Memo Hits Willard Scott, Shalit, Horowitz : Associates Don’t Make Gumbel’s ‘Today’

“Today” show co-host Bryant Gumbel complained in an in-house memo that weatherman Willard Scott’s antics are in “bad taste” and that Gene Shalit’s film reviews are often late, a newspaper reported today.

Almost no one associated with television’s No. 1 morning news show escaped reproach except co-anchor Jane Pauley, who is not mentioned in the memo to Marty Ryan, executive producer of the NBC program, New York Newsday said.

The four-page, single-spaced memo was written last fall in response to Ryan’s request for Gumbel’s opinions, according to Newsday, which obtained the memo.

Gumbel, 40, said that Scott “holds the show hostage to his assortment of whims, wishes, birthdays and bad taste,” that Shalit’s reviews “are often late and his interviews aren’t very good,” and that consumer reporter David Horowitz “is a walking cliche.”

Gumbel, who has a three-year, $7-million contract with NBC, also criticized Ryan for a “lack of guidance and a lack of willingness to stand on folks and make sure they do what’s necessary. Nice guys may not finish last, but it’s hard for them to stay in first.”

Newsday quoted one unidentified on-camera person as saying, “Gumbel wants as much editorial power as Tom Brokaw has on ‘Nightly News.’ ”

Asked by Newsday about the memo, NBC News President Michael G. Gartner said he had not seen it “and I don’t want to see it,” and he refused to discuss it.

“It’s a memo that was stolen and you have to question anyone’s motive in stealing it from a computer,” Ryan said. “Bryant and I always have candid exchanges about the show.”