Susan Zirinsky: A Lifetime of Achievement

Tonight in Las Vegas, Susan Zirinsky will be honored with the "2013 TV & Film Lifetime Achievement Award" by the New York Festivals.  In her 40 years at CBS News, Susan is a legend in the industry.  She is currently the Senior Executive Producer of 48 Hours, she produces prime time news specials, see oversees the website Crimesider, and she has developed a new prime time series, Brooklyn DA, which will premier in May.

Susan has covered wars, presidents, world leaders, summits, elections, uprisings and scandals.  She has produced news packages, newsmagazines and documentaries.  She also served as a role model for Academy Award winning actress Holly Hunter, who played news producer Jane Craig in the 1987 movie, Broadcast News.  Susan's shelf is stuffed with industry awards.  But what is most noteworthy is what those who have worked with Susan say about her. 

CBS CEO Les Moonves: “There is simply no one better in any business than Susan. She’s the consummate pro whose instincts and artistry are unerring and completely unique, and there’s just nobody who is more competitive than she is. For decades, she has simply been the go-to storyteller than we have turned to, over and over again, when there was an important project, something that had to be told. When we needed to capture the truth about 9/11, it was Susan who got us there with her award-winning and deeply moving account of that day. Every week, she gives us the top show on Saturday night, keeping the flame burning bright on one of our most highly regarded franchises – 48 Hours. She’s been doing it for a long time. And she just keeps on getting better and better. Today, she’s at the top of a really tough and crucial game, one of the people leading the regeneration of CBS News. Congratulations, Z, on this honor. We love you too.”

CBS News Correspondent Bob Schieffer: "I have known Susan since when she was a student at American University who was working part time for the weekend news in the CBS Washington bureau. She was one of those kids that you knew was going to rise to the top. The best part of watching her grow up is seeing how she still attacks her job and attack is the right word with the same enthusiasm and determination and grit that she showed back then. She always got to the office first and is still the last to leave. I love everything about her and have for a long, long time."

60 Minutes Correspondent Lesley Stahl: "Congrats to Susan Zirinsky, the maven of Meeting a Deadline.. The Queen of the Crash! In Zee's lifetime in journalism she's been at the top of her game from the beginning - which was in the '70s during Watergate.  Whether she was producing pieces or broadcasts, covering the White House, elections or crime stories, she managed to be a master.  And she's done it all with heart and good cheer.  And against all odds, she always made the deadline, whether that meant ordering up her own Air force of helicopters or just making her reporters better and faster than they thought they could be. How lucky I am, and CBS is, that Susan's been our colleague and friend."

Vogue Editor Anna Wintour: "When I worked with Susan, we were staging a global project with so many moving parts that to us it felt like a military operation.  Now, throughout her career Susan has produced segments on actual military operations.  But she brought the same remarkable focus, levelheadedness and sense of humor to what we were doing as I imagine she brings to everything she does."

Actress Holly Hunter: "It was an extraordinary advantage for me to get to tail Susan Zirinsky around the CBS newsroom in Washington to prepare for the role of "Jane Craig" in BROADCAST NEWS.  I was given carte blanche to steal all behavior, professional and otherwise, from her. I ripped off the unselfconscious intimacy she gave to co-workers---putting her hand on the shoulder of a guy as she was making a suggestion to him---or giving someone's arm a squeeze as she breezed by.  I just loved that.  And I thought it was a beautiful gesture to bring to an environment filled with nothing but deadlines.  I stole her hairdo---scaled her height and took that, too.   I mimicked her feist, but that was easy since I have some of my own.  I tried like crazy to capture her imaginative ability to take divergent parts of a story and intuitively contain them with an image that was previously unrelated but that  made manifest the heart of the story. The one thing I could not steal from her, though, was her calm.  Susan was a still point in a turning world at CBS, as far as I was concerned.  She never raised her voice.  She never ran. She made her producorial rounds with her wit and intellect blazing, but also while brandishing a good deal of laissez faire.  She had faith in her fellow man.  And woman.  Even under pressure, she always looked like she was definitely Not Sweating, which made her more attractive to all the people who were.  Because they knew, under the calm and encouragement, she was obsessed.  That's leadership."

Former CBS News colleague and Sony Chairman Sir Howard Stringer:  "Even actress Holly Hunter in the seminal movie “Broadcast News” could not match the intensity, the skills or the breadth of commitment of the extraordinary Susan Zirinsky.  As a producer she is fearless; as a colleague she is peerless; as a leader she is matchless, but as a friend she is irreplaceable.  When she clambered over a moving freight train to get her tapes to a ground station before the competition, she became a news icon who really did capture hearts and minds. She captured mine long ago!"

