By Kara Bloomgarden-Smoke 10/01/12 8:53am

Inside the Times

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Clyde Haberman on Writing an Obituary of the Boss

The New York Times announced that Arthur Ochs Sulzberger died on Saturday morning with a 7,741-word obituary by veteran Times writer Clyde Haberman. In an email to Poynter over the weekend, Mr. Haberman described the writing process.

Mr. Haberman began working on the obit in 1997 — the same year “Punch” Sulzberger stepped down as Chairman of the Times Company (he had retired from his role as Publisher in 1992).

“It is never simple to write about the boss,” Mr. Haberman told Poynter. “But Mr. Sulzberger made the assignment as easy as could be.” Read More

By Drew Grant 6/28/12 4:50pm

Nora Ephron

Nora Ephron lives on in memorial essays (Getty)

The 5 Best Nora Ephron-y Tributes to Nora Ephron

When legendary author/screenwriter/feminist/Huffington Post blogger Nora Ephron passed away on Tuesday, the Internet immediately lit up with tributes and personalized memorials. Everyone, it seemed, had something to say about their relation to Ms. Ephron’s work. Though she was a real reporter, most people remember her as the queen of first-person journalism (with the subject of interest being herself). Which meant that a lot of these memorials–if they weren’t dashed off tweets saying “R.I.P. Nora”– were about the writer’s relationship with Ms. Ephron’s work, taking on the voice of the Crazy Salad author in what amounted to some strange transference/fan fiction-y memorials.

With the knowledge that to write like Nora Ephron is not to be Nora Ephron, we can’t help but love some of these amazing eulogies honoring the cultural icon’s passing by writing a eulogy in her voice. Read More

By Daniel D'Addario 6/20/12 1:01pm

Obituaries

Sarris

Andrew Sarris, Longtime Observer Film Critic, Dies at 83

Andrew Sarris, the man who brought auteur theory to American shores and who ably reviewed films for The Observer, has died at 83, the Times reports. Mr. Sarris’s passion for film bled into his prose at The Observer years after he’d already become one of America’s most prominent champions of innovative directors at The Village Voice. To the end of his writing career here, Mr. Sarris sang the praises of directors like Bunuel, rather than focusing solely on Oscar bait or big-budget fiascos. Read More

By Daniel D'Addario 5/09/12 4:19pm

Obituaries

Vidal Sassoon Dies at 84

Famed hairstylist Vidal Sassoon has died at 84 after an illness. Mr. Sassoon, the subject of a 2010 documentary, grew up in poverty in London and came to prominence as the engineer of geometric, shiny cuts and for his licensing his name to a line of shampoos. If you didn’t look good, the slogan went, Read More

By Steve Huff 4/21/12 5:36pm

Obits

Chuck Colson (ChuckColson.org)

Watergate Figure Chuck Colson Dead at 80

Charles “Chuck” Colson, evangelist, author and former hatchet man for President Richard M. Nixon, died today, two weeks after surgery on a blood clot in his brain. Mr. Colson was 80 years old.

As President Nixon’s special counsel, Mr. Colson played a major role in the Watergate scandal. While serving on the committee to re-elect the president he took part in the plan for White House “plumbers” like G. Gordon Liddy to steal background information from Democratic foes. Read More

By Foster Kamer 4/18/12 4:40pm

In Memoriam

That Time Michael Moore Harassed Dick Clark (Video)

Dick Clark, who famously acted as the longtime host and producer of American Bandstand, New Year’s Rockin’ Eve, The $10,000 Pyramid, as well as a stint as the announcer on MTV’s short-lived The Jon Stewart Show, is dead at 82. His representative told the New York Times—who noted Clark as an “icon”—that he died of a heart attack.

Over the last decade, Clark’s popularity waned as another new plucky, seemingly immortal Caucasian man named Ryan Seacrest generally took his place at the throne of organizing innocuous television that everybody you know watches, shame factor not withstanding. His most famous appearance in the final decade of his life may have been at the top of it, in Michael Moore’s Oscar-winning 2002 documentary Bowling for Columbine, in what is arguably one of the funniest scenes in the film: Dick Clark escaping Michael Moore by yelling at his associates to jump in a van, and then speeding away in it. Read More

By Steve Huff 4/08/12 12:06pm

R.I.P.

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Legendary Journalist Mike Wallace Passes Away

Mike Wallace, long considered one of the most fearsome interviewers in broadcast news, has died. He was 93.  A spokesman for CBS told the Associated Press that Mr. Wallace died Saturday night.

Mr. Wallace went into a kind of semi-retirement from regular appearances on 60 Minutes in 2006 but kept a promise made upon announcing his slowdown to do occasional new reports, profiling Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney in 2007 as well as “suicide doctor” Jack Kevorkian.

Over the course of his 6 decades as a newsman Mike Wallace frequently went toe-to-toe with the famous and powerful in interviews legendary for their confrontational and emotional nature. As the A.P. reports in his obituary, Mr. Wallace once managed to break through Barbra Streisand’s intensely controlled public persona: Read More