Louisville Magazine is Louisville's city magazine, covering Louisville people, lifestyles, politics, sports, restaurants, entertainment and homes. Includes a monthly calendar of events.
Issue link: https://loumag.epubxp.com/i/453014
48 LOUISVILLE MAGAZINE 2.15 be because they keep it at a very cool tem- perature and I have awful circulation. My hands and lips turn Fox 41-purple. Te set boasts 40 monitors, mostly high-defnition. During newscasts, anchors dash between them all — from a stack of three monitors for one story to an L-shaped cluster of monitors that can project wall-sized video behind them. Te weather desk is a few feet away from the main round glass news desk that a purple blanket covers between shows to prevent dust from collecting. Te set is a glossy fnish to WDRB's quest to look sharp and shed its underdog image. In 2011, WDRB became the only station in town shooting video and broadcasting in full HD. Keeney grimaces when she thinks of the old days. "We had good people but shitty equipment," she says. Another em- ployee who's been at WDRB since the '90s described the set's former look as "cheap." At 3:30, the newsroom grows louder. Night crews have arrived to start their work on the 10 p.m. show. Te smell of hairspray — equal parts sweet and sour — wafts as on-air talent primps. Denson, the 4 p.m. producer, is a committed Tweeter. She posts a series of teases for stories now less than 20 minutes from air: "A Lou lawyer doesn't mince words with a judge. Hear what he said as @TamaraWDRB explains the penalty he'll pay at 4pm." Another producer reads scripts aloud. "When I turn to leave, the gun is pointing at me. Bang. Bang. Bang. I'm down," she says. "Tat's an awesome SOT (sound on tape.)" Shiny black heels march to and fro. Producers wear them. A few reporters too. It's not in the dress code, but the station does have one. No jeans. Even casual-clad photographers should tuck in their shirts. It's also recommended that desks stay tidy. Mounted cups hold pens at each. It's part of the WDRB culture, I'm told. Look pro- fessional, take pride. At just before 4 p.m., Denson opens a drawer and reaches for red lipstick and face powder. She mans her show from a dark control room. She doesn't need to doll up. But it's become part of her process. "She's got her lips on," a fellow producer jokes. "It's time." "Y ou used to be in TV, right?" Gilbert Corsey asks as he's hustling out the back door, an earpiece, a press release and a cup of cofee in hand. He seems slightly suspicious as to why, given my experience, I'd shadow him. Everyone likes a good behind-the-scenes story, I say. When reporters and photog- raphers leave the station to start piecing together a story, there are no guarantees. Breaking news can jostle crews. Equipment problems can eat away at the fve or six hours given to turn a story for air. It's like family holidays in reverse. Once the pack splits, dysfunction can erupt. A reporter from a competing station might Tweet a detail or quote relating to a story and sud- denly the newsroom hammers their own — Did you know this? Did you get this? So-and-so just Tweeted … Dressed in a light-brown suit and tie with blue stripes, Corsey heads to a 10 a.m. press conference about Louisville Catholic schools expanding fnancial assistance. Energetic and outgoing, the 30-year-old is a self-admitted news junkie. On vacation, Corsey's in the hotel room at 5 o'clock clicking around to catch the evening news in other cities. His wife thinks he's nuts. I'm charmed. I've been known to do the same thing. As we drive, we're quick to swap dark tales. He grows animated de- scribing the "sweat shop" he once worked in — anchoring sports and news, shooting and editing video. Equipment that had one function — to play a news story for air — often crumpled at the task. His orig- inal "sweat shop" news director was largely absent. "I got a new news director and he was not a Gilbert Corsey fan," Corsey recalls. "You can go from being the favorite son and the best employee to out the door through no fault of your own if your news director changes or general manager chang- es." My turn: "My news director in Spokane (Washington) just took me of the schedule one week. Tat's how I found out I was out of a job and my contract hadn't been renewed." Corsey shakes his head. "Brutal," he says. Turns out, the guy who told me I'd been let go in Spokane almost hired Corsey a few years later. It's common practice in television news to move every few years, leaping toward a larger market. I did Med- ford, Spokane, Louisville and Nashville in eight years. Combine nomadic tendencies with a limited number of news markets (just more than 200) and everyone's basi- cally second cousins. "I could write a book, a novel, on news horror stories," Corsey says. "Having worked at other stations, WDRB is freakin' nirvana." Gilbert Corsey, I like you. But did you just equate a television station with a divine state in which there is no sufering, longing or sense of self? Corsey's been at WDRB for four years. On his frst day he assumed he'd turn his story (aka "pack- age"), anchor the 4 o'clock show, then zip out for another round of evening live shots for WDRB's 6:30 newscast. Turned out, he could head home after anchoring the 4. Corsey remembers his reaction: "Like, 'What?!'" He throws his hands up in the air, brown eyes widening. "I'm only ever in the 4?" TV reporters must never expect a 9-to- 5 gig. Want that? Try public relations. Without a 5 p.m. newscast, WDRB staggers employees to work either for the early-morning, 4 p.m., 6 p.m. or 10 p.m. shows in eight-hour shifts. In the last 12 years, newsroom staf has doubled, from 42 to 80. On the day I'm with Corsey, WDRB has a total of 10 reporters working for its late-afternoon and evening newscasts. (Tis does not include four former C-J reporters WDRB has hired for the web. WDRB TV crews often abbreviate those longer, more investigative stories for air. As if to rub it into the C-J, every week WDRB hypes an enterprise piece written by a web report- er as the "Sunday Edition.") One might expect to fnd such a robust staf in larger markets, like Chicago or Dallas. Corsey has compared. "I have friends who work in San Antonio and we have more people than they have there," he says. "I can tell great stories here. I have the time and resources to do so." Tose print reporters often assist in obtaining documents and records while television crews gather videos. How does WDRB aford all this? Bill Lamb, WDRB's GM known for his con- servative and blunt "Point of View" rants, lights up talking about money. He says in 2008, when the recession was forcing other stations to slash budgets, he invested. He told this magazine in 2012 that the Gan- nett-owned C-J was in a "death spiral." And he was setting up WDRB to take its place. Block Communications Inc., a relatively small Toledo, Ohio-based media company, owns WDRB. Lamb, who serves as Block's vice president of broadcasting, doesn't receive a lot of interference from WDRB's parent company. All the investments have paid of, Lamb says. Website hits have soared. Ratings have climbed. Sponsored sports segments, featuring Rick Bozich and Eric Crawford — two popular sports columnists Fulmer recruited from the C-J — help rake in millions of dollars, Lamb says. Last year was WDRB's most proftable year, placing it as the second-highest rev- enue earner for local ad dollars (about 65 percent of WDRB's budget) in the market behind WLKY. C orsey heads into the press confer- ence. Te Archbishop of Louisville, Joseph Kurtz, and others take turns at a podium. Corsey asks questions about declining enrollment and receives positive spin — "Well, some of our schools have wait lists." Corsey's a man wired for TV. He can scribble a script in minutes. When he