Q&A; with TED KOPPEL : ‘I Can’t Say I’ve Ever Gotten Bored Here’

With all the hoopla over Dave and Jay, the guy who’s been around in late night longer than both of them is actually the man on top. And we don’t mean Johnny.

Ted Koppel and “Nightline” have been beating both NBC’s “The Tonight Show With Jay Leno” and CBS’ “Late Show With David Letterman” in the ratings since the beginning of this year.

Koppel points to a number of factors that have boosted his program’s numbers, including ABC’s ascendance in prime time while CBS has faltered, more affiliates than ever airing “Nightline” at 11:35 p.m., and executive producer Tom Bettag’s efforts to keep the subjects varied and sharp. But major news events such as the O.J. Simpson trial and the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City have also been crucial.

Koppel, 55, who works only four nights a week, has about a year left on his current three-year contract. He says he’s as happy in the job as he’s been since the show was born in 1979 following the takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Iran.

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Question: When a big news event occurs, there is now so much news available on local stations and CNN throughout the day. Why do people still turn to “Nightline”?

Answer: I think the fact that we have been doing this for 15 years has created a certain imprint in the public mind, so that people know that when there is a major story--even if they have watched the evening news or their local news, but it’s a story that they want to know a little bit more about--they know that there is only one place on network television to go at 11:35 and that’s “Nightline.”

Q: Do they then stay for those drier shows on the trillion-dollar budget with obviously partisan politicians?

A: They are more inclined to. It’s not going to be as big an audience, but . . . we’ve been ahead in the ratings just about every single week since January, even when we’re doing the budget or taxes.

Q: I’m sure you saw the article in the Washington Post that said, despite all the news that is available today, most Americans are not paying attention. They don’t know what the “Contract With America” is. Isn’t that a contradiction of what you’re saying about the popularity of your show?

A: No, it seems to me rather like a confirmation. One of the things that story showed was that a great many more people knew who the presiding judge was in the O.J. Simpson case than knew who the Speaker of the House was. You would think that by now they would know who Newt Gingrich is, but they don’t. . . . So it demonstrates what I’ve always known, and that is we have a certain core audience that watches “Nightline” no matter what we do, whether it’s Rwanda or Bosnia or the budget. But on a night when we do a story that the public at large is passionately interested in--and that can be an earthquake or the riots in Los Angeles or an airplane crash or the O.J. Simpson case--on those nights we see our ratings going up.

Q: When you see that an O.J. Simpson show brings in more viewers, how do you resist doing too many shows on O.J. Simpson?

A: It’s easy. It’s simple. Self-interest dictates that we’re not going to do that because if we did O.J. Simpson every night, we would lose our core audience eventually. Our core audience is prepared to accept that, once every seven programs, doing something on O.J. Simpson is actually a pretty responsible thing to do. If we start doing five out of five on O.J. Simpson, we would lose the very people who are with us on all those other nights, and all we’d be left with are the sunshine patriots who come to us only when we have some story that titillates their fancy. We are far more concerned about that core audience than the folks who join us for a night or two.

Q: How do you keep yourself interested after 15 years of doing it every day? Is it ever a grind, a struggle to come in?

A: Every now and then, sure it is--as it is, I think, for most people. Today was one of those days. It’s so nice outside, I’d rather have been out playing tennis. But one of the advantages that this job has over most other jobs is that the focus of my attention every day is different. It’s never the same thing. I think that’s what keeps journalism such a lively profession. So, no, I can’t say that I’ve ever gotten bored here.

Q: Do you still ever get nervous before interviewing anyone--the President, the Pope?

A: Very rarely.

Q: Was there ever an argument that got so heated you lost control of the show?

A: I don’t think I’ve ever lost control that way, but what’s really difficult is when you have a really boring guest and you’re about 15 minutes into the program and they are giving you an answer, and what is going through your mind is, “Keep going with that answer because I can’t think of another single thing that I want to know from you.” That is truly devastating.

Q: What do you do? Switch to another guest, a commercial?

A: If you have one, sure, but what’s really death is when you don’t have another guest, or both guests are really boring, or they just have become so nervous on the air that they’ve lost all their juice. And that’s terrible. Give me a bunch of shouters any time.

Q: Can you assess the impact “Nightline” has had over the last 15 years?

A: Within the very limited realm of influence any one television program can have, I think “Nightline” has done some significant things. But do television programs tend to have a lasting impact? No. Do television anchor people have a half-life of more than six months after they go off the air? No. Ask any group of 25-year-olds today who Chet Huntley was, or Eric Sevareid or Howard K. Smith or Frank Reynolds, and you will find blank stares. The fact that these were among the best-known men in the country only 15 years ago doesn’t have much of an impact. The fame that television bestows tends to be evanescent.

Q: Is there something else you’d like to do before . . .

A: [chuckling] Before I die?

Q: Before you hang up your TV journalist trench coat?

A: I don’t know. I look at my friend David Brinkley and it sort of inspires me to think that there’s still possibly 20 some odd years left. And that’s a very nice thing to see. I look at David, I look at Mike Wallace, Don Hewitt, Andy Rooney--there are very few jobs other than being a member of the Politburo in China that you can do past the age of 75. And it’s nice to know that this is one of them.