And it seemed that every celebrity, every murderer, every frog had a lawyer or a press agent all interviewing the interviewer to determine where they could get the most airings for their clients, what kind of questions would be asked, and how much promotion and advertising would be guaranteed. The interviewer had to audition to land the interview. The press agents for the celebrities were the worst, with endless demands and restrictions. (“You can’t ask this.” “You can’t talk about that.”) It wasn’t much fun anymore for me, and it certainly wasn’t prestigious.
I was plenty busy. Between 2002 and 2004 I interviewed around a hundred people for 20/20, from Mariah Carey to Al Gore, and, after a twenty-five-year wait, a new interview with Fidel Castro. But interviews with heads of state, even someone as hard to land as Castro, were becoming less appealing to newsmagazines. Celebrities with problems were becoming less appealing to me.
It wasn’t just that. Everybody in my business works hard. Well, almost everybody. But at that point I was swamped. I was not only fully involved with 20/20 and The View, which by then, seven years since its debut, was running full steam, I was also doing a minimum of three one-hour prime-time Specials a year.
On an average day I would get into my 20/20 office at 12:30, having just finished appearing on The View in a different building. I would go to the ABC cafeteria to pick up a salad and eat at my desk. When I came back to my office, there was a lineup of producers waiting to discuss whatever story they were doing with me. There was also my superconscientious booker, Katie Thomson, standing with a list of future guests. Then there was David Sloan, the executive producer of 20/20, with another list. If I was doing a Special Bill Geddie would be on the phone, anxious to discuss which interviews we should try to get that would not conflict with 20/20.
All this I could handle, and would have continued to, were it not for the big “get” and the pressure to be the first to secure an interview with whoever was making news, whoever was involved in a scandal, whoever was appearing in the newest film, whoever was accused of murdering his or her parents or wife or lover. In my last two years on 20/20 getting the “gets” had gotten out of control. I was not only competing with the newsmagazines on the other networks—Dateline, 48 Hours, 60 Minutes, and its spinoff, 60 Minutes II—but with the new crop of nightly entertainment interview programs like Entertainment Tonight and Access Hollywood and the like. And finally, I was competing right inside my own network.
A little history.
ABC was the only network to have two competing women on two nighttime newsmagazines, Diane Sawyer and me. Roone Arledge had orchestrated that. If there was a big star on another network, Roone could not rest until he secured that star for ABC. It was the reason ABC had such a strong news lineup. For example, Roone had offered Dan Rather an anchor job at ABC while Walter Cronkite was still doing the evening news at CBS. It was CBS’s determination to keep Dan that made that network take Walter off the program in 1981, before, he later said, he truly wanted to leave. Walter had many good years left as an effective anchor, but CBS more or less said “bye-bye,” and Dan took over the news program. So Roone not only made waves at ABC, he also created choppy waters at other networks.
In 1989 Roone had lured Diane away from CBS, where she had been appearing very successfully on 60 Minutes. He convinced her that, whereas on 60 Minutes she was one of an ensemble, at ABC she would have her own magazine program and could choose to do any stories she wanted. Roone then created a new magazine program on Thursday nights at 10:00 p.m., called Prime Time Live. Diane’s partner was the brash former White House correspondent Sam Donaldson. They were described as a sort of beauty-and-the-beast pairing—the cool, lovely Diane and the boisterous and irreverent Sam. But it was a pairing that didn’t click. Still, ABC now had an hour newsmagazine at 10:00 p.m. on Thursday nights and another, 20/20, on Friday nights, also at 10:00 p.m. Eventually, Charlie Gibson replaced Sam as Diane’s partner. By this time, Prime Time was successful and after a certain point we at 20/20 felt we were competing as much with Prime Time as we were with newsmagazines on other networks.
