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Flagpole
Special Correspondent For The Flagpole.
William Orten Carlton = ORT
Habits are hard to break. For years, I have been a
night person,’ doing my best thinking and work
between the likes of midnight and 5 a.m. Helping
carry me through these hours I have had the com
pany of Larry King, one of the greatest interviewers I
have ever encountered. Originally, Larry was carried
in Athens by WRFC-AM when he was on from mid
night until 5:30 a.m. in the earty-to-nrud 1980s. Larry
switched affiliates briefly to WNGC-FM when that
station signed up with NBC news; an uproar from
country music fans forced Clarke Broadcasting to
switch Larry over to WGAU-AM. its sister station,
where he remains today. After a heart attack several
years ago, Larry curtailed his radio schedule, adjust
ing it to 11:00 p.m. to 2:00 am with a taped rebroad
cast in the three hours afterward.
It has been a minor matter of consternation to me
lately that Larry King has switched Ns program time
to afternoons, now airing live from 3:00 - 6:00 p.m.
over he 335 or so affiliates
WGAU is airing him from 9:00
a.m. until noon instead of car
rying him live, which is quite a
larger consternation. In
Larry’s place in the afternoons
they have substituted Rush
Limbaugh, the man who
strikes me as somehow man
aging to turn talk radio into
Live Spartanburg Wrestling
or Roller Derby (or some per
mutation of the two). Instead of conducting any form
of interview (as Larry does on a daily basis, often
twice in each show). Rush solely takes calls from
listeners. Furthermore. Rush screens his callers, which
Larry refuses to do: ’If you get in, you get on,* is a
phrase I have heard Larry utter many times.
Seeing talk radio as education rather than as
combat, I am boycotting Rush Limbaugh. Yeah, I’ve
heard him a couple of times, but he isn’t the journalist
Larry King is: akin to hiring a fleet of eight-year-olds
to turn out a daily newspaper the size of the Athens
Banner-Herald and expecting the average reader to
be able to get something out of it: that’s the best
parallel I can draw (and even Flagpole does better
than that!). Don’t accuse me of having a political bias
against Rush: I don't always agree with Larry, either..
but Larry King has never been guilty of wasting a
minute of my time, and Rush Limbaugh consistently
bores me... I yawn at the very thought of him.
Again, my consternation against WGAU is solely
because of the time they air Larry Other of his pre
vious affiliates that are listenabie here have seemed
to drop him like a stone: in fact right now Larry isn’t on
in Atlanta at all. Not even WDUN-AM in Gainesville is
airing him in the afternoon, having substituted other
talk programming: fact is, I don’t know if they even
carry Nm at all now. But I did find Larry live on WMA2-
AM in Macon (940 kcs.) while I was on the way to
Elberton the other afternoon. (Charlie Smthgall of
WGGA in Gainesville once told me that their call
letters stood for Watch Mercer Attain Zen.’ For years,
they used a water-cooled 10-kilowatt RCA transmitter
at their antenna site on Forsyth Road: I can’t help but
wonder if that antique is still sitting out in their brick
building, runabie. Sometime I'm gonna make a trip
down there just to find out) WMAZ can easily be
heard outside of Athens, but not in town due to
blanket interference from WRFC on 960 kcs.
Reading the Atlanta paper the other day, I noticed
an interesting piece of information, speaking of Larry
King and taikradio: as I said, nobody's carrying Larry
in Atlanta right now in any
time slot. Seems WGUN-AM
Ru»M Limbaugh (1010kca.).a8tat>on that has
been a southern gospel pow-
erhouse for 45 years, has
agreed to air Larry live in the
afternoons. Their 50 kilowatt
signal reaches clearly into
Athens and well beyond,
serving an 80-mile radius or
better As of March 1, Larry’s
dulcet tones will replace
those of The Sego Brothers And Naomi on WGUN
from 3:00 - 6:00 p.m. and enable those of us with
decent radios to hear his show live, perhaps while
we do our homework or prepare the evening meal,
or maybe even at work (if the fluorescent lights don't
buzz it to oblivion). I, for one, will tune in on a regular
basis and plan to call WGUN once he is on and thank
them for aplenty of Athenians
I think back a number of years, to the early 1970s
even, when there was an all-night call-in talk show
based in Salt Lake City called Night Caps. I heard it
once over sometNng like WING in Dayton, Ohio
(wNch comes in like gangbusters at night), but it
disappeared after two or three years. If only it had
lasted like Joe Donovan's all-night oldies show on
WHAS in Louisville has; but then, it was Night Caps
that gave rise to Larry King. With that in mind, I wish
Larry many happy years in afternoon radio over
WGUN: I plan to listen in, and Rush Limbaugh can
say whatever he wants on WGAU. a symphony
orchestra isn’t just tubas, /know. (30.)
