Liza Minnelli, Sammy Davis Jr. and Irv Kupcinet on “Kup’s Show”

No one embodied Chicago or celebrated it as much as “Mr. Chicago” Irv Kupcinet. And when he died 10 years ago today, the city lost a little of its greatness and a lot of its heart.

Though newcomers to town may know only of the Wabash Avenue Bridge that bears his name or the statue of him astride its southern end, it’s impossible to overstate the impact Kup had during his 60-year run as a columnist for the Sun-Times. Continue reading →

Craig Wall

Chronic technical problems plaguing WFLD-Channel 32 turned a reporter for the Fox-owned station into a refugee from Blue Man Group last week.

An image captured from Craig Wall's bizarre blue-tinged live shot on Wednesday's 9 p.m. newscast became an instant sensation on the station's Facebook page until management ordered evidence of the mistake to be taken down. Continue reading →

Jim Pastor, who headed WMVP AM 1000 for five years before moving up to senior vice president of ESPN Radio, is taking charge of the sports/talk station again.

Under a reorganization of ESPN Audio to be announced Monday, Pastor will oversee ESPN Local, encompassing ESPN Radio 1000 and ESPNChicago.com as well as company-owned stations and websites in New York and Los Angeles. He will continue to be based in Chicago.

The role of general manager at all three stations will be eliminated in the restructuring. Continue reading →

Jake Hamilton

This is a video that has to be seen to be believed. Words alone cannot describe how excruciatingly, jaw-droppingly awful it is.

The man you are looking at is Jake Hamilton, 25, who's just been hired by Fox-owned WFLD-Channel 32 as a feature reporter for "Good Day Chicago." He will be replacing Patrick Elwood, a fourth generation Chicagoan and a 15-year veteran of Fox 32. Continue reading →

Corey McPherrin

Just when you thought they couldn't screw things up any worse at WFLD-Channel 32, they've done it again.

After letting Corey McPherrin twist in the wind for more than a week, bosses of the Fox-owned station have decided to redeploy the former sportscaster and current "Good Day Chicago" host as solo anchor of the noon newscast.

But rather than announce it officially and allow McPherrin an opportunity to comment on his fate, they hurriedly leaked the news late Thursday to the website TVSpy and ran back in their foxholes for cover. "The move is supposed to take place in December with McPherrin also reporting for the station’s 9 p.m. newscast," TVSpy's Kevin Eck reported. Continue reading →

Linda MacLennan, Bill Kurtis, Carol Marin, Ron Magers, Mary Ann Childers and John Drury (1993)

Twenty years ago, I invited the anchors of Chicago's three 10 o'clock newscasts to assemble for a group photo at the Museum of Broadcast Communications. The gathering was captured by the great Sun-Times photographer Rich Hein.

There they were: Bill Kurtis and Linda MacLennan of CBS-owned WBBM-Channel 2; Ron Magers and Carol Marin of NBC-owned WMAQ-Channel 5; and John Drury and Mary Ann Childers of ABC-owned WLS-Channel 7.

The picture was taken to illustrate a Sunday spread about local TV news that included lots of fancy charts and graphs about viewership patterns, competitive strategies and stuff like that. But as it turned out, none of what I'd spent months researching and writing mattered. The photo became the story.

Continue reading →

On a historic news day, what a crappy looking front page.

The Chicago Newspaper Guild warned Tuesday it would "exhaust all legal options" to block additional layoffs among the editorial ranks of the Sun-Times.

“Any further layoffs in the editorial department on the part of Sun-Times Media will be at its own peril," executive director Craig Rosenbaum said in a statement posted on the Guild website. "Moreover, from a practical standpoint, I really cannot see how the Sun-Times can put out a viable product with any further layoffs in its editorial department.” Continue reading →

Joel Lisinski (aka Jax)

Ladies and gentlemen, here's . . . Jax!

The new evening personality at WUSN FM 99.5 introduced himself Monday to listeners of the CBS Radio country music station simply as Jax.

Although his real name is Joel Lisinski — and he was known on his last radio job in Milwaukee as Joel Sheridan — Jax has been christened as his nom de air from 7 p.m. to midnight Monday through Friday.

When Lisinski's hiring was announced last month, US99.5 program director Jeff Kapugi solicited suggestions from the staff for a new name. Continue reading →

I've been a fan of the Chicago Jewish News since it started, but this week's cover story on Chicago's Jewish sports talk show hosts may carry its worst headline ever.

Disc Jewkeys? Give me a break.

That unforgivable clunker aside, Pauline Dubkin Yearwood's profile of six prominent local sportscasters offers some unique insights into why talking about sports on the radio seems to attract so many nice Jewish boys (you should pardon the expression).

Here's what some of them told Yearwood about how their ethnic heritage figures into their work: Continue reading →