Last night I caught the premiere of the new Bravo reality show Tabloid Wars, which follows the working exploits of a bunch of folks at the New York Daily News. To say it hits close to home is the MamaQ of all understatements.
Where to begin? Right, the white guys. This episode featured exactly one female journalist, goss mom Joanna Molloy, the uber New Yawk broad. She was slated to cover a party being given by Victoria Gotti, but had to bail because her kid hurt his foot jumping on the trampoline at home. The next day, she brought the kid to work. (Luckily, Jack is too young to remember spending much of Sept. 11, 2001 in his stroller next to my desk in the newsroom. It happens.)
The show's lineup is said to include staff reporter Tracy Connor, so I remain hopeful for later episodes. But damn, where's Lisa Colangelo*, the Queen of Queens, when you need her? Oh wait, there was one other woman figuring prominently in the first show, Tony Sclafani's unseen fiance. Sclafani was trying to get out the door to begin his first real vacation, during which he was getting married. He ended up chasing Christian Slater all night instead.
The real story of the day was an assault in Howard Beach that may or may not be race-related, and this is where the show really crackles. They should forget the other crap and just follow reporter Kerry Burke around, because he's about the most real of the real.
Sent to Howard Beach without a name, address or any real information, Burke spends all day and well into the evening sweating and chasing each incremental bit of detail. And he gets them, too, by asking politely, then cajoling, and ultimately knowing when to just hang around and let them see you're not leaving until someone comes out to talk to you. And believe me, someone always does, usually about 10 minutes before deadline. Just like on the show.
All the while, Burke is fielding phone call after phone call from his editor, Greg Gittrich, who's probably the newsroom heartthrob but owing to his deptuty metro editor position, spends 99 percent of his time on the phone hawking reporters. He's got the fluorescent tan to prove it.
Not that his job is without stress -- Gittrich's days are, in turn, spent being hawked by his editors, the Aussie and the Asian Guy. At the end of the night, as deadline approaches, Gittrich is on the phone again, taking quotes from Burke and adding them into the story, with no fewer than four other editors literally standing over his shoulders watching.
I've been on both sides of that kind of phone call, many times. Though these days, it's only as the spouse at home wondering when the damn story's going to be sent already so the damn editor can come home and have his damn dinner. Deep breath.
Still, seeing it on TV made my stomach knot up with familiar, wonderful tension. Like Marisa Tomei said in that movie, "God, I miss this place!"
* Fellow former Inky stringer and APP'er, who would probably rather lie down on subway tracks than let a camera crew follow her around
Is it just me, or are all they all starting to look alike? 
