{"id":247444,"date":"2017-09-18T16:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-09-18T20:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/?p=247444"},"modified":"2017-09-19T17:04:43","modified_gmt":"2017-09-19T21:04:43","slug":"why-i-dont-do-tv","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2017\/09\/18\/why-i-dont-do-tv\/","title":{"rendered":"Why I Don\u2019t Do a TV Show"},"content":{"rendered":"

RUSH: Geno in Houston. Next you are. Welcome to the EIB Network. Hi.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Hello, Rush, my main man.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Great to hear from you, Geno. How are you?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Good. I am now one of your so-called staunch Trump supporters.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Okay.<\/p>\n

\"\"CALLER: And I tell you why quickly. Number one, every time they beat, kick, and slur my president, I become more entrenched. You know, the man. He is a common-man president. He is not a swamp dweller. That\u2019s my comment, now I have a question.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Hm-hm.<\/p>\n

CALLER: And this I give you with my heart. Why don\u2019t you go on Fox News for a half hour, a half-hour show, and if it does well, obviously you would go on for an hour show. You know, you would rate higher than all the pundits combined. It just makes me go crazy when I listen to you and I listen to all of the crazy pundits out there, and I don\u2019t ever understand why you don\u2019t do that. You know, you could do a half hour show and still be on EIB.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Yeah. Look, I\u2019ve answered this in a number of different ways before, but I owe you one, but I gotta take a break here because have no time. Be patient.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Now television. I don\u2019t know how many times — folks, it\u2019s intriguing. I will admit to you, it\u2019s intriguing. Mr. Snerdley, you\u2019ve heard me explain this enough. Your answer will help me answer this. You\u2019ve heard as much as I\u2019ve ever said about thoughts on TV. What, in your memory — there\u2019s no wrong answer here — what do you think the number one reason that I don\u2019t do television is? Okay. The last thing you said, you got it. Mr. Snerdley said the lack of spontaneity and endless meetings.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the answer, folks. To do television, you have to collaborate. You can\u2019t do a TV show the way I do this. I don\u2019t have a single meeting. I don\u2019t consult anybody. I don\u2019t tell anybody what I\u2019m gonna talk about. I often don\u2019t know until the show starts, and I never, ever lay out the order in which I\u2019m gonna get to things. I organize things in stacks<\/a> here, but I don\u2019t put them in order. The whole thing is improv, and it simply isn\u2019t possible on TV. And I learned this when I did a TV show for four years.<\/p>\n

That was a 22-minute show, and every show required two meetings a day that added up to three times as long as the show was. Many of the meetings were looking at audio clips and saying, “Yes, yes, no, no.” You can\u2019t do a TV show alone. You have to have camera people, they have to know where they\u2019re going. You have to have people in the booth who know what sound bite you\u2019re gonna use or video clip. That all has to be prearranged before you do it. There\u2019s a stage manager, there\u2019s a floor manager, there\u2019s a lighting director, there\u2019s a makeup person, there\u2019s all these things.<\/p>\n

But the main thing, I don\u2019t collaborate. I don\u2019t even like to collaborate. You know, sitting down and telling people and planning a program, I\u2019m not capable of it. (interruption) Live improv TV? There wouldn\u2019t be any video sound bites then \u2019cause that stuff all has to be planned. You have to make sure you\u2019ve got it. It has to be timed out. They have to put it in the machine in the order you\u2019re gonna use it. You\u2019ve just killed improv right there.<\/p>\n

TV is not made to do a show like this on TV. So you have to accommodate the way TV does things, and that includes collaborating. Let\u2019s go nightly. Let\u2019s say I had a 6 p.m. show, not picking a specific part of day, but something after this program. Before this program started, I\u2019d have to have a phone call with somebody at the TV network and say, “This is what I\u2019m interested in.” But I wouldn\u2019t know for sure \u2019cause the day\u2019s not halfway done. So that meeting would ultimately be useless because there\u2019s gonna be things happening after that meeting that I\u2019m gonna want to put in there.<\/p>\n

So then after the show there\u2019d have to be another meeting before I go to the TV studio to review what happened in the first meeting and then add things that might be taken out from the first meeting. And by that time I\u2019m feeling so hemmed in and so narrowly existent that I don\u2019t have any room to go outside those boundaries \u2019cause nobody can follow me.<\/p>\n

