Winchell

What’s it about?: Neal Gabler‘s biography of tabloid columnist and broadcaster Walter Winchell. Written in the context of celebrity culture, and how this developed over time with Winchell as the celebrity columnist.

My opinion: Probably the most readable biography of Winchell that’s out there, and a fascinating case study in the beginnings of celebrity journalism. Definitely more objective and considered than Winchell Exclusive. Winchell’s own memoir is interesting and worth reading, but I couldn’t help but feel like it was a man writing for an audience of himself. Which is fine, just that Gabler’s account is the total opposite.

Remember how “Brangelina” was a thing? It seemed like every paper — from the New York Times to the Daily Mail — was covering everything they said and did. Simply because it was Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. This is similar to the rise of reality television in the 2000s. The Osbournes, Laguna Beach, The Hills, et cetera. Then came Paris Hilton, the hotel heiress and socialite. Then the upskirt photos of various celebs in the “news,” collected from all over Hollywood like Pokemon cards. Then the Kardashians, who were famous just for being famous (Winchell would have had a field day with Kim’s sex tapes, but I digress).

Today, in terms of the journalists themselves, you still have your legacy publications and papers, like The New York Times and The Guardian. But you also have YouTubers and Twitch streamers like The Young Turks, Alex Jones, Tucker Carlson, Tim Pool, Hasan Piker, and others hosting their own channels that can more or less be described as news broadcasting, with a twist. They are not independent journalists in the sense of being a freelancer. They host shows where people are watching not so much for the news, but for the hosts themselves, or the guests. News, gossip, sensationalism, and conspiracy theories. The condensed, purified version of infotainment in today’s world. And, I think this is a corrosive element in our media ecosystem that keeps people less informed of what’s going on in the world.

Not that I think Winchell is solely responsible for all of this. He was long gone by the time the internet kicked in, but he was hugely influential in how infotainment spread. The rise of online news is not his creation by any means, but it is very Winchell-like.

That being said, while a lot of what he put out was garbage, there was some good to come from his brand of journalism. He put the Nazis on blast, famously condemning an American Nazi rally in 1939, so props to him for that. This is somewhat remarkable when you consider that the U.S. were slow in recognising the heavily armed and ascendant Nazi Germany as a threat.

Gabler deftly chronicles Winchell’s career, his politics, his personal life, and the culture of celebrity, with plenty of insights and observations. It gets lengthy and forensic, and it can be a labour to read at times, but I think that, for Gabler, this is to convey the importance of this time in history. So much more than just a dispassionate recounting of events.

Essential reading for anyone interested in the history of journalism, and never boring!