This is one reason why his show works so well. Another is that Mr. Rose is a lawyer by training (Duke Law, of course), and he does not interview guests as much as cross-examines them. But he does it with such riveting savoir faire that his guests seldom know what has hit them; no need for anyone to be under oath. We are reminded that it's not what one does so much as how one does it; an understanding that must absolutely be grasped for successful navigation of the bayous of southern society. Rose's interviews of relevant figures in diplomatic and political circles, as well as his timely foci on other critical current affairs are often real public services, more than worthy of our time and attention. In the days following 9/11, there was seldom a better place to be on the tube than the Charlie Show. Mr. Rose has certainly paid his dues and established his well-deserved niche. But why is he such an unabashed Celebrity Hag?
Watching Charlie Rose fawn over someone like, for example, Tom Cruise, actually seeming to care what he thinks, is highly embarrassing. Sure Mr. Cruise is a competent actor. I admire his integrity and lack of obvious vanity in such films as Born On The Fourth Of July. Hell, I didn't even mind him in Legend. But let's keep it real. There's something about getting paid cyclopean amounts of money that tends to bring out the best in many of us. I certainly appreciate film, but if I find myself even slightly concerned about the details of Tom Cruise's thought process, or that of almost any actor, so many of whom are remarkably uninteresting `in person', I'll know that I no longer have a life. I mean, do Julianne Moore or Nicole Kidman, both undeniably luminous, really have anything to tell us, especially now? Tom Hanks? For the entire hour? (If only Charlie and I were both black so I could say, `N****r, please.' ) Sure, Tom's a nice guy, but so am I, despite my lack of millions, and I have had more than a few reasons not to keep the nice going.
We, and Charlie, genuflect to such people because we are becoming a society of actors; unauthentic, psychologically-truncated role players and poseurs. We just don't get paid big bucks for it; the dubious index by which we almost all measure our worth. We want to be someone else but without ever having discovered our true selves. Charlie Rose may not quite understand this, but he definitely knows how to use it. Sorry, Charlie, but when I see a Hollywood mug at the oak table, I'm gone, especially when said mug belongs to the astonishingly successful Michael Crichton, the person whom, I suspect, Charlie himself really wants to be. Crichton, ever gracious, as someone with his cash reserves can be, seems almost embarrassed at times by Charlie's slightly goggled-eyed supplication. You're cool too, C.R. Trust me. We all are, if you know how to see it. But, when the dust settles, I'll keep my Confederate money on you, Charlie, even if Benjamin Netanyahu rather snoidily rejected your offer to bear diplomatic communications to Hosni Mubarak. (Hey, Bibi's on the bench. You're still out there, plus you had to leave something for him to do, right?) You're still ok, even when your impatience at not being allowed to define international policy on the air nearly gets the better of you. Thanks for the many good moments. Keep up the good work.
Rose's aggressive, sometimes shabby, treatment of guests who challenge his neo-liberal bias and that of the show's funders is not new. See, for example, Scott F's comment (23 May 2015) on Rose's variable manner with other political guests:
"Two examples will hopefully illustrate {Rose's 'scrappy' biased interview style}. When Thomas L. Friedman is the guest (as he has been countless times) , I sit and wait for the moment when Charlie is going to bend forward to kiss Friedman's ring, as if everything Friedman says is as epochal as a papal homily. Contrast that with when someone from the political left is the guest (hardly ever, of course). When Noam Chomsky was the guest several years ago, Charlie attacked from every direction everything that Chomsky said, and that was after Charlie fessed up that Chomsky was one of the most requested guests ever by the viewers."
Rose made Sanders his new Chomsky. I did not count how many times Rose (a lawyer by training) put leading questions to Sanders, only to cut him off mid-sentence with additional questions. But it had to number in the dozens. Sanders took Rose's rapid-fire interruptions with good grace, perhaps sensing how many viewers would sympathize with him. And Sanders likely knew that sooner or later Rose was bound to slip up and let him (accidentally?) answer one of Rose's questions fully.
Despite Rose's persistent dismembering of Sanders' concisely articulated and well-supported explanations of his campaign's purpose, Sanders got a number of key ideas across. In the process, he nudged Rose into seeing that health care and education didn't really belong in the "social welfare program" drawer to which Rose had relegated them.
One marvels that Rose seems unaware that, to the politically savvy, the normative overtones Rose takes with guests whose opinions left, right, economic, medical, artistic veer from the beaten path betray him as a loyal defender of an elite-consecrated status quo.
Whatever talents Charlie Rose's decades on the air may confer, his most glaring professional deficit is his inability to get out of the way of guests who don't fit his Procrustean mold. Let them make their cases without the badgering, Charlie!
When it comes to effectively interviewing people who hold opinions at odds with his own, Rose has quite a few things to learn from NPR's Terry Gross and former late-night king Jon Stewart. Only, as a 73-year- old establishment-beholden millionaire, Rose may now be too comfortable with his Janus-faced role as darling/bulldog to sniff them out.
Two examples will hopefully illustrate this. When Thomas L. Friedman is the guest (as he has been countless times) , I sit and wait for the moment when Charlie is going to bend forward to kiss Friedman's ring, as if everything Friedman says is as epochal as a papal homily. Contrast that with when someone from the political left is the guest (hardly ever, of course). When Noam Chomsky was the guest several years ago, Charlie attacked from every direction everything that Chomsky said, and that was after Charlie fessed up that Chomsky was one of the most requested guests ever by the viewers.
And lastly, two of my pet peeves. After asking a question of a guest, as soon as the guest begins to answer, Charlie compulsively interrupts with a further refinement of his question. Some guests then just keep talking, leaving Charlie no choice but to button up and listen. The other peeve is how Charlie talks with his left hand, and leaves it frozen in the air in front of the camera after his voice trails off. I want to say to him, "Charlie, put down your hand!"
But this perception usually leads me to skip his interviews with actors, unless it's someone who I haven't heard from before. But there were even a couple of such programs where I couldn't get through the whole show because of Charlie's going ga-ga within minutes of the start. In those times I think of Charlie as a red carpet interviewer before the Academy Awards, except the people who do THOSE interviews usually maintain a better emotional balance.
I recall Bill Buckley being interviewed and saying how tired he was of life. He wasn't. I remember a number of entertainment figures making similar comments that might seem to give us insight into their minds. He never did, and never will.
Well, the nation has its share of nut cases. But, when a program such as this is needed to sooth the alleged "disturbed minds", is it not time to take stock of what the values of good "emotional health" really are? Is it not the case that perhaps that which is being medicated is a matter of justice, and not a matter of medicine?
Oh well.
Watch it if you must, but you'd be better served watching mainstream broadcast sound bite media than this garbage.
In plainer language, it's more Mental Health TV.
It's an outpatient "facility" aired on PBS.
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