\"\"With radio, it\u2019s so much different. Today I\u2019ve got 25 sound bites. They\u2019re not in any order. They\u2019re just there. As I go through the program, and I sometimes tell the broadcast engineer two seconds before I want it. Not possible in TV. It\u2019s not possible to have 25 video sound bites and to be able to call one up as you want it and have it happen. No, it will take a couple of minutes while I\u2019m twiddling my thumbs waiting for it and then the spontaneity is gone.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s also — well, my hearing, but since I don\u2019t do guests, that wouldn\u2019t be a problem. But I couldn\u2019t wear an IFB, which means the people in the booth couldn\u2019t talk to me, which would be a benefit. (laughing) The fact that I can\u2019t hear would be a net positive excuse not to listen to anybody. And I have a firm belief, folks, I think there\u2019s certain people, \u2019cause TV is all visual, I can tell you the four years I did TV the number of times people told me they remembered something I said could count on one hand. And the number of times they commented on my tie or a video clip or whatever were legion.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a visual medium and you have to look the part. And, you know, monologues on TV, I don\u2019t know if they work. It\u2019s all possible. TV is evolving. All kinds of things are possible now. But I don\u2019t do writers. Do you ever watch the credit roll of, say, Real Time with Bill Maher or 30-minute comedy show on Comedy, look at the credits rolled for the writers. I don\u2019t have any. There aren\u2019t any. There are research assistants who plug in facts and figures now and then, but there\u2019s nobody writing down what is said on this program, including me.<\/p>\n

And then there is the time factor and — I don\u2019t know. But I never totally rule it out. Let\u2019s just leave it at that. (interruption) Once a year, yeah, but that wouldn\u2019t amount to much. You know, maybe once a week. Somebody said, “You need to do once a week.” I said, “Once a week they put you on weekend, nobody sees it.” I might do once a week if it\u2019s a weeknight. “Then they\u2019d have to broom somebody.” So give somebody a four-day week and put me in there one day. You know, just one night a week, one night a week.<\/p>\n

You know, I was watching a particular show the other night, the first time I had cable TV on in a while, and I was thinking, “You know, I\u2019d love to be on this show at the end every segment giving my opinion on what just happened.” The segment ends the host says, “Okay, let\u2019s go to Rush and find out what just happened on this show.” And then I would do five or six, or two or three minutes, maybe four, on whoever said what that was stupid and correct \u2019em. And then the host takes the show back and does the next segment. After that segment they throw it to me and I comment on what I just heard, host and guest, and then do that maybe four appearances an hour, on an hour show.<\/p>\n

And I could do that from the couch. They could put a camera in my house, be sitting there on the couch like a viewer watching at home and reacting like everybody else watching the show, what I thought of it. You\u2019d really need a host with a strong ego and a backbone to put up with something like that.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Here\u2019s Nate in Lynchburg, Virginia. Hey, Nate, how are you doing?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Hey, Rush how you doing?<\/p>\n

RUSH: Fine and dandy. Thank you, sir.<\/p>\n

\"\"CALLER: I was wondering, when you listen to all these callers, do you ever zone out? Do you ever have a moment, like a brain fart or whatever, that you just sort of zone out and you kind of miss the whatever? I\u2019m just wondering this because I listen to you every day and I love your show, but it\u2019s like as I\u2019m driving around and listening to you, I always wonder, I wonder if that guy ever has a moment where he just loses it altogether. For me, it\u2019s practically impossible for as long as you\u2019ve been on, to be so good with what you do. Do you ever just show up to work and you hate your job?<\/p>\n

RUSH: Oh, oh, oh, that never happens. No, no, no, there\u2019s not a day I wake up and wish I didn\u2019t have to go in. Not a day. It\u2019s usually just the exact opposite. I\u2019m like everybody else; I hate waking up. But once that process is over, I\u2019m jazzed. I\u2019m ready to go. But, yeah, I lose my train of thought now and then. I\u2019ve just become highly expert at covering it. I\u2019m very lucky. I can go to commercial break, I can make an excuse for a technical problem. It happens.<\/p>\n

Well, the way it usually happens, I\u2019ll be talking to you and something you\u2019ll say will remind me of something I want to say later on in the conversation. The conversation goes on, and I will forget what it was I wanted to say. So I\u2019ll keep talking with you, trying to remember what it was. Sometimes I remember; sometimes I don\u2019t. But I\u2019ll either acknowledge it or not mention it, in which case nobody would know. Doesn\u2019t happen much but, yeah, it happens.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m really flattered by your comments, though. That\u2019s what I call a Bill Belichick question. You can tell when Belichick gets a question he likes, \u2019cause he\u2019ll actually answer it, versus most of them where he thinks they\u2019re stupid. He says, “We\u2019re on to Cincinnati. We\u2019re on to Cincinnati.” Or whoever the next opponent is. Nate, thank you very much.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RUSH: I don't collaborate. I don't even like to collaborate. You know, sitting down and telling people and planning a program, I'm not capable of it. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":247544,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[12,1],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nWhy I Don't Do a TV Show - The Rush Limbaugh Show<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2017\/09\/18\/why-i-dont-do-tv\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Why I Don't Do a TV Show - The Rush Limbaugh Show\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"RUSH: I don't collaborate. 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