Roone Arledge dies
On December 5 2002 the legendary television producer and executive Roone Arledge dies in New York City at the age of 71.Born in Forest Hills Queens Arledge won his first producing job from New Yorks Channel 4 where he worked behind the scenes on a puppet show starring Shari Lewis.After unsuccessfully pitching a pilot called For Men Only to NBC he was noticed by ABC executive Ed Sherick and began working at ABCs fledgling sports division in 1960.From the start of his tenure at ABC Arledge aimed to add show business to sports as he put it.
He pioneered a number of new techniques in college football programming including hand-held cameras aerial footage and improved sound.With Sherick he introduced ABCs Wide World of Sports a weekly roundup of sporting eventsfeaturing many less mainstream sports from around the worldhosted by Jim McKay.The groundbreaking show became a hit and by 1964 Arledge was a network vice president he became president of ABC Sports four years later.More than anyone else Arledge brought sports programming out of its limited weekend niche and into prime time beginning with the broadcast of the Olympic Games in 1968.
In 1970 Arledge solidified his impact with the premiere of Monday Night Football with Howard Cosell Frank Gifford and Don Meredith which opened the floodgates for all major sports to move into prime time.Arledges enormously influential styleincluding up close and personal stories about athletes lives and technological innovations such as instant and slow-motion replays split-screen views and isolated camerasaimed to thrill audiences and get them emotionally involved in the broadcast.His philosophy continues to define sports programming today.Notoriously detail-oriented Arledge truly showed his mettle during the 1972 Olympics in Munich when Arab terrorists took 11 Israeli athletes hostage.
As the U.S.broadcaster of the Games ABC had exclusive access and under Arledges guidance the network covered the unfolding crisis continuously for the next 17 hours up to and including the announcement that the hostages had been killed.ABC Jim McKay- and Arledge won a historic total of 29 Emmys for the Munich coverage.Arledge took over ABCs struggling news division in 1977 retaining control of ABC Sports as well.
Renaming the nightly newscast World News Tonight he nurtured the careers of top newscasters such as Peter Jennings and oversaw the coverage of such momentous topics as apartheid in South Africa and the longstanding Israeli-Palestinian conflict.During the Iranian hostage crisis of 1979-80 Arledge produced a nightly special on the crisis a first in network news.The show later became Nightline hosted by Ted Koppel.
Arledge put another network star Barbara Walters at the head of the first news magazine show 2020.By 1990 ABC News was turning a yearly profit of some 70 million another first for a network news division.In the mid-1990s Arledge began to relinquish day-to-day control at ABC the Walt Disney Companys acquisition of the network in 1996 accelerated this process.Three months before his death on December 5 2002 Arledge was awarded the first-ever lifetime achievement Emmyhis 37th Emmy Award overall.
