ABC news anchor Charlie Gibson and Diane Sawyer work together at the White House in June. Gibson is retiring at the end of the year.
ABC News made history Wednesday by naming Diane Sawyer as the anchor of World News Tonight. But maybe not for the reason you think.
Yes, for the first time, two women — Sawyer and CBS Evening News’ Katie Couric — will be anchoring network news programs solo.
Given Sawyer’s long, often groundbreaking career, it’s not particularly shocking that she is succeeding the retiring Charles Gibson in January, other journalists and media observers say.
But it is notable, experts say, that a 63-year-old woman is getting a visible on-air job when the TV business tends to replace veteran newscasters with younger, blonder versions of themselves.
“It’s a great day for women journalists, but for me, the story is that it’s not just another woman taking the reins but a woman in her 60s,” said Tiffany Kenney, an anchor at local ABC affiliate WPBF-Channel 25. “She continues to work in a field that has not always been kind to older women, and I fully expect her to build on what ABC News has accomplished. This is good for all of us.”
Chandra Bill, an anchor at NBC affiliate WPTV-Channel 5, agrees that Sawyer has done much to change “the portrayal of female broadcasters from the pretty, vacuous stereotype of the past.” But for viewers used to watching female anchors on competing stations in local markets for years, “it’s not a big deal,” she said.
“It’s a natural transition that networks would catch up with the local markets,” Bill said. “I don’t know why it’s taken them so long to put women on the news desk (nationally), because there are so many female reporters. Think about the legacy of Barbara Walters, Lesley Stahl, Meredith Vieira and Christiane Amanpour.” (Walters and Connie Chung have shared network anchor chairs with men.)
Discovery Channel host Mary Alice Williams, a former anchor on CNN and on NBC’s Weekend Today, said she’s “thrilled” about Sawyer’s new position, “having lived through years during which we were told women’s voices will never carry authority and women don’t have enough tenure for the top job.”
“Having two accomplished, smart women in the big chairs has been a long time coming,” she said. “I wish (NBC anchor) Brian Williams well!”
The question, then, is why now? Gemma Puglisi, a professor of communication at American University in Washington, wonders why ABC didn’t name Sawyer as the anchor after Peter Jennings died in 2005 or after Bob Woodruff was wounded by a bomb in Iraq in 2006.
Woodruff’s co-anchor, Elizabeth Vargas, then announced her pregnancy and was replaced by Gibson.
“It’s fantastic that they have her because she’s very competent, and Charlie’s done a great job,” Puglisi said. “But they could have easily done this when Peter Jennings, who is really just not replaceable, died, instead of going to that co-anchor situation. They could have kept Vargas, to make a statement. Why couldn’t they have set the precedent?”
She answers her own question: “Ratings are sliding, and the way the industry is, they’re trying to hold on to what they have because there’s a lot of money at stake.”
Robert Thompson, director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture at Syracuse University, agrees that ABC’s move was a business decision, and not “for any altruistic or socially progressive reason.”
Sawyer “is the natural heir apparent,” Thompson said. “She’s well-liked by her audience and has a lot of credentials, including the hard news and the morning stuff.”
In the end, WPTV’s Bill believes that Sawyer’s competence in every aspect of TV journalism, from the hard news perhaps once seen as the sole province of men to the comfortable chat format on Good Morning America, will make her a success in the anchor chair.
“Look at what Diane has done,” she said. “She can go from a feature story about fuzzy animals to interviewing a president. She was on 60 Minutes, she’s worked from foreign countries. She’s going to slide into that position quite easily.”
