A marriage made in Iran

CBS and C-SPAN got together recently -- thanks to the president of Iran. If that seems like an unlikely marriage, performed by an even more unlikely minister, you should have seen the wedding video.

Last August, the very venerable Mike Wallace of "60 Minutes," the just as venerable Sunday-night news show on CBS, requested an interview with Hashemi Rafsanjani, the president of Iran. The president said, in effect, "I know how you people work. You tape for an hour and then show the five minutes you like. Give me a full hour to get my message across and I'll agree."

Wheels began turning at CBS. How could they give Rafsanjani what he wanted when it is traditional on "60 Minutes" to do three stories plus Andy Rooney plus letters plus commercials? The "aha" answer came to them: Approach C-SPAN, the cable channel that has oodles of time and a tradition of giving newsmakers as much of it as they want.

Twenty-four hours a day, C-SPAN and C-SPAN2 cover Congress, the president of the U.S., press briefings, the courts, business and industry, lobbying groups, world affairs, the media and literature, and so on. They aren't hampered with commercials -- or Andy Rooney.

Option accepted

A message went back to Rafsanjani: "What if CBS shows the five minutes it wants while C-SPAN runs the entire interview you want?" The Iranian president gave the thumbs up.

In early March, Wallace journeyed to Tehran to spend what turned out to be 90 minutes with Rafsanjani (a total that includes time for translators to do their work). CBS also videotaped elsewhere in Iran in order to provide background and context, and interviewed average Iranians to get their thoughts.

In mid-March, "60 Minutes" broadcast the results: a segment that ran less than 14 minutes and that included exactly 5 minutes and 25 seconds of the 90-minute interview Wallace did. So, in late March, C-SPAN took the raw videos, excised the translators' time and ran the resulting 50-minute dialogue between the CBS newsman and the Iranian leader. Wallace then talked about the experience with Brian Lamb, C-SPAN's venerable presence, and with viewers (some of whom were venerable).

Rare perspective

For average viewers, the result was a fascinating, rare and long overdue peek into how a TV news piece comes together from the first request for an interview, through the negotiation process (which included how close Wallace would sit to Rafsanjani), to the actual videotaping, editing and final product.

We saw Rafsanjani joust with Wallace, using denial, counter-attack, evasion, split-hairs and ridicule to avoid tough questions. We watched as the newsman was put on the spot about America's problems; should he be an apologist for the U.S. or a disinterested party? We sensed him picking carefully for phrases that would get at key issues without causing his subject to walk out of the room.

Back and forth they went, batting topics at each other like tennis balls: frozen Iranian funds...thwack...terrorism...

thwack...women and Islam...thwack...nuclear weapons. They even managed to discuss "Baywatch." Whish!

In the end, viewers learned a lot about Iran and even more about how TV news goes about its business. It was a very informative process -- and one that should be repeated.

(04-17-97) [[In-content Ad]]