The ratings were tightening. Big bookings were more important than ever.
On July 24th, 2002, in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, nine miners were trapped underground after drilling through a wall that gave way, letting in millions of gallons of water. In a dramatic rescue four days later, all nine were lifted to safety. America was glued to the TV.
The next day, Diane had an exclusive with one of the rescued miners in the GMA studios. I flipped out. Then I called Jonathan from the production area and reamed him—with plenty of people in earshot on both ends. I couldn’t believe we’d been completely scooped on a news story that was heaven-sent.
After the show, I dropped by Andy Lack’s office. “Listen,” I said. “I thought Jonathan was a good choice for the job but now I’m not so sure. I’m worried about the show staying competitive.”
“I hear you” was pretty much all Andy had to say. After just 16 months, Wald was rerouted to CNBC.
As the senior person and a face of the show, I felt like the responsibility of keeping it strong, smart, and in the zeitgeist was on my shoulders. So I pushed the producers to stay on top of breaking news and interviews, but I also hatched ideas for the sort of fun, buzzy, unexpected segments the show had become known for. We did one called “Fantasy Jobs,” where I sang cabaret at Caroline’s Comedy Club with a surprise guest, Tony Bennett. Matt learned how to be a jockey, Al a cartoonist, and Ann went to astronaut school, which led to plenty of good-natured space-cadet jokes.
That turned out to be a dry run for a stunt we’d do a few years later for May sweeps called “Trading Places,” which for me meant switching spots with Jay Leno. No one had ever taken his seat on The Tonight Show before—it was an audacious move. That morning on TODAY, Jay-as-me had awkwardly interviewed Colin Powell, providing material for my best joke of the night: “I have to tell you, I was really impressed with Jay—and then I got kind of upset, because, you know, probing Colins? I thought that was my area!” Ba-dump-bump. We got a ton of publicity out of it—we were back to being a hot topic at the watercooler.
But GMA was steadily closing in. So NBC tapped Tom Touchet, who’d been a producer at GMA, for EP.
There were a couple of warning signs early on, like hearing that people at ABC News were shocked Tom had been given such a big job. And he tried awfully hard to win everyone over, hosting ice cream and bowling parties. But he seemed indecisive and in over his head.
I regret not working more closely with him and offering guidance. I also should have lowered my expectations and wrapped my head around the fact that I’d never again know the kismet I felt when I worked with Jeff.
A NEW STORY LINE had taken hold: America’s Sweetheart had become a bitch on wheels. （During commercial breaks, if we were playfully sparring, Matt would mock the moniker, saying, “America’s Sweetheart—wouldn’t you just like to backhand her?”）
If caring about the show and expecting a lot from people made me a bitch, I could live with that. But the truth is, I was under a lot of pressure, and I’m sure I could have handled it better. For instance, with the miner story, maybe I should have met with Jonathan Wald in his office, then ripped him a new one—rather than humiliate him publicly.
The fact that I’d negotiated a contract for $65 million over four and a half years—leaked before the ink was dry—didn’t help. Nor did the fact that I’d ramped up my look.
On their own, none of these things were a reason to make voodoo dolls in my image. Taken together, it made me look like I’d become a raging diva, a trope that the media found irresistible. It got to the point where they saw evidence of my supposed overweening vanity where it literally didn’t exist.
Women’s Wear Daily swore on a stack of Holy Bibles that I was scheduled to get an Endotine brow lift. I didn’t even know what the hell that was and flat-out denied it, but they ran with the story anyway. Suddenly it was everywhere: New York Magazine, Page Six; talk-radio hosts were analyzing my decision to have the procedure. When I confronted WWD’s publisher Mary Berner, she actually said they stood by their story—as if they knew more about what was going on with my forehead than I did, presaging a kind of fast-and-loose approach to reporting that would practically become the norm. Only after I got Jay’s colleague David Kendall to threaten legal action did they print a retraction, including my quote: “I can think of a couple of things that could use lifting, my forehead not being one of them.”
The worst piece came courtesy of the New York Times’ Alessandra Stanley. An NBC publicist called to apprise me of the bombshell that was about to drop on my head.