MONDO EXTRAS

Eric Deggans is the TV/media critic for the St. Petersburg Times, where he is a columnist and blogger.

Sars: What is the most common misconception about your job as a TV critic that you run into?

Eric Deggans: The most common misconception that I have from people is that it's an easy job, or that all you do is sit around and watch TV shows all day, and then you sit down and dash out some snarky commentary. If you do the job right, you really are doing the job that any other reporter does -- you're interviewing sources, you're looking at data, you're trying to unearth things that people are trying to keep hidden, and you're trying to find some trend stories and news stories that kinda exemplify the biggest issues facing the medium. And that's tough work, and it doesn't often involve sitting in front of a TV and actually watching the stuff that's on television. In fact, until recently, I almost never watched shows for review in my office; I did all that work at home, outside of my office hours. I would come into the office and make phone calls and read blogs, look at ratings reports, keep an eye on the cable news channels, and interview people and things like that, so, that's the biggest misconception I think people have. I think they have that misconception in part because there are some people, that's all they do. But they're not necessarily the best critics out there.

Sars: Do you ever wish it were more a straight reviewing gig, or would you get bored?

Deggans: Yeah, I mean, number one, I would get bored, and number two, I just think that's an underutilization of the job, because I was a music critic before I was a TV critic, and part of the fun of the job was going out to all the different clubs, and meeting the musicians, and talking with people who are making music up close and personal, and getting to know your community and its music scene, and what people there cared about, and also getting to know people at the national level and figuring out what that's about, and that's just carried over for me into television, where it's harder, because the business is so centralized in New York and in Los Angeles, but it really is about getting to know people and learning the stories behind the story. When something happens in the TV industry, knowing who to call to find out what's really going on, or, you know, maybe having a sense of what's really going on just because you've been covering it for so long. I think that's where you bring added value to your readers. If all you do is watch an early release of a DVD, and then write some funny, snarky thing about it...

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Eric Deggans is the TV/media critic for the St. Petersburg Times, where he is a columnist and blogger.

Sars: What is the most common misconception about your job as a TV critic that you run into?

Eric Deggans: The most common misconception that I have from people is that it's an easy job, or that all you do is sit around and watch TV shows all day, and then you sit down and dash out some snarky commentary. If you do the job right, you really are doing the job that any other reporter does -- you're interviewing sources, you're looking at data, you're trying to unearth things that people are trying to keep hidden, and you're trying to find some trend stories and news stories that kinda exemplify the biggest issues facing the medium. And that's tough work, and it doesn't often involve sitting in front of a TV and actually watching the stuff that's on television. In fact, until recently, I almost never watched shows for review in my office; I did all that work at home, outside of my office hours. I would come into the office and make phone calls and read blogs, look at ratings reports, keep an eye on the cable news channels, and interview people and things like that, so, that's the biggest misconception I think people have. I think they have that misconception in part because there are some people, that's all they do. But they're not necessarily the best critics out there.

Sars: Do you ever wish it were more a straight reviewing gig, or would you get bored?

Deggans: Yeah, I mean, number one, I would get bored, and number two, I just think that's an underutilization of the job, because I was a music critic before I was a TV critic, and part of the fun of the job was going out to all the different clubs, and meeting the musicians, and talking with people who are making music up close and personal, and getting to know your community and its music scene, and what people there cared about, and also getting to know people at the national level and figuring out what that's about, and that's just carried over for me into television, where it's harder, because the business is so centralized in New York and in Los Angeles, but it really is about getting to know people and learning the stories behind the story. When something happens in the TV industry, knowing who to call to find out what's really going on, or, you know, maybe having a sense of what's really going on just because you've been covering it for so long. I think that's where you bring added value to your readers. If all you do is watch an early release of a DVD, and then write some funny, snarky thing about it...

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10Next