Who doesn’t remember what they were watching on TV this time two years ago? Anderson Cooper tearfully reporting from a flooded street. Grainy footage of looters swimming away with their goods. Entire families standing on their rooftops awaiting rescue. “They are so poor, and they are so black.” “George Bush doesn’t care about black people.”
All the major TV networks, and many of the cable news channels, will be helping us remember this week, with coverage involving most of the major anchors and many broadcasts originating in New Orleans this week. The Hollywood Reporter has most of the details: ABC kicks off their week-long coverage, titled Katrina: Where Things Stand, tonight. Good Morning America co-anchor Robin Roberts will report from New Orleans; Dan Harris, who anchored the network’s Katrina coverage in 2005, Jim Avila and others will be stationed elsewhere along the Gulf Coast. NBC Nightly News will be airing from New Orleans starting Tuesday, and Today will be there on Wednesday, the anniversary of the hurricane’s landfall in the city. Katie Couric will anchor a four-part series about the storm on CBS Evening News, and co-anchor Harry Smith will present pieces on The Early Show.
CNN, just as it was with Cooper’s coverage back in 2005, might be the most worth watching. Spike Lee, who directed the Emmy award-winning documentary about Katrina, When the Levees Broke, teamed up with CNN’s Soledad O’Brien to produce Children of the Storm, a documentary filmed almost entirely by 11 New Orleans adolescents whose lives were uprooted by the hurricane. CNN has an interactive feature on their website featuring each of the teens; the site describes the documentary’s aim to give the students the tools, the encouragement, and the venue to share their voices and visions with the world. Just reading their short blurbs is inspiring: Joshua Kagler, a high school senior, says “When I look around the city, I see hope. I see change. I mean, it takes a while, but I see it. Eventually I see peace. I see joy. I see happiness. I see tranquility.
Call me cynical, but I don’t really want well-fed TV anchors telling me how much I need to honor and remember the victims of Hurricane Katrina. I didn’t watch most network coverage of the storm as it was happening, but what stuck with me was the unscripted moments, when the actual residents of New Orleans got to speak, or many of Anderson Cooper’s career-making moments of honesty. There’s plenty still to digest and figure out about Katrina, two years later, but I think I’m still not ready for Meredith Vieira and Matt Lauer to do it for me.
