Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University Communication Dissertations Department of Communication Summer 8-13-2013 Nothing But the Truthiness: A History of Television News Parody and its Entry into the Journalistic Field Curt W. Hersey Georgia State University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/communication_diss Recommended Citation Hersey, Curt W., "Nothing But the Truthiness: A History of Television News Parody and its Entry into the Journalistic Field." Dissertation, Georgia State University, 2013. https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/communication_diss/46 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Communication at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Communication Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. NOTHING BUT THE TRUTHINESS: A HISTORY OF TELEVISION NEWS PARODY AND ITS ENTRY INTO THE JOURNALISTIC FIELD by CURT HERSEY Under the Direction of Ted Friedman ABSTRACT The relationship between humor and politics has been a frequently discussed issue for communication researchers in the new millennium. The rise and success of shows like The Daily Show and The Colbert Report force a reevaluation of the relationship between journalism and politics. Through archival research of scripts, programs, and surrounding discourses this dissertation looks to the past and historicizes news parody as a distinct genre on American television. Since the 1960s several programs on network and cable parodied mainstream newscasts and newsmakers. More recent eXamples of this genre circulate within the same discursive field as traditional television news, thereby functioning both as news in their own right and as a corrective to traditional journalism grounded in practices of objectivity. The dissertation utilizes genre, discourse, and textual analyses to establish the attributes of television news parody and to analyze its role in past and contemporary journalism and culture. INDEX WORDS: News parody, Television satire, Journalistic field, That Was the Week That Was, Saturday Night Live, Not Necessarily the News, The Daily Show, The Colbert Report NOTHING BUT THE TRUTHINESS: A HISTORY OF TELEVISION NEWS PARODY AND ITS ENTRY INTO THE JOURNALISTIC FIELD by CURT HERSEY A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University 2013 Copyright by Curt Wesley Hersey 2013 NOTHING BUT THE TRUTHINESS: A HISTORY OF TELEVISION NEWS PARODY AND ITS ENTRY INTO THE JOURNALISTIC FIELD by CURT HERSEY Committee Chair: Ted Friedman Committee: Kathryn Fuller-Seeley Jason Mittell Alisa Perren Leonard Teel Electronic Version Approved: Office of Graduate Studies College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University August 2013 iv DEDICATION This dissertation is dedicated with love to my wife and son who supported me throughout this project, and to the memory of my mother and father, who instilled a love of knowledge and indulged my love of television—probably not foreseeing how the two would meet. They always believed I could accomplish whatever I wanted and because of that, so did I. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my dissertation chair, Dr. Ted Friedman, for his guidance and patience over many years of research and writing. His positive attitude and incisive feedback helped me through the rough spots and kept me going. Thanks also goes out to the rest of my committee: Dr. Kathryn Fuller-Seeley for her unfailing humor and for imparting a love of media history, Dr. Jason Mittell for his genre eXpertise, Dr. Alisa Perren for emphasizing the importance of media industry, and Dr. Leonard Teel for his vast knowledge of journalism history and practice. I am indebted to my brother, Scott, for proofreading the manuscript and suggesting language clarifications. Thanks also to my former student worker, Steven Walker, who found solutions to issues with footnote software. Thanks to the following individuals and organizations for their assistance in accessing archive materials: My dean, Dr. Tom Kennedy, and department chair, Dr. Bob Frank, at Berry College for funding my travel to various archives. Richard Holbrook and Richard Weigle at the Paley Center for Media for preparing and accessing archive viewings. Julie Graham at the UCLA Performing Arts Special Collection for help with the HBO script collection. The staff at the UCLA Instructional Media Laboratory for assistance in viewing video archives, including transferring outdated formats to make them available. Jen Nydick for housing me while visiting archives in New York City. While researching and writing the dissertation I was surrounded by supportive colleagues and friends to whom I am indebted. Thank you to my Berry College family, who encouraged and motivated me: Dr. Bob Frank, Dr. Brian Carroll, Dr. Jason Peterson, Kevin Kleine, Diane Land, Dr. Kathy Richardson, and Dr. Randy Richardson. Thank you to past vi colleagues Dr. Marcie Hinton and Jeffrey Morris. Thanks to my friend and former newsroom colleague Dan Bevels for providing me hours of discussion and argumentation that helped me further conceptualize partisanship in the media and the role of humor. Completing this project would not have been possible without the love and support of my family. My wife and intellectual partner, Karen, helped in ways too numerous to count: talking through ideas, creating opportunities for me to write, encouraging me when I doubted my own abilities, and struggling through the process with me. My son, Griffin, provided me with endless joy and helped me to remember that journalism and politics impact those who come after us. Lastly, my father, who walked through it all with me; I wish he could have seen its completion. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................................................ v LIST OF TABLES ................................................................................................................................... xii LIST OF FIGURES ................................................................................................................................ xiii INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................................... 1 Television News Parody ................................................................................................................ 1 News Parody and History ............................................................................................................................ 2 News Parody: Crossing the Disciplinary Divide ................................................................................ 6 News Parody as Journalism ........................................................................................................................ 8 Review of Literature – Journalism Studies ............................................................................ 10 What is News? ............................................................................................................................................... 11 The Role of the Journalist ......................................................................................................................... 16 Contemporary Press Criticism ............................................................................................................... 23 Media industry and structure ................................................................................................................. 25 Story development and perspective ..................................................................................................... 29 Journalistic construction of reality ....................................................................................................... 36 Television formatting and presentation ............................................................................................ 39 Review of Literature – News Parody ....................................................................................... 43 Soft News and News Parody .................................................................................................................... 47 News Parody’s Audience ........................................................................................................................... 50 The Acquired Knowledge and Behavior of Political Comedy Viewers .................................. 54 Straight News vs. Comedic News .......................................................................................................... 62 viii Methodology .................................................................................................................................... 73 Chapter Outline .............................................................................................................................. 76 Humor and its Subversive Potential .................................................................................................... 77 That Was the Week That Was and the Limits of 1960s Political Comedy ............................ 77 Weekend Update: Moving News Parody to Late Night ...............................................................