30 years ago, ‘Lou Grant’ depicted a journalistic era

Published 2:03 pm Wednesday, December 5, 2007

NEW YORK — When everyone but idiotic anchorman Ted Baxter was fired from WJM News in 1977, Mary Richards and her fellow casualties were left reeling. It was a classically bittersweet finale for the beloved “Mary Tyler Moore” show after seven hit seasons.

Then Mary’s crusty boss, station news director Lou Grant, made a smooth transition. Within weeks, he had blown Minneapolis and snagged a good job in Los Angeles as city editor of The Tribune.

That’s right: Lou went from the glamour and glitz of TV news (such as it was at WJM) to embrace print journalism.

At the Trib, the formerly comic Lou (still played by Ed Asner) got serious about news. What resulted was “Lou Grant,” a superlative drama series that premiered 30 years ago this fall.

Now “Lou Grant” is worth noting for how vividly it captured a singular era in journalism, while somehow preserving that long-ago time in 114 episodes in remarkably relevant fashion. (Though not widely available, it can be seen in 10 million homes served by cable’s American Life network, airing at 9 and 11 p.m. Wednesdays.)

“Lou Grant” arrived in the blazing afterglow of Watergate coverage by newspaper rock stars Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, and the 1976 movie version of their book, “All the President’s Men,” where Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman played them.

The bracing message of that era: Two dogged reporters (and a newspaper that backed them up) could change the world — and earn the public’s adoration.

Anti-press fulminations from the Nixon administration were largely nullified by scandals and disgrace in the White House. It was only later that an anti-media crusade took hold, drawing battle lines between the press and government, and breeding suspicion among much of the citizenry.

Sure, it may seem primitive that, in the first season, Trib reporters were still banging out their stories on typewriters. But “Lou Grant” was breaking ground from its debut on Sept. 20, 1977.

Reconfiguring a half-hour sitcom into an hour drama was risky. The show dared to populate “Lou Grant” with a full-out ensemble — a casting format that, while proven in comedy, was largely untested in dramas.

Lou was the hero in the title, but Asner shared that fictitious newsroom with a wonderful cast. Robert Walden played the driven young investigative reporter Joe Rossi. Linda Kelsey was reporter Billie Newman, determined to make good in what was still primarily a male domain. The glorious Nancy Marchand (later, of course, Tony’s craven mother on “The Sopranos”) was Mrs. Pynchon, genteel owner of the Trib.

Taking full advantage of its news-oriented setting, “Lou Grant” dealt with social issues that ranged from nuclear accidents to religious freedom, from dog fighting to (often) media ethics.

“Lou Grant” won 13 Emmys, two Humanitas Prizes and a Peabody Award, among many other honors. And although never a ratings smash, it drew an average audience of about 22 million viewers in those days of Big Three network dominance — routinely matching the viewership of “Dancing with the Stars,” last week’s top-rated show.

Then, in May 1982, CBS announced “Lou Grant” would end.

Whatever the circumstances, press reaction to its cancellation was harsh. There was some picketing. But there were no bloggers or e-mail crusades. “Lou Grant” was a lost cause, however immortal.