Another Classic Aaron Sorkin Moment
The biggest laugh I got over the weekend — other than remembering that to deal with her 32-day marriage to Ernest Borgnine in her autobiography Ethel Merman offered a single blank page — came on “The Newsroom.” Early on in this third episode, Will McAvoy (Jeff Daniels) delivered a manifesto detailing what his cable-news show “News Night” would stand for from now on. No more giving viewers what they think they want; the show will give them what Will McAvoy thinks they need. Why? Because, he concluded, “We’re the media elite.†I understand the irony being deployed here, but really. Is there any network that screams “media elite” more than HBO? And is there any screenwriter who brand screams “media elite” more than Aaron Sorkin? (That’s a compliment by the way: I respect elitism, at least if it’s properly deployed.)
