Almost Live

I didn't watch the live Sound of Music last night. As excited as I am about any live or live-to-tape multi-camera production, particularly those in New York, at the moment, I am working in news, and in news, when Nelson Mandela dies, you log a lot of overtime hours.

Thanks to the DVR, I will get to watch the "not-live-anymore" version this weekend, and I am curious to know whether I will be more captivated by the story or more captivated by the process that went into the production.

Once upon a time, I was the person in the control room shooting the dramatic stuff and the music, and just looking up once in a while at the news on the network monitors. I remember looking up when Nixon died (I was fascinated by the funeral coverage for years). I remember looking up on 9/11, when I arrived at work just around the time the news started carrying the horror stories. And I remember looking up at election coverage (many times--it was a lot of years!)

These days, I am often one of the people putting together some of those things I used to look up to see. And on a day when I might have been home watching the live Sound of Music, I was helping to chronicle the life of Nelson Mandela. I'm still helping to tell the stories--they're just different stories.

And thanks to the DVR and my love of multi-camera and musical theater, I'll still get to watch The Sound of Music (and likely be jealous of all the people who worked on it). Almost live.