It's A Wrap

After 6 and a half years of taping shows for ETV, Marilyn Vitale and I are calling it a day. We started out taping Inside the BOE for several years where we brought news about education, or lack thereof, to our viewers. A couple of years ago we switched to a Town-wide news show called EH News. With both shows we tried to bring an unbiased, but opinionated, view of the goings on here in East Haven. We managed to piss off both political parties and most politicians over the years. Neither Marilyn nor I regret that in the least. If it helped the viewers understand the issues of the day any better we did our jobs. As viewers of the shows may have guessed I can be irascible at times. For that I owe a debt of gratitude to Marilyn for putting up with my occasional rants, both in and out of the studio. Marilyn is a treasure trove of facts about politics and politicians in our fair Town. Numerous times I have mentioned a name and she knew them, their family, what boards and commissions they served and a host of other things about the person. I am constantly amazed by the information she has stocked up in her head and in her box of newspaper clippings going back decades. How she could keep going for over 4 decades to improve East Haven I don't know. But year after year she is there going to meetings, speaking out, running for office, writing letters and going on TV in order to make things better. I would also like to thank all the guests we had on over the years. They have made the show much more entertaining and informative by their presence. A special thanks to John Finkle who came on the various shows more than any other guest. He was always prepared and funny even when we did Bottom Line, the shows about the budget. Being funny on budget shows is not the easiest task in the world. John and I crammed 5+ shows into a little over 2 months during budget season. Those budget seasons were grueling for both of us. Paul Hongo was another favorite guest. He was funny and always had good information for the viewers. Mike Lawlor was the easiest guest to interview by far. I would ask Mike a question and zone out for 10 minutes while he answered. I'm pretty sure I could just ask random questions having nothing to do with the legislature or politics and he could come up with a 10 minute answer. A special round of thanks to all of the people that we could not have done the show without but who you never saw on camera. This includes the folks at ETV who were incredibly helpful with anything we needed. One person who you heard me mention any number of times on the show was our producer, Fran. She did yeoman's work getting the props together, coming up with ideas, putting up with my irascibility and generally making the show hang together. She also had an eye for lighting and camera angles that is nothing short of incredible. Fran made Marilyn, the guests and I look as good as possible. During the shows she was standing just on the other side of the camera giving us stage directions as needed and trying to pantomime instructions to us. Sometimes we understood what she wanted us to do. Other times we just kept doing what we were doing while Fran scowled at us. Marilyn and I would both like to thank the viewers for watching us for 6+ years. You were the reason we did the show. We very much enjoyed doing it but all good things must come to an end. And now it is time to say, "It's a wrap!"