• I960
f YAWN AT TNf
VERY THOUGHT
Of HMm
— r- *—> *—I • I A *~* V/ 0/1 1 QO *3
Movie Dope Extra
The Nmglmctwd
Malcolm X
This year's Academy Awards shut-out i
and his mammoto Malcolm X This was certainly a batter
film toen Scent of a Woman, AFewGoodMen, or Unkxghmn,
and Lea might have even gotten a director's nod V he
didn't have such an abrasive personality I actually
cringed when I learned X wasn't among the Best
Picture nominations, because now waYe going to hoar
toe man bitch like weVe never heard anyone bitch
before Matcom a oe&eosea a tttai ncture nod.
When Lae lectured at UGA after Do toe Right
Thing came out, I remember students repeatedly
asked him about world affairs and things having to do wtto his opinion
ratoer than his ten. It was as if the audience was trying to Rft Nm up
to be some Wnd of savior — trying to make hkn into a leader, which
he wee not. “I’m only a filmmaker,* he would say. That fact m so
obMous, yet so many cannot see it I was glad to sea Lea remind the
UGA crowd that he was “only a filmmaker* Unfortunately, In toe few
years since then. Lae has apperentfy changed his nr find on the
subject Now he is so much more than a filmmaker, ha Is the
mouthpiece that Mi not go unheard. Taka an Issue, any issue, and
turn on the tube <— in the tost six months you were pretty Bkefy to see
Lee spouting off about tost issue to anyone who woMd listen. I
personally think Malcolm Xis a fine, fine ffim. It was incredibly hard to
make, and if s incredibly good despite toe obetactes that occurred in
making it It was one of the vary best films of 1992. and as Eleanor
Rings!, the JoumafCcnaRuHon 11m crific. has pqjnted out, if Sir
Richard Attenborough had directed X It probably would have gotten
10 nominations.
ITs a shame to see toe Academy punish the film because of toe in-
your-teoe tactics of the filmmaker, but the Academy has plenty of
ineitoficable quirks and tois Is just one of toe unfair ones . Naturafty Lae
Mi blame this on racism, never considering that maybe toe world is
tired of hearing his opinion on anytoing and everytoing. i suppose
everyone Is bund to some extent, and Spike Lee's blindness is to
honest crtedsm (ha sti swears that Reverts a better Mm than
Barton fhk). What's ironic is that it was Lae's tantivne about the white
Norman Jewison deeding Xtoat got him the project in toe first place.
Mare than likely it was those tantrums that lost Lee any dwnoe of toe
recognition he deserves.
The Academy has an annoying tendency to misa the great
performances, then make up for toeir mistake years later by awarding
an undeserving Oscarte to toe person they had jilted. Pam Newran's
award for The Cotar of Money was an apology for having yews of
greet performances neglected. AJ Padno wfll win Bast Actor this ye*
because he has been nominated (and lost) seven fimaa before.
Pacino's performance in Scent of a Women was vary good, but again,
he wM win as an apology for past neglect Maybe someday Spike Lee
wifi getsuch an Oscar*, but toat doesn't a*e away his pain right now.
And more mportanSy, then hel have to keep his mouth shut for a
vtoMe, and for Spike, I don't think that w« be easy.
Marc PIMnsky
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