Then, in 1999, Diane, a terrific reporter and so hardworking, took on another formidable assignment as the coanchor with Charlie Gibson of ABC’s morning program, Good Morning America. That program was locked in a ferocious battle with its NBC counterpart, my old stomping ground the Today show. The morning shows were huge moneymakers, much more than the newsmagazines, because they had much more commercial time to sell, being on five days a week. It was therefore all the more important that Diane snag the big “get.” We at 20/20 were suddenly competing not just with Prime Time but with GMA as well and we hated the whole idea.
Diane and I struggled to figure out what to do, especially when we were competing for the same newsmaker or celebrity for our respective newsmagazines. We each had a booker to help pave the way with a potential guest’s lawyers, press agents, and other handlers. Then we would come in for the last round of phone calls or meetings. Our bookers were notoriously competitive. Diane and I were more polite. We would say something like this to the press agents: “I hope you will do the interview with me. If not, I hope you will do it with my colleague [Barbara or Diane],” whatever the case might be. We were out for the kill ourselves, but if we didn’t get the interview, we didn’t want one of the other networks to get it.
We were both so successful on our newsmagazines that, although most people don’t remember this, in September 1998, the year before Diane started to appear on GMA, ABC put us on as cohosts on a Sunday-night edition of 20/20. The network figured if one of us was good, two would be better. But although we enjoyed working together instead of competing, our hearts weren’t in it. We were keeping our best stories for our own programs. The Sunday program died within a year. It was also decided that instead of Prime Time and 20/20 being two separate newsmagazines, they would merge into two nights of the more successful 20/20. The staffs would also merge, but Diane and I would each still anchor on our own night. It was an awful time. The producers couldn’t figure out which pieces should go on which nights, and in spite of having the same name, the programs were still competing. We hadn’t taken lemons and made lemonade. We’d taken lemonade and made lemons.
The dual 20/20s lasted just two years. When David Westin took over from Roone as president of the News Division we went back to two separate shows, Prime Time and 20/20. By that time Hugh Downs had retired from 20/20 to live in Arizona. When Hugh left, I had a new partner, John Miller. John was ABC’s crack investigative reporter. He also, among all of us, was the only person to have interviewed Osama bin Laden. I adored John. He was so smart and funny, but our partnership was short-lived. John gave up the fame and money of broadcasting to move to Los Angeles and join the L.A.P.D.’s chief, William Bratton, as bureau chief for the Counter-Terrorism and Criminal Intelligence Bureau. Currently John is assistant director of public affairs for the FBI in Washington. After John left, I was fortunate to have another John, John Stossel, as my new partner. John and I had worked together for so many years on 20/20 that it was an easy transition. But usually neither John nor Charlie, Diane’s partner on both Prime Time and GMA, went after the “gets.” Those were left more often to Diane and me.
There was one more wrinkle. Roone, in his ever-expanding desire to hire all the best talent, had persuaded Connie Chung to leave CBS, where she had been paired with Dan Rather on the evening news. Their duet in 1993 was as big a failure as the combination of Harry Reasoner and me years before. Roone promised Connie an anchor job, which put her in the position of competing with not one but two other female anchors, Diane and me.
I was and am very fond of Connie, and it couldn’t have been easy for her. Whenever she wanted to go after a “get,” she was told that Diane or I had first dibs. Connie’s big coup was the first interview with Gary Condit, the congressman alleged to have been involved in the disappearance and presumed murder of Chandra Levy, an intern in Washington. But she had to struggle to get any other important
interviews and she was understandably unhappy. Soon after her Condit piece, CNN offered her a job. David Westin, with great relief, I think, released her from her ABC contract.
So Connie left, but that didn’t really help the situation between GMA, Prime Time, and 20/20. Finally, in desperation, Westin assigned a conscientious arbitrator named Kerry Smith to make the choice as to who should go after which interview. It was a thankless job for her, and a particularly difficult setup for me. Kerry Smith’s theory was that whoever seemed to have been working on the story earlier should be the one to whom it would be assigned. Diane not only had her bookers on Prime Time but another whole set of bookers on Good Morning America. They booked both short-term and long-term. I also knew that in the early-morning competition, it was more important for the daily GMA to score a big “get” than for the weekly 20/20. I was running as fast as I could, but it seemed to me it was an uneven playing field.
