New York – Matt Lauer is sent packing this week on another one of those round-the-world mystery jaunts for “Today,” the kind that has probably earned him enough frequent-flier miles to get to the moon for free.
Some of his work during the past few weeks on stories closer to home better illustrate his value to NBC News.
Amid Don Imus’ career implosion over his remark about the Rutgers women’s basketball team, Lauer so adroitly handled an on-camera interview with his own boss at NBC News that it impressed an ex-competitor watching at home.
With his news organization again in the news a week later, Lauer and partner Meredith Vieira bluntly discussed NBC’s role in disseminating pictures sent by Virginia Tech gunman Seung-Hui Cho and the reaction against that decision.
The departures of Katie Couric and Charles Gibson for evening anchor jobs last year left Lauer as the king of morning television.
Although the transition to a new “Today” hasn’t been flawless, Lauer has assumed his role with quiet authority and skill.
The Imus controversy was the nation’s biggest story for a week and it directly involved NBC News because MSNBC simulcast the radio star’s show. Lauer spoke to Imus and his chief critic, the Rev. Al Sharpton, on the April 10 show, and for most TV hosts merely preventing a shouting match would have be an achievement.
Lauer kept in firm control and asked pointed questions.
To Imus, who still had his job, he asked: “If you didn’t immediately understand how deplorable the comments were of last week, how can you be trusted to clean up your own act or censor yourself down the road in the future?” He asked Sharpton how the biblical concept of forgiveness applied to Imus. “Can he only be forgiven,” he said, “if he’s unemployed?”
Two days later, he interviewed NBC News President Steve Capus about the decision to end the MSNBC simulcast. There was no friendly banter. Lauer pressed Capus about the timing of the firing when the question was ducked. He forced Capus to respond to the idea that NBC was caving to pressure from advertisers and some of the loudest voices.
It was sharp and to the point.
“When you put the boss on television, it typically sounds like you’re interviewing the boss,” said Ben Sherwood, former executive producer of ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “I think Matt treated it like he was interviewing a newsmaker. He showed the curiosity and toughness that he would with any newsmaker.”
The morning after NBC News released the photos sent by Cho, Lauer and Vieira signaled that the backlash against NBC was on, resisting impulses to duck or get defensive.
“You can’t say a bad word about Matt Lauer,” said Steve Friedman, executive producer of CBS’ competing “The Early Show.” “He’s a tremendous performer. He’s smart, he’s a hard worker, but this is not a one-person show.”
