Quick Takes

Washington Post showcases home of CPB’s Jennifer Lawson

By |

You can take a photographic stroll around the Washington, D.C., rowhouse of Jennifer Lawson, CPB’s s.v.p., television and digital video content, thanks to Thursday’s Washington Post. The Real Estate section features a peek inside the 1909 architectural gem that Lawson and her husband Tony Gittens, founder and director of Film Fest DC, had modernized for their empty-nest years. The Post noted that the kitchen and adjacent seating area hold two of six televisions in the home. “I actually need to watch Downton Abbey — it’s my professional responsibility,” Lawson quips.

Programs/Content

NPR drops Talk of the Nation, replaces with WBUR’s Here & Now

By |

This item has been updated and reposted with additional information. After more than two decades on the air, NPR’s Talk of the Nation will come to an end in June to make way for the newsmag Here & Now, which will be revamped under a new partnership between NPR and Boston’s WBUR-FM. Talk of the Nation will air its last episode June 28, ending a 21-year-long run. The call-in talk show has helped launch big names in public media, including original host John Hockenberry, This American Life’s Ira Glass and PBS NewsHour’s Ray Suarez. NPR Chief Content Officer Kinsey Wilson said the network decided to end Talk of the Nation because a newsmagazine might pull a bigger audience in midday.

Quick Takes

APTS’ Butler to appear on C-SPAN program

By |

Patrick Butler, president of the Association of Public Television Stations, will be the featured guest on C-SPAN’s The Communicators at 6:30 p.m. Eastern Saturday, with a repeat at 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. Eastern April 1. He’ll discuss the future of public broadcasting with Communications Daily reporter Kamala Lane, and Communicators host Peter Slen.

Quick Takes

KCETLink confirms SoCal Connected “going on hiatus”

By |

Bret Marcus, executive producer of SoCal Connected on KCETLink in Los Angeles, addressed the award-winning investigative program’s future in a statement today. “SoCal Connected is going on hiatus as Season 5 ends this week, although we will continue to be on the air twice a week with some original programming and the best of the season,” said Marcus, s.v.p., news and factual programming. “As happens every year, there are questions about the show’s future. And the answer is always the same. SoCal Connected depends on public funding and we don’t know at this time what that funding will be.

Quick Takes

Two transmitters going dark due to budget cuts at Blue Ridge PBS

By |

Blue Ridge PBS in Roanoke, Va., is shutting down two transmitters due to state funding and federal sequestration, according to the Roanoke Times. Households in the Tri-Cities region of Bristol, Va./Tenn. and Kingsport and Johnson City, Tenn., and far southwest Virginia, will lose the station’s over-the-air digital signal. About 15 percent of viewers in that area receive its programming through digital antennas or converters. The state cut all funding for pubcasting last year, which meant a drop of about $1 million for Blue Ridge PBS, nearly a third of its operating budget.

Quick Takes

Co-host Brand mourns “last taping” of KCET’s SoCal Connected

By |

Is KCETLink’s award-winning news show SoCal Connected ending production? There’s no official announcement from the pubcaster in Los Angeles yet, but co-host Madeline Brand tells Current that she’s “proud to have worked” on the program. “It’s a journalistic gem in TV news,” she said. “The show regularly aired investigative, hard-news stories and in-depth interviews — something that’s becoming increasingly rare in all media. Unfortunately, it costs a lot of money to do that.”

Quick Takes

OK Go helps NPR celebrate move to new headquarters

By |

NPR called on rockers OK Go to mark the network’s move to new digs, the Washington Post reports. The performance, “filmed in meticulous, stop-motion-ish staccato at the old offices and the new — and on a truck weaving through the streets of Washington in between,” will be featured in a video that lands online late next month. NPR is relocating from 635 Massachusetts Ave. NW, in downtown D.C., where it has been since 1994, to 1111 North Capitol St. NE, near Capitol Hill.

Development

Massachusetts’ WFCR adds to capital campaign with Cosby fundraiser

By |

New England Public Radio in Amherst, Mass., got a helping hand earlier this month from a famous friend when listener and local resident Bill Cosby staged a benefit performance for the station’s capital campaign. Cosby’s March 2 show at Symphony Hall in Springfield, Mass., raised $140,000 for the station, drawing more than 2,000 attendees who each paid from $37.50 to $75 to see the comic. The event stemmed from relationships between Cosby and various station staff that developed over the past few years. Cosby first got in touch Tom Reney, host of the station’s weeknight jazz show, says General Manager Martin Miller. Cosby and his wife then began donating money by sponsoring challenge grants during on-air fund drives, for which they were credited as “Dr. Bill and Dr. Camille.” The comedian visited the station in 2011 for an interview, and when he came back for a second interview, Miller discussed the station’s capital campaign with him.