Essence Spinoff Pulled Back for Rethinking
Suede magazine, the Essence spinoff that aims toward a hip, multicultural audience, is going on “hiatus” after four issues because it launched too quickly and needs time to regroup, Essence officials said late today.
The magazine debuted in November as a quarterly and began a monthly schedule with the February issue. “We realized we had set ourselves up for a pace that we couldn’t sustain,” Michelle Ebanks, president of Essence Communications Partners, told Journal-isms.
Almost all of the magazine’s 46 employees are expected to be placed elsewhere within Time Inc., Ebanks said. Time Inc. announced in January it was buying control of the magazine.
‘Suede’s unique approach to fashion defined a new category,” Ed Lewis, president of Essence Communications Partners and co-founder of Essence magazine, said in a statement. “The magazine is smart, exciting and provocative. However, although some of our most talented people have been working on Suede, it has become clear that more time and resources would be needed to further develop this brand. This decision will give us the opportunity to step back and reevaluate the concept and its place in the market.'”
Editor Suzanne Boyd “is the living, breathing incarnation of the magazine her New York bosses hired her to create—young, savvy, well-heeled, with a rock-solid belief that blacks rule fashion,” Canada’s National Post wrote soon after Boyd took the job. Boyd is a native of Halifax who grew up in the West Indies. She “is absolutely staying with Time Inc.,” Ebanks said.
Suede guaranteed advertisers an audience of 250,000, which was split evenly between newsstand sales and subscriptions, Ebanks said.
In January, Samir Husni, a journalism professor at the University of Mississippi known as “Mr. Magazine,” told Journal-isms that Suede was “a great idea” but that it might be too much of a “fantasy magazine,” compared with a traditional service publication. “If you are an African American woman” leafing through the pages of Suede, he said, “you wonder, is this out of reach?” In addition, he said, “so far it is next to impossible to create a multicultural magazine.”
Ebanks said, however, that readers and advertisers responded favorably, because “there’s a fatigue with more of the same. That caught the attention of advertisers.”
As an example of Suede’s uniqueness, she cited an article in the March issue, on the “Fab 40,” “the most fabulous people in fashion,” that includes Jennifer Lopez and Andre 3000 of OutKast. “It’s breathtakingly beautiful,” she said.
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Cop Pulls Gun, Curses at TV News Photographer
A police officer in the Washington suburb of Germantown, Md., pointed his gun at an African American television news photographer on assignment after a woman called police saying she believed she saw a man “pull out a gun on another” man in front of the news van, police confirmed today.
“The main thing I was thinking about was ‘accidental shooting,'” the photographer, Dale Wright of WJLA-TV, told Journal-isms, “and I’m trying not to be the accident.”
Wright, 41, said he had no warning before he saw the gun pointed at him. However, the officer told superiors that Wright had ignored a warning to show his hands. Under either scenario, Lucille Baur, a spokeswoman for the Montgomery County, Md., police department, maintained that the policeman acted “appropriately with the information he had.”
Baur, the reporter and the photographer all told Journal-isms that the Monday incident had no racial overtones, despite a report today on the NewsBlues Web site, picked up on www.dcrtv.com.
That report was an unattributed “tip” that “a woman called police saying she saw a big black man holding a gun on a little white man.”
Actually, said Baur, the caller did not mention race or the size of the suspect.
The “gun” that the 6’2″, 265-pound Wright had was likely his cell phone. He and reporter John Lisle, who is white, were in the suburb following up a story on home invasions. They returned to their news van when “we got a call from the desk saying someone had a gun,” Wright said. “We looked around. I went back to tell my reporter. Next thing I know, I see a police car driving around the corner. I’m walking back toward the vehicle, toward the generator and line truck. I put my hand in my right pocket to put my phone away. Next thing, he came out with his gun drawn.
“I said, ‘I’m not the one you’re looking for.’ I showed both hands. He said, ‘just put your f—– hands on the van.’ That’s when I put my hands on the van.”
While Wright said he was upset with being cursed at, spokeswoman Baur said that, “When you’re trying to make a point, many street criminals don’t understand” any other language, though she quickly added that Wright was not a street criminal.
After Wright and Lisle were searched, the episode ended. “I think he did his job,” Wright told Journal-isms today. “I just hated the fact that he pointed the gun. He had the decision to take my life if he wanted to.”