Moreover, Diane could offer a guest a package of two or three appearances on GMA as well as a more lengthy appearance on Prime Time. I didn’t have that option. To make it even more difficult, the Today show was doing the same thing. The competition between the two programs was fierce. And my lighthearted daytime program, The View, was just not in the league of GMA, Today, or the other newsmagazines.
Today, when Diane and I no longer compete, we have a relationship of good humor and affection. I mean that sincerely. Diane is a wonderful reporter, the best. Back then, however, we often found ourselves in that hated competition, and as much as we wanted, there seemed to be nothing we could do about it. We never criticized each other in public or in print, but the conflict was well known inside ABC.
So that was more or less how things stood in 2003. I complained to Jackie about the show almost every time I talked with her. “Why don’t you leave, Mom?” she would say. “You’ve been doing that program for twenty-five years. What else do you have to prove? Leave now while you still feel good about it.” Maybe she was right, I thought. I also sought the advice of Monica Caulfield, my trusted assistant. She, perhaps more than anyone, knew what my schedule was like. I remember her saying, “It’s a great big world out there and it will set you free.” Still, I wasn’t sure. That summer I walked the beach with two wise and close couples, Elizabeth and Felix Rohatyn and Louise and Henry Grunwald, and discussed over and over again my feelings about wanting to give up 20/20. Felix had been the U.S. ambassador to France. Henry had been, for years, the editor in chief of Time Inc. Both men knew what it was like to leave extremely important and influential positions. Their wives were also very informed and understanding. I could fully explore my conflicted feelings with the four of them.
The View, then, was like dessert, fun and not hard to do. The Specials took time but were in general also fun. Working on 20/20, on the other hand, seemed debilitating and exhausting. But would I miss it? Would I miss the rare interview with the president or a head of state? Would I, now that I was not on a major news program, miss being seated at some black-tie dinner next to a visiting prime minister? To that I said no. It is usually much more fun not to be seated next to a prime minister, especially when he or she speaks no English. But I might not even be invited to the party. As an agent I knew said of one of his clients who had retired, “I love you—and I will miss you.” Moreover, and more important, I realized that I was ending the major part of my career and might have trouble filling my days. Oh, well, I told myself, I can finally learn Spanish, go to museums, travel, and stay in a foreign country for more than one day. I kept walking the beach until I was sure.
Then, in the fall of 2003, David Westin called and asked if he could come to my office and talk. He wanted to tell me of a new plan to make the booking competition between Diane and me less difficult. He was as unhappy with the situation as I was. But by then I had made up my mind. Before he could describe his plan, I stopped him. “No need to tell me,” I said. “Don’t be upset. But I’m leaving 20/20.” He was stunned, and I realize now that I never did hear what his plan was. But I did tell him my plan and my reasons. I asked him to please keep my decision a secret from everyone until I had decided how and when to announce it. I asked him not to tell even Michael Eisner. This was a big thing to ask, but David understood. I think the world of David Westin. He is a man of his word, and his word was all I needed. Then he said, “Whatever you want to do, I just can’t afford to lose you. You are an icon. [Nice to hear, I thought, but there are a lot of icons these days.] You will stay in News. We will work something out.”
