COASTE | TAKE FIVE
1 You’re among a generation of women who broke a lot of ground in what was then a male dominated broadcast industry. What was that like? A lot of doors were opening for women at that time, but you still had to “join the crowd” rather than push the envelope and once you were accepted by the guys, you had far more equal footing. If a woman confronted issues, yes, it was different then, and you tried to take the higher ground. 2 You were Senior Producer of The Early Show for three years — what kind of energy did that take? It took a tremendous amount of energy, it was a 24/7 job. You’d go in at 5 AM, get ready to put that show on for the day and when done, immediately start preparing for the next day. Inevitably you stayed through the Evening News, then go home and get phone calls all night. Anything that happened in the world, the phone would ring for you because there’s always a Washington, D.C. reaction. You were the first woman to direct a State of the Union Presidential address for use by the entire network pool. What was that like? That was a really exciting time. Prior to 1995, there were only cameras allowed in the balcony looking down to the House Chamber floor. Through some negotiation, we were able to introduce new, more mobile technology and put three cameras on the ground that moved seamlessly through the crowd, and the room was packed. I’m proud to say it’s a technique that’s still used today. Obviously you had a very successful career in Washington, D.C., as did your husband. What brought you to move to Sanibel? My husband Danny and I were both 40 when we married and in less than 30 months, both of our daughters were born. Then came 9/11 and it changed my life. I really wanted to spend more time with my beautiful daughters. I figured I was lucky enough to have them so late in life, I didn’t want to mess it up. So one evening, walking on the beach while vacationing on Sanibel, I said to my husband, what are we waiting for? How has news changed since you first started as a journalist? The news is totally different because of social media, anybody can consider themselves a newscaster. Today a lot of content is easily available to you as a producer, so you need to know how to weed through what’s relevant and what’s not, and that’s a very difficult job. 3 4 5
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