News Director Jamie Foster said he talked to the officer, identified by Wright as “Officer Ferragine.” Montgomery County police said they would not release the name because no complaint was filed. “He seemed a little shaken himself, and seemed apologetic and wanted to move on with this thing and move it behind,” Foster said.
“It was just an unfortunate incident,” said Bill Lord, the station’s vice president for news. “The police went there thinking they were protecting us.”
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Latino Journalists Want Nightly Anchor on CBS
The president and executive director of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists met last week with CBS News President Andrew Heyward to urge that a Latino be part of whatever new arrangement the network creates for the “CBS Evening News,” NAHJ President Veronica Villafañe said today.
Dan Rather steps down March 9, and CBS announced three weeks ago that veteran Bob Schieffer “will serve as the interim anchor of the CBS Evening News for a short transition period until the new format of the broadcast is launched.”
CBS is reportedly considering several formats, including one with more than one anchor.
Heyward, who was joined Thursday by Linda Mason, senior vice president, standards and special projects, “was extremely responsive, and he’s taking initiative,” Villafañe said. A follow-up meeting is scheduled for March, said Villafañe. She said they met for an hour.
Latino correspondents at CBS include Vince Gonzales, Jim Acosta and Manuel Gallegus.
Villafañe and NAHJ’s executive director, Ivan Roman, “were interested in how they could help us find talent, and we welcomed and encouraged their help,” CBS spokeswoman Sandra M. Genelius told Journal-isms.
“We reiterated CBS News’ interest in NAHJ’s help in identifying promising interns, too. It was the most productive meeting with this organization that we have ever had, and we’re excited about continuing our mutual efforts.”
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Elvis Mitchell Out as NPR Film Reviewer
Elvis Mitchell, entertainment critic for National Public Radio’s “Weekend Edition Saturday,” will not be reviewing films for NPR if he accepts a post at Columbia Pictures, NPR spokesman Chad Campbell told Journal-isms today.
However, Campbell said it had not been decided whether Mitchell might perform other work for the network.
“We have not received the final word that Elvis is taking the job, but if he does in fact take the job with Columbia, he will no longer review movies for Weekend Edition,” Campbell said.
Columbia announced last week that Mitchell, until last year a film critic at the New York Times, would jointly head a production office in New York.
“Mitchell, who exited The Times last spring, has been charged with canvassing the film festival circuit for movie projects. He also will be probing the Columbia film library for possible remakes, the studio said,” Phyllis Furman wrote in the New York Daily News.
Mitchell has been reviewing films for “Weekend Edition Saturday” since the show’s inception in 1985.
Ingrid Sischy, editor-in-chief of Interview magazine, told Journal-isms last week that Mitchell would continue to write for the magazine. “The real issue is I will have to be super-vigilant” about conflicts of interest, she said.
Ruth Seymour, program director at KCRW, the Santa Monica, Calif.-based radio station where Mitchell hosts a half-hour interview show called “The Treatment,” said in the New York Observer that she hoped Mitchell would stay there.
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Time Warner Professionals to Teach at Howard U.
“A partnership between Time Warner and the Howard University School of Communications will allow Howard students to be taught by both professors and working professionals starting in the fall,” Christina M. Wright reported Tuesday for the Black College Wire.
“Richard Parsons, chairman and CEO of Time Warner, and Jannette Dates, dean of the school, introduced the Time Warner program during a taping Feb. 16 at the studios of the university’s television station, WHUT-TV.”
Parsons “mentioned that Time Warner has donated $50 million, but he didn’t mention that he had donated over $1 million of his own to Howard,” University President Patrick Swygert is quoted as saying. Parsons is chairman of advancement on the university’s board of trustees.
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Shirley Hung Gets New Producing Post at CNN
Shirley Hung has been named executive producer for a new “America Bureau” at CNN, “a Washington, D.C.-based unit that combines the network’s Justice Department, homeland security and national security beats,” CNN announced Tuesday.
“Through this joining of the three beats, CNN’s America Bureau will strategically integrate sources, information and contacts to pursue short-term investigations, piecing together comprehensive news stories to examine the state of security in the United States.”
“CNN’s Justice Department correspondent Kelli Arena, national security correspondent David Ensor and homeland security correspondent Jeanne Meserve become correspondents for the America Bureau, sharing information and running reports through the department as a central clearinghouse for all security-related news. The correspondents will continue to report within their own fields of expertise,” a news release said.
Hung, who is Asian American, has been with CNN for 10 years, most recently as a senior producer in CNN’s Washington newsroom, where she supervised the bureau’s editorial output and oversaw story development, the announcement continued.
