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Dorie Fox
Segment Producer
Ms Fox, who worked on CC from 1986-1996, has kindly
provided insights into what it was like working on the Computer
Chronicles and discusses various aspects of the series.
'I was a producer for the show for 10 yrs. & loved
every minute of it - very creative show & certainly a pioneer in
computer technology.'
'Working with Stewart Cheifet was always easy as
once he gave me the topic of the show to be done I had free reign to do
my research & get the best possible guests for the show. Most all of the
100 shows I did were done while he was CEO of a Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
PBS station so that meant that I did not have him looking over my
shoulder while I was working. I could phone & fax him & I had to have
the show put together at least 2 days before we taped on a Saturday so
that I could fax it to him back east.
This was how he knew what the remotes were so he could write his toss,
he knew who the guests were & through my explanation of the show
(sometimes my papers were liked college terms running 10 pages or more)
he could write a loose script to use for the taping. We did 2 shows on
Saturdays every 2 weeks, one in the morning & one in the afternoon & we
had a staff person set up a very lovely lunch for the crew so that
inbetween shows we could eat & discuss the shows with the staff present.
If SC was easy to work with, Gary Kildall was a dream. He didn’t need a
script, never did any work ahead for the show, talked with SC in the
morning before we started taping to find out what the show was about &
just winged it while he was on the set. He was fun, easy going, always
joked with the staff, & when we heard about his death it was a personal
tragedy for all of us, but by then he had already stopped doing the
shows.
Two of the shows that I produced received awards: one was for the one on
Hypercard Show #501 in 1987 from the Computer Press Association and the
other was the one I did on Computers & the Disabled #923, in 1992 from
the National Easter Seals Society in New Year. In fact I flew to NY to
receive the trophy from the actor Cliff Robertson. That was really an
exciting trip for many reasons as the fall season had begun & I was in
the middle of doing a new show. I thought I had it all in place when I
left only to find out when I returned that everything had fallen apart &
I had to work like crazy to get it together before the Sat. taping.
[...] I have tapes I recorded here at home from the TV on most of the
shows I did. I really loved the 10 yrs. I worked on CC & had some
wonderful experiences, met some great people, & loved learning computers
when most of my generation had no idea what a computer was! I had a
ball!
D. Fox' |