Well she captured my heart and mind long ago as well, because she is simply the most amazing woman I have ever known.  

Remembering Lane Venardos: 1944-2011

Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather, Diane Sawyer, Lesley Stahl and Charles Kuralt are among the giants who have been the public faces of broadcast news over the past four decades. But just out of the public spotlight, whether in glittering world capitols or war-torn hellholes, there worked behind the scenes some legendary figures that were held in the highest esteem by their peers. On Friday Lane Venardos, one of the news industry's greatest producers and executives, died at his home in Hawaii.

Lane was a very special person who combined a fiercely competitive spirit, a strong commitment to professionalism and integrity with a wonderful effervescent personality. For nearly thirty years he personified what was great about CBS News.

Lane was an exceptional executive producer because he had a clear vision, he communicated effectively and he was always incredibly organized. "No detail too small" he would often say. His approach would earn him more than a dozen Emmy awards. As an executive producer and then vice president of CBS News his energetic leadership style won respect from all those who worked with him.

Lane was born in post-war Alton, Illinois, just across the Mississippi River from St. Louis. He was a product of America's heartland. He started in radio news and had a booming radio voice. "Tall tower full power!" he would frequently blurt out even years after jumping to television. That transition would take place in Chicago in the early seventies where he served as assistant news director at WBBM-TV News. It wasn't long before CBS News recruited him.

In the late seventies, as a producer for The CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite in Washington, he helped modernize television coverage of the White House. He applied organization and the latest technologies to presidential trip coverage around the world. He soon was promoted to senior producer. Sir Howard Stringer, now CEO of Sony and then the newly appointed CBS Evening News executive producer, brought him to New York to work with Dan Rather. When Howard was promoted to the CBS News front office two years later Lane took over as executive producer of the broadcast.

For four years in the mid-eighties he served as the executive producer of the CBS Evening News with Dan Rather, and he was proud to point out the broadcast was number one in the ratings during his entire tenure. "The CBS Evening News brings people together every day even for only a brief period of time." he once said. "That carries a special responsibility."

In the late eighties Lane took on the role of vice president of special events coverage. He was the executive producer of 48 Hours on Crack Street, the premier broadcast of that series. Lane led CBS News' presidential election specials, campaign coverage and dozens of specials on major news stories. He led the CBS News operations in Beijing, China, for its highly acclaimed coverage of the student uprising at Tiananmen Square. He was also executive producer of such CBS News specials as Remember Pearl Harbor, Eye on the Earth, and William S. Paley: Tribute to a Broadcasting Giant.

In the early nineties he was promoted to vice president of hard news. There he ran all of CBS News day-to-day news coverage and worldwide bureaus. He was as outstanding an executive as he had been an executive producer.

He retired from CBS News in the late nineties but did not retire from television. His subsequent television credits included several Survivor series, The Apprentice, The Contender and The Biggest Loser.

Yet, for all these considerable accomplishments, friends and colleagues will best remember Lane’s extraordinary sense of humor and personality. "Let's get out there and scratch that surface!" he would often quip. Working with him, no matter how difficult the task, was always fun. His energy, his passion and his down to earth character were incredibly endearing. And he was deeply admired for his strong family commitment.

Lane Venardos was a great friend to thousands of broadcasters throughout the world. For them, Lane Venardos is a legend in television news.

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A few LANE-isms

A greeting: "Good luck in your own personal career!"
Booming radio voice: "Tall tower, full power!...50 thousand watts, clear channel...broadcasting from the heart of the capital...the capital city's number ONE source for ne-uws...now the golden tones of (insert your name)."
Answering the phone: "Good morning. miracle productions."
Comment during a failed video feed: "It looked good leaving here, New York."
Inspring the troops: "Let's get out there and scratch that surface."
Killing a package: "Boom, boom, boom, boom, you're piece is dead."
Or: "On any other day your story would have been the lede!"
Setting expectations: "Never make the same mistake once."
On being human: "No good deed goes unpunished."
Hard work: "If it is worth doing, it is worth overdoing."
Organization: "No detail too small."
On television investigative reporting. "Your report should be like a rock skipping across the top of the water, never too deep as to slow down the story."
On praise: "You're only as good as your next piece."
Avoiding controvery: "Life is lonely in the middle."
The producer's apology when caught being sneaky: "I don't know how it happened, I am sorry, it will never happen again."
The producer's pledge: "You have my word as a producer!"