Gayle King: What I Read
The CBS This Morning co-host has a television in every room of her house and has named her iPhone Charlotte, after Charlie Rose.
.How do people deal with the torrent of information pouring down on us all? What sources can't they live without? We regularly reach out to prominent figures in media, entertainment, politics, the arts, and the literary world to hear their answers. This is drawn from a conversation with Gayle King, CBS This Morning co-host and editor-at-large of O, The Oprah Magazine.
My alarm goes off at 3:30 a.m. and the car picks me up at 4:30 a.m., so I do a quick little run around the dials to see what everybody’s doing — CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN. In the morning before I go into work I like to have a great sense of how the day is shaping up. Plus I get rundowns from work that include stories we’re going to be covering and what we’re going to be doing. So when I go to work I have a strong sense of what’s going on in the world and where you live at home and abroad.
When I get into the CBS This Morning studio we have all the papers — the Post, the Daily News, the New York Times, USA Today — in print. I still like a good old newspaper.
The Times and the Post come to my house. I was a subscriber to People magazine when I was in college. I think it was a dime. I’m still a People magazine subscriber. I love People magazine. Back in the day I worked for a Post-Newsweek station but now I’m more of a Time girl. I like Time magazine. I’m an O magazine subscriber, too. I get Ebony. I like that. That was in my house when I was a kid. I was raised on Ebony magazine. And Essence was the first magazine for black women that I thought, “Oh gosh, somebody’s speaking to me” — so I’m still holding on to my Essence subscription. And Vanity Fair if there's a great cover story. Vanity Fair articles are always fun to read because you know they are going to be very detailed.
I love Maureen Dowd at The New York Times. I’m always fascinated to see what she has to say, and she kind of nails it for me most of the time. I like Linda Stasi of the New York Post for TV. I’ve started watching a couple of shows just because I’ve read about them in her column and thought, “Let me check them out.”
Websites I like — I do like Politico and I do like Huffington Post. That also gives you a good well-rounded view.
I have a TV in every single room of my house. I’m a big, big, big TV news junkie. I think it starts with my background in local news. I love the news. My DNA is very news driven and news oriented. I like Lori Stokes. I see her in the morning. She’s on ABC. At our place I like Terrell Brown. That’s my morning team that I tune into see. I like Scott Pelley for evening news because I’m a team player. I always like to see what we’re doing. I’m a big Anderson Cooper fan. I like to watch his show at night it’s really great to catch up on the day’s news with Anderson. He seems to cover all the bases, or certainly things I’m interested in, whether it’s a local story breaking news or national breaking news. I find I can get a lot out of his show. CNN is big for me, MSNBC is big, and during the campaign I was watching Fox because I was curious to see what they were saying.
I have to spend time catching up on television shows on the weekends because the week is pretty full. I don’t know if anybody watches TV in realtime anymore. Love Downton Abbey. Love Breaking Bad. Love, love, love, love, love Homeland. I was late to the Homeland party but so many people started talking about it I thought let me take a look see, and I watched the first season in an all day marathon. I like the sitcoms. I’m watching Mike & Molly — I think they’re fun. Two Broke Girls — I think they are fun. Still holding onto The Office in the last season. Tina Fey just asked me to do an episode of 30 Rock. She knew that I liked the show and I was flattered that she asked me. I’m a big 30 Rock girl because I admire Tina so much. I just think she’s a genius. I’m all over the map when it comes to music, when it comes to TV shows, and when it comes to movies. If you looked at my iPod, if you looked at my book list, if you looked at my media stuff you couldn’t say, Boy, I really get a strong sense of who she is, because I like such a variety of things. I’m not a girl that likes one particular genre of anything. I just got Taylor Swift’s new CD. I’ve liked Taylor Swift for a long time — very smitten with her. I just got Alicia Keys's new CD, too. I listen to music on planes.
Sheryl Sandberg’s book just came in. We're going to do something with her in the magazine. Oprah’s Book Club is back. Very excited about that. Somebody just brought me Grace Coddington’s book, the memoir, it’s sitting on my desk — a beautiful orange book. I find her fascinating. Believe it or not, Sidney Poitier has written a novel called Montaro Caine, and I can’t wait to read that.
I’m on Twitter. I don’t want to be consumed by it. I enjoy getting on and engaging with people. I can’t honestly say I spend a lot of time on Twitter and Facebook. I follow Cory Booker, although I tell him he tweets too much, but I do follow him. John Legend’s fiancée Chrissy Teigen is hilarious. She’s very funny. She’s very raw and candid. I can’t say I follow so-and-so religiously. There are just certain people that pop up and you go, "Oh, I like hearing what they have to say."
I’m new to the iPhone party. Charlie Rose gave me an iPhone. I’m a BlackBerry girl. I think he’s trying to bring me into the 21st century. They say you shouldn’t keep your BlackBerry with you by your side when you’re sleeping. But it’s right there. My iPhone’s name is Charlotte. I named her after Charlie Rose. I figure Charlotte is the female version of Charlie and she’s from North Carolina. Charlotte is yellow and my BlackBerry’s yellow, too. Yellow’s my favorite color.