WGBH 1999-2000 Annual Report Text Version
Introduction | President's Letter | Awards | Financials | Annual Report with Images
8am-12pm | 1pm-5pm | 6pm-12am
8amHost Ron Della Chiesa opens Classics in the Morning with works by Bach, Shostakovich, Godard, and Mozart. WGBH Radio delivers eight hours of classical music every weekday on 89.7fm and the Web, offering a wide repertoire of beloved masterpieces, lesser known gems, and new works for thought-provoking entertainment.
During a pause in taping on a busy New York set, executive producer Judy Stoia and puppeteer Anthony Asbury review a segment for Between the Lions, WGBH's ambitious new multimedia initiative aimed at helping children learn to read. Set in a magical library, Between the Lions combines the latest advances in literacy skills instruction with an entertaining format that includes puppets, live action, animation, and music video. The TV series debuts on PBS in spring 2000.
Christopher Clark sorts the morning's mail. Each year WGBH's Audience Services department responds to hundreds of thousands of letters, e-mails, and telephone calls from viewers, listeners, and Web visitors around town, and around the country. The most frequently asked question: "How can I get my house on This Old House?"
With only 200 days to go before the 35th annual WGBH/Channel 2 Auction, volunteer chair Debbie Katsiroubas has little time to pause as she works the phone, assembling the volunteer teams that will take calls, run with the bids, and package more than 6,000 items. The nine-day televised auction is the single largest community-based annual volunteer event in Massachusetts.
Producer/director Michael Kirk and editor Steve Audette incorporate police video into Frontline's The Killer at Thurston High, the story of Oregon high school shooter Kip Kinkel. WGBH's Frontline gained exclusive access to police investigators and was the only news program to obtain an audiotape of Kinkel's harrowing confession. Winner of two 1999 George Foster Peabody Awards, Frontline is television's premier investigative journalism series, presenting hard-hitting documentaries on critical issues facing the nation and the world.
Executive producer Margaret Drain and senior producer Mark Samels review the script for The American Experience's Eleanor Roosevelt, a provocative portrait of the woman whom historian Geoffrey Ward calls "one of the best politicians of the 20th century." The film and companion Web site launch the 12th season of The American Experience, which earned the 1999 Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Non-Fiction Series for its powerful biography, MacArthur--the second year in a row the series has won this top honor.
Tony Kahn (left) tries to convince fellow Says You! panelists that "hoove" may be defined as "an unsuccessful Heimlich maneuver" during a taping session in a tavern west of Boston. The fast-paced game of wit and wordplay is garnering rave reviews and building audience. Says You! (a WGBH co-production with Pipit & Finch) is heard on more than 85 public radio stations nationwide.
"Our New York cab driver is Carlos Rubino, a Brazilian immigrant in his 30s," reports WGBH's Paul Solman, correspondent for The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, in a story on day traders. "Above the dashboard sits a Palm Pilot, getting (by satellite, from Reuters) the latest prices on stocks in his portfolio. Between Rubino and the shotgun seat, a laptop computer is ready (wirelessly) to e-trade, which our driver occasionally pulls over to do." Known for his ability to demystify complex economic issues, Solman won a 1999 Emmy for news analysis.
More than 6,000 Antiques Roadshow fans wait their turn in the Baltimore Convention Center to have their heirlooms and yard sale finds appraised. Top find of the day: a rooster weathervane from a Pennsylvania farm, valued between $30,000 and $50,000. Part adventure, part history lesson, part treasure hunt, WGBH's Antiques Roadshow is the most popular series in the PBS primetime schedule.
Producer Zvi Dor-Ner meets with colleagues from 59 countries who have come together at the BBC's London headquarters to finalize details for PBS Millennium 2000. The ambitious 25-hour international broadcast (co-produced by WGBH and the BBC) took an estimated one billion viewers to the dawn of the millennium as it occurred and was celebrated in each of the earth's 24 time zones.
After two failed attempts to raise an obelisk in Egypt, the NOVA team working on the miniseries Secrets of Lost Empires brings the project closer to home. In a quarry west of Boston, they finally succeed in raising the 25-ton structure to an upright position using ancient technology. NOVA, the most popular and critically acclaimed science series on American television, took home the prestigious du Pont-Columbia Gold Baton Award in 1999.
WGBH's Greater Boston Arts teams up with filmmaker Ross McElwee to document the formative years of the Boston Arts Academy (the city's first public high school for the visual and performing arts), including students' introduction to classic acting techniques. Winner of seven New England Emmys, the monthly TV series and its Web site offer a close-up look at the extraordinary and diverse artistic talent at our doorstep.
ExxonMobil Masterpiece Theatre executive producer Rebecca Eaton and host Russell Baker make minor adjustments to introductions the Pulitzer Prize-winning author has written and is about to tape for the upcoming winter 2000 season; productions include Madame Bovary, The Turn of the Screw, and David Copperfield. Masterpiece earned a George Foster Peabody Award in 1999 for its acclaimed production of King Lear.
WGBH's Ready to Learn intergenerational literacy project, a collaboration with South Side Head Start and the Rogerson House senior care center in Roslindale, gives senior Catherine and preschooler Kayla (and 60 other participants) a chance to watch PBS children's series together, read books, and work on crafts. An award-winning preschool and family literacy program, Ready to Learn served 7,000 children and their families in communities throughout Massachusetts in 1999.
Interactive technology director Annie Valva and senior technologist Peter Pinch collaborate on the development of a digital TV version of WGBH's award-winning children's series Arthur. The prototype includes an interactive glossary, activities kids can do after the broadcast, access to the Web through the TV, and multilingual choices that also ensure full access for people with vision or hearing loss. The pair is evaluating kids' responses to this new kind of viewing experience.
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