Set Straight
By Mitch Berg
Jeff Horwich of MPR’s In The Loop noticed what I wrote about my guest-shot on the show two weeks ago, in the show’s “Loophole” blog.
He commented about my “country radio mouse/city radio mouse” remarks:
[I provide] these observations, which certainly caught my attention:
The culture shock continued when I saw the way the show ran. Where commercial talk show involves a host or two, a board operator, and maybe a call screener (and on major-league talk shows like Limbaugh they might add a person or two to do on-the-fly research), a National/Minnesota Public Radio show involves a crew that, to my commercial-radio tastes, looks more like the crew for a good-sized TV production…The show’s closing credits ran on a long time, listing close to a dozen people. Plus the band. To produce a one-hour, monthly show. Not criticizing. Just saying – to my frugal, commercial-radio-raised tastes, it was like being in a foreign country.
I can understand the impression, and it’s valid to a certain extent. True, on the night of the show we put on an impressive display. We are fortunate to draw on the engineering staff of MPR once a month to make the show happen, and of course a beautiful and effective space for what we do. We can plug into some remarkable resources here.
It’s worth pointing out, though, that there’s more (or less) here than meets the eye. Many of the names in the credits — including people who run the lights, hold the microphones, run the slideshow, and print up scripts — are volunteers. We couldn’t do it without them. Many other names in the credits are people from inside and outside MPR who offered their free advice or assistance in putting the show together. Our band and stage manager are compensated but…let’s just say they wouldn’t be there if they weren’t in it for the experience.
(Carson on) I did not know that! (Carson off)
Duly noted!
I will say this (in addition to what I’ve already said) about In The Loop – the thing I found most surprising about the show’s production was that the whole production had a kind of “Hey, gang! Let’s put on a show!” quality to it – in the sense of enthusiasm, as opposed to amateurism – that was the last thing I’d expected to encounter at MPR (especially given things I’ve heard about life in the Keillor and Lanpher universes at MPR).
