During the fall of 1990 a memo was sent by Montreal Gazette entertainment editor Brian Kappler to associate managing editor Michael Cooke regarding the book section. It read, in summary: Feature novels closer to public taste (Danielle Steele, Stephen King, Robert Ludlum). Scrap the French best-seller list. Limit commissioned reviews to five a week. Shorten… Continue reading The Art of Book Balancing
Just another Saturday Plight
Saturday Night, the magazine that hasn’t made a penny for more than 40 years, has always been a hard sell. And now that the venerable but perennially money-losing magazine is operating on a controlled-circulation basis, few media forecasters are predicting an easier economic future. At the magazine’s glitzy launch party last October at Toronto’s Royal… Continue reading Just another Saturday Plight
Taking on Toronto
It is going to be a hard night for Jack Layton. Pre-election polls have forecast defeat of Toronto’s NDP mayoralty candidate at the hands of his Tory opponent, and at 7 p.m. on election day, time is ticking away. And here is Layton, sweating in his overcoat and red scarf, rushing from door to door… Continue reading Taking on Toronto
The Snooze at Six
Right off, an ugly problem stood between me and my assignment to write a piece on CBC Newsworld, “the all-news channel for Canadians.” I would have to watch it. Try it sometime. While you yawn your way through another Capital Report or Ontario Update you get a small dose of what it must be like… Continue reading The Snooze at Six
A Few Choice Words on Critics
Barbara-jo McIntosh couldn’t understand what had happened. A week earlier, when Eve Johnson of The Vancouver Sun had called her, they’d gotten along fine. Quite well, in fact. Johnson had asked her about the chef, the menu and the history of her central Vancouver restaurant, Barbara-jo’s Elegant Home Cooking. She hadn’t sounded unimpressed. Certainly not… Continue reading A Few Choice Words on Critics
