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MUMBAI: US broadcaster HBO will kick off the drama series
'Thev Newsroom' on 24 June.
The
10 episode show is about a news anchor, Will McAvoy, who has
found a safe niche with bankable ratings on his 8 pm flagship
cable show "News
Night." Numbed by success, McAvoy has become stoic, complacent,
cynical - content not to rock the boat as he delivers the
nightly news
straight down the middle of the road - dialing it in as he
avoids
ruffling feathers with anything resembling politics. What
fire he
still has, he reserves for the cutting sarcasm and general
unpleasantness that earn him no fans with his news team.
Then
he is catapulted from apathy to engagement when a spontaneous
outburst leads him to tackle the principles of American patriotism
in a public forum. Surviving the professional fallout from
his unexpected tirade following an enforced vacation, McAvoy
returns to work to discover that most of his staff has jumped
ship for another show and is forced to work with several new
team members brought on board duringhis
absence.
McAvoy's
boss, Charlie Skinner, the unapologetically old-schoolpresident
of ACN's news division, laments the changing face of the news.
Setting the stage for Will's return to the standard set by
news legends such as Edward R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite,
Charlie covertly orchestrates the hiring of Will's new executive
producer, the one person who can restore Will's passion and
bring the best out of him - whether Will wants it or not.
Will's
new executive producer is MacKenzie McHale, back from 26 months
embedded in Iraq and Afghanistan. MacKenzie was once romantically
involved with Will and knows the idealism he has buried beneath
a veneer of apathy and cynicism. With their shared past, she
knows exactly how good he can be. Even more unsettling for
him, she challenges Will to abandon the successful, middle-of-the-road
approach that has made him so popular with both sides of the
aisle, and realisehis
full potential by delivering the news with integrity.
Also
imposed upon Will are Jim Harper, Margaret Jordan, Don Keefer,Neal
Sampat and Sloan Sabbith, the newsroom staff. Although this
group finds itself off to a tumultuous start when breaking
news comes over the wire, they immediately come together for
one elusive goal: to do TV news well.
Jim
Harper is MacKenzie's loyal senior show producer.
Though only 27 years old, Jim is more like the old-school
reporter Charlie than he is like his contemporaries. He finds
himself instantly smitten with Margaret Jordan, a young intern-turned-associatedproducer,
who is already in a relationship with Don Keefer, Will's former
executive producer. Neal Sampat, a young, resourceful self-made
newsman writes Will's blog and scours the Internet for stories,
often finding leads his colleagues have missed. Sloan Sabbith
is ACN's financial news analyst.
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