Cronkite replied, “Of course.”
“Would you?” I said in disbelief.
“Of course, Katie, I’d be honored.”
He would be honored?
Bob flew out to California to record the open. The problem was, Walter mispronounced my last name on every take, rhyming the first syllable with door rather than her. Finally, Bob said, “It’s Katie Kerr-ick. Think of Steve Kerr” （a basketball player, apparently）。 Bob requested a few more takes. Slightly exasperated （“Now, listen, young man”）， Walter acquiesced, and they nailed it （more or less）。
SEAN MCMANUS HAD tapped Rome Hartman to be the executive producer. Rome emanated decency, and I was excited to work with him—despite the fact that he’d never helmed a nightly newscast before.
Determined to innovate the broadcast, we had endless meetings around a conference table, spitballing ideas. I pitched a weekly segment called “Free Speech,” where we’d invite a variety of people, from politicians to pundits to everyday citizens, to weigh in on an issue they felt passionately about. The TV version of an op-ed.
Sean’s number two, network news veteran Paul Friedman, piped up. “Why not do ‘Free Speech’ every night?”
Everybody thought that was a great idea. Privately, I had to wonder if we really could pull it off.
In August I spent a couple of weeks hanging out in the Hamptons with the girls to fortify myself. I’d sworn off sweets, determined to look as good as possible for my debut （I even turned down a piece of cake at my dad’s 86th-birthday party—a literal first）。 Imagine my surprise when I learned I had miraculously dropped 20 pounds.
A heavily photoshopped picture of me from the upfronts had landed on the cover of Watch!, the CBS promotional magazine. Turns out some bonehead in the photo department had gone rogue. An eagle-eyed New York Post staffer realized something was awry （respect）。 They published humiliating side-by-side photos; someone gleefully wrote that I’d gone on the “photoshop diet.” （A year and a half later, a clueless speaker gave a lecture to Carrie’s sixth-grade class on female objectification and used that very photo as an example of body-shaming in the media. How fun for Carrie that her mom was exhibit A.）
Given my practically lifelong struggle with weight, the whole thing hit me in a very vulnerable place. I hadn’t even officially started at CBS and already I was at the center of a mini-scandal. The first in a series of unfortunate events.
59
Tick Tick Tick Tick
I WALKED INTO THE reception area at 60 Minutes, located across the street from the Broadcast Center. What a thrill to see a huge stopwatch affixed to the wall. A senior producer named Michael Radutzky, who resembled Timon, the meerkat in The Lion King, gave me a tour. We stopped by offices and cubicles where he introduced me to producers, researchers, and assistants. As we walked down the hall, he casually shared the show’s ethos. “The mantra here at 60 Minutes is ‘Someone else’s success diminishes you. Someone else’s failure elevates you.’”
I’m about as competitive as they come, but seriously?
A few days later, I was summoned back to the offices for a photo shoot. I was directed to a cavernous space where Bob Simon, Morley Safer, Steve Kroft, and Lesley Stahl were waiting. I wished I had brought a parka. I’d never gotten such a chilly reception anywhere for anything. No eye contact, no small talk, no nothing.
Jeff Fager, the executive producer of 60 Minutes, ran the place like a fiefdom, with its own culture and self-serious identity. At first he seemed happy to have me. He gave me an office, which I really appreciated. But he didn’t give me a team. Every other correspondent had one, researching stories and submitting “blue sheets,” the system they used to determine who got there first and who would get to do the piece. But Fager decided I didn’t need a team, despite the fact that I had another full-time job—anchoring the evening news. Instead, he said Radutzky would oversee my stories, and there would be a few other producers who would work with me on an ad hoc basis.
Okay, I thought. Let’s see how it goes.
THE GEARS OF a massive PR campaign were cranking away. I did a ton of media, speed-dating a long line of reporters in 20-minute intervals, all asking the same questions. I was effusive with each one. When I voiced my concern to Matthew Hiltzik about all the press I was doing, he said, “Look, they’re gonna write about you anyway; you might as well try to keep some control of the narrative.”
In addition to print and TV stories and spots I’d taped with 48 different affiliates to run on local stations, my smiling （but warmly authoritative!） mug was plastered on the front of city buses—my stomach lurched every time I saw one lumbering and belching up the street. The launch was anything but soft. Expectations were sky-high.