Hung began her career at CNN Headline News in 1992 as an associate producer and writer. She has produced for CNN’s Baghdad bureau, managed CNN’s daily coverage of the 2003 California gubernatorial recall election, and in 2003, went to Kuwait to produce coverage leading up to and during the war in Iraq. She graduated summa cum laude with a B.S. in journalism, and magna cum laude with a B.A. in international relations from Boston University. She also earned a master’s of public policy at Georgetown University, according to her bio.
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Cleveland Forum Goes On With Cosby on Phone
“After Bill Cosby canceled his appearance at a town-hall-style meeting in Cleveland last month, the city did the next best thing: It got him on the phone,” Susan Vinella reported Tuesday in the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
“The comedian and entertainer dialed in Monday during a business trip to Houston to speak to children and adults gathered at East Tech High School for an event billed as ‘A Conversation with Cleveland’s Youth.'”
“In a five-minute call that was amplified for the audience of about 250 adults and kids to hear, Cosby reiterated the values and focus he believes poor black communities need to embrace,” the story continued.
The event was moderated by Plain Dealer Metro columnist Sam Fulwood III. As reported by Kevin Merida in the Washington Post Sunday, Cosby had been appearing at town-hall-style meetings, often hosted by black columnists, until recent allegations of sexual misconduct.
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Reporter’s Past Said to Cause Conflict of Interest
Eric Wesson, a reporter for the Kansas City Call who was doing consulting work for Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Mo., while covering him, was accused of an additional conflict of interest because he served time in prison but reported on the county prosecutor, Howard Kurtz wrote Monday in the Washington Post.
“A spokesman for Jackson County prosecutor Michael Sanders complained to the Call last year about Wesson’s reporting on his boss—noting that the office had prosecuted Wesson for robbery in 1991, leading to a 10-year prison term,” Kurtz wrote.
“Wesson declines to comment, but the complaint drew a sharp reaction from [Call Publisher Donna] Stewart, who wrote Sanders that the objections were ‘stereotypical as well as racist. . . . If a small business like the Call does not give an opportunity for an ex-felon to redeem himself who is black, who will? Is redemption only for white ex-felons?
“John Liebnitz, the prosecutor’s spokesman, says it’s ‘unfortunate’ that anyone would see his complaint as race-related and that he’s glad Wesson is ‘turning his life around.’ Liebnitz says he questioned whether someone who had been prosecuted by the office he was writing about ‘might have a very difficult time separating those experiences from his daily work.’
Asked whether the Post account was accurate, Wesson wrote to Journal-isms:
“It depends on how you define inaccurate. Yes, I went to prison and pretty much redefined my life and what is important.
“I became addicted to drugs and committed several armed robberies. I received a 25 year sentence, but because of the outreach in the community by starting several programs for at risk kids, I founded six NAACP Branches and helped area inner city schools, as well as setting up programs to feed needy families, I only did 10 years on the 25.
“I currently work as a volunteer within the school system helping third grade children and fifth grade children with their writing skills.
“I have successfully completed parole and I am pending an early discharge from the remainder of my sentence, a Gov. pardon.
“I am active in my church and the community. At Christmas my company along with K.C. Mo. Police department fed some 82 families.
“I also host a radio talkshow called Makes Me Wanna Holla.
“My examples of taking a negative and turning it into a positive come from examples set forth by the ‘X’ man whose face graces postage stamps and Nathan McCall who [has written] for the Post and has written two books.
“I also have two degrees. I guess that that was not newsworthy.”
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MTV Launches in Sub-Saharan Africa
“MTV has launched its first music channel for Africa,” the BBC reported today.
“MTV base Africa is available to some 1.3 million homes across the continent via satellite, but also plans to broadcast on free-to-air networks.
“From the outset a third of the new station’s music will be African, with that figure set to rise to 50%.
“. . . Speaking from Johannesburg, the president of MTV Networks International, Bill Roedy, said the company was committed to the music and culture of Africa.
“‘We’ve made it symbolic by making it our 100th channel. It’s symbolic because we have a tremendous belief in the role that music from Africa can play,’ he said.
“‘Our aim is to be very aggressive, creative, even relentless in getting our channel out to as many households as possible in Africa.
“. . . Among the channel’s plans are a weekly documentary series on emerging African musicians.”
Africa, and Its Artists, Belatedly Get Their MTV (New York Times)
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