Brill, the co-CEO of NewsGuard, gave me a preview of the start-up on "Reliable Sources." Backed by $6 million in funding, NewsGuard is rating the reliability of thousands of news sources. It wants to help consumers distinguish between sites that are trying to get it right and sites that are trying to trick people... | | Jordan Klepper gets serious | | | Comedy Central's Jordan Klepper also joined me on Sunday's show... He said the students from MSD have been able "to own the media narrative in a way that I haven't seen since Donald Trump's become president." Here's the video of our conversation... | | | Email brian.stelter@turner.com... the feedback helps us improve this newsletter every day... Thanks! | | | | | | |
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