I think we all need at least one really nice positive thing about the entertainment business every single day of the year, including weekends. Sometimes it may be something simple, like a video that showcases something fun and sometimes it may be a movie poster that embraces the aesthetic we all want Hollywood to aspire to. Sometimes it may be a long-winded diatribe. Sometimes it’ll be from the staff and extended family of CHUD.com. Maybe even you readers can get in on it. So, take this to the bank. Every day, you will get a little bit of positivity from one column a day here. Take it with you. Maybe it’ll help you through a bad day or give folks some fun things to hunt down in their busy celluloid digesting day.

02.08.11
By Jeremy G. Butler  (Author Page, Twitter Page, Facebook Page)

What I’m Thankful For:


TV News

Fun Fact:  I hate TV News.  It’s exploitive, pandering, sensationalistic and superficial.

Well, that’s not ENTIRELY true (or fair), but it certainly has those tendencies.  Hell, just turn on any of the Big 3 Cable Nets and chances are, at some point during the day, you’ll see all of those things on each of those channels (and on one you’ll get the added bonus of outright LIES, but I’ll let you guess which one while I rerail this article).  Local TV News isn’t much better – they fall prey to the same trappings and tactics and bullshit politics as any other market, no matter the size.  The characters and stereotypes are all real, they’re all real people – I’ve worked with everybody from Kent Brockman to Murphy Brown to Mary Richards* (sorry – cinematic news people aren’t coming to me as easily at this point in time).

Wait – I’ve worked?  Yeah.  I’ve worked in TV News for ten years this summer.  Luckily enough for me, I’ve spent my entire career in Promotions, just outside of the newsroom’s incessant negative energy and soul-crushing bleakness in my own little snappily-decorated awesome-bubble.

That’s a bit hyperbolic…my office isn’t THAT snappily-decorated.

At any rate, yeah – ten years.   What started as a random job as the third man in the department (part time promo tagger for a FOX Affiliate in Longview, Texas!  Woo!) when I was 20 years old that I only got because my wide-eyed enthusiasm at just BEING ALLOWED IN THE BUILDING edged me over the guy who had experience but no passion has become a career that I’ve carved out for myself.  There are two reasons I’m thankful for this.  One – news is everywhere.  In every city, state and country in the world.  And it’s NEVER GOING TO GO AWAY.  That, my friends, is job security.  No matter where I go, no matter the situation in which I may find myself or what roads let me TO that situation, I have a place to go.  That’s a comfortable feeling.

Secondly, and this is what the main focus of this article is, over the course of these ten years I’ve managed to receive one of the most dense, varied and amazing educations money could buy.

But I got paid to learn it.

Ancillary things aside, the main crux of my job is to write promos which I, in turn, shoot and edit.  This, considering my aspirations, is a priceless skillset.  Yeah, I don’t care much for TV News but I adore production and, given the relative creative freedoms I’m allowed, I’m able to teach myself more every single day.  It’s translated itself into really fun and challenging freelance work, a better understanding of film and the filmmaking process and the credentials to be involved in that process myself in a professional capacity should the opportunity arise.

I’m not saying I can stand toe-to-toe with a hot-shot film student, but because of TV News, I’ve gotten paid an exorbitant amount of money over the last ten years to learn a great deal of what that student paid an exorbitant amount of money to learn, and for that I’m thankful.

* – I also have worked and currently work with some really great, wonderful, amazingly talented people with whom I’m honored to be associated.  I don’t want my sniggly (yeah, I made up a word) little remarks to overshadow that.