And we did. As I had no agent, I asked a brilliant entertainment lawyer, Allen Grubman, to represent me and meet with David to discuss my future at ABC News. True to his word, Westin offered me a new long-term contract and asked if I would agree to do four to five prime-time Specials a year. These would include the two very popular hours I had been doing for so many years, 10 Most Fascinating People and the Academy Award Special. The others would be mutually agreed to. As it has turned out, in the years since I left 20/20, I have also done three extremely highly rated and controversial noncelebrity Specials—one on transgender children who consider themselves born into the wrong bodies, and two others, one on the question of the existence of heaven, and the other on the new science of longevity, leading to the search to live to beyond a hundred. (I am planning to do that myself. Where are my vitamins?) David also asked me to continue to contribute commentary when a president, head of state, or important celebrity whom I’d interviewed, died. From time to time, he said, I might also be asked to do an interview for a Special if it was deemed very important. (This would be the case for my interviews in France with the doctor of the woman who had the first face transplant after her dog mauled her, and the hour with Terri Irwin in Australia.) I also contributed to the coverage of the funerals of Presidents Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford.
I agreed to continue to do this kind of reporting and signed the contract. Forget the language lessons, forget the museums. I would still have a full plate but, on the other hand, I would be out of the daily competition. What a great relief that has turned out to be.
We decided that although I would make the announcement of my leaving 20/20 a few months later in January 2004, I would continue on the program until September so that I could launch the person who would take my place. David Westin chose Elizabeth Vargas, a fine reporter.
When January came I called Bill Carter and said I wanted to speak to him confidentially. Bill had done quite a few stories on me in the past, including a 1992 New York Times Magazine cover story. I wanted to release my statement in the most dignified way, so I gave my news to him as an exclusive. The day before the article was to appear, David Westin told Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Schneider, the ABC News vice president who oversees communication.
The next morning, Carter’s column appeared on the front page of the New York Times Business Section. When I finally saw my words in print I felt both scared and relieved. My twenty-five years on 20/20, the mainstay of my career, were over. I had done the deed, and I was on to a new and uncharted course of my life.
I thought my colleagues would not be surprised. They knew how heavy a workload I had and how I struggled over the “gets.” Certainly, I thought, my executive producer, David Sloan, knew. I would really miss working with David. He was my friend as well as extremely talented at his job. But, as it turned out, neither he nor anyone on the staff had any idea. As soon as I arrived in my office, I hastily called the staff together. Some were in tears (perhaps because they were also concerned about losing their jobs; David Sloan and I assured them this would not happen). Most just hugged me and asked that I do my last story or any future stories with them. I loved my producers. We had worked very closely together, preparing and editing. I was very hands-on. Some of them had worked only with me all these years on the program. I promised to keep my hand in and do stories for 20/20 now and then. It was an extremely emotional meeting.
That fall ABC News presented a two-hour retrospective Special of my work calle
d 25 on 20/20. It was painstakingly produced by Martin Clancy, who had worked with me on so many interviews and reports for so many years. Martin chose highlights from each of the twenty-five years and each category of interview. There were the heads of state, the politicians, the human interest stories, the murderers, alleged or convicted, the celebrities, the famous and the infamous. It was a list, culled from hundreds of interviews, that even surprised me. I was very proud of the program, which aired September 17, 2004.
After I left 20/20, the show underwent somewhat of a change. My departure made it even more difficult for the program to attract the big “gets.” The format often turned instead to theme programs, with one subject being investigated or analyzed for an hour. John Stossel did a whole series of programs looking at myths about things we fear but shouldn’t. There were also hours on subjects like hate, lust, happiness, and greed. The program still ran important interviews but less often with big stars or world leaders. Those super “gets” more and more went to Oprah or to Diane for Good Morning America. Even so 20/20 still continues and is an important and valuable program.
Once I announced that I was leaving, I was deluged with requests for interviews and invitations to be honored by this or that organization. It was like reading my own obituary. I hadn’t retired from television, but it looked as if I had. I turned down all the so-called honors and most of the interviews. I thought the “exit” interview I had done for the New York Times said it all. The interviews I did do were with Oprah, one for her magazine O and one for her television program. As I have written, Oprah is one of the people I could interview again and again. Now the tables were turned and she wanted to interview me.
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