by William Powers

The Media Royals

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Last week a tearful America waved goodbye to Katie Couric as she departed Today. Somewhere amid all the lookbacks and appreciations, I caught a Hometown-Girl-Makes-Good piece on Channel 4, the NBC affiliate in D.C. where Couric worked before she hit the big time. As clips of a younger, less glamorous Katie played on screen, the station's Barbara Harrison did the sentimental voice-over: "It seems like yesterday that we followed her as she winged her way from Washington northward to New York and upward on the ladder of success."

Despite the local twist, the piece was much like the rest of the Katie coverage—fondly upbeat, rooted more in Couric's personal charisma and story than in her journalism.

Watching the media cover its own superstars can induce a kind of cognitive dissonance. They are journalists—news gatherers, interviewers, reporters—yet we track them as if they were something else. There were striking overlaps between the coverage of Katie's departure and the simultaneous coverage of Jennifer Aniston's big comeback movie, The Break-Up. In both stories, a cheerleading overlay presumes that we have taken to heart the personal struggles of these women—one losing her husband to cancer, the other to Angelina—and that we follow their work with that meta-narrative very much in mind. And, in fact, we do.

It isn't just Katie. Quite a few people are in this special class, and new members are frequently added. Anderson Cooper has just been anointed, through his best-selling book and ascension to the cover of Vanity Fair. Cooper is now unquestionably bigger than his own work. He is what Katie is.

But what are they? Are they genuine newspeople, hacks of a higher order, or something else? Years ago, some media-watchers tried to clear up the confusion by dismissing vast swaths of the media as "infotainment," which would make the inhabitants of this zone "infotainers." But these derogatory terms don't do justice to the class in question.

The uber-journalists of television are not just well-paid pretty faces. Starting in September, Couric will be delivering and making sense of the news, real stories gathered by the less famous journalists working under her, for tens of millions of Americans. If she's good at it, she could revitalize TV journalism.

We need a taxonomic term that takes such figures seriously, while acknowledging that they are a breed apart—among us, yet also above us. I think the best analogy is not movie stars but the British nobility. When Queen Elizabeth bestows an official title, the recipient's status is forever changed. People everywhere understand the significance of such titles and defer to them. Indeed, U.S. media outlets have a habit of using British titles when covering those who hold them—Sir Paul McCartney, Sir Howard Stringer, Dame Thatcher, Lord Black—even though our society does not have its own system of aristocratic honorifics.

It's time we did, and where better to start than with our media superstars? I propose that Katie, Anderson, and their peers henceforth be referred to as "media royals." The journalistic establishment might even form a committee or board—just like the Pulitzer board—to decide exactly who qualifies. Crucial factors would include income (eight-figure contracts a plus), Nielsen ratings, number of magazine covers, size of retinue, fame level of spouse, and so on. Any permanent anchor of the evening news is automatic royalty, but temps such as Bob Schieffer would be a judgment call. Diane Sawyer is certainly in, but what about Matt Lauer?

For the moment, the simple word "royal" will do the job nicely: "Media royal Katie Couric drew raves for her first appearance at the anchor desk of the CBS Evening News last night."

But if this idea takes off, the system could get could much more elaborate. A newcomer like Anderson Cooper might be dubbed a viscount. When he moves from cable to network, he'd become a duke. And if he ever ascends to one of the three network thrones—well, why not king? It would be true, in a way, and it has such a nice ring.

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