When L.A.’s KCBS anchorwoman Suzanne Rico says on air that
it would have been nice to skip work today, it sounds like an
irrelevant comment. But it’s a calculated move that allows
her to point out the day happens to be a holiday, Veteran’s
Day.
“The most important characteristic of a television
journalist, especially on a show like this, is the ability to think
on your feet,” Rico said. “You have to switch gears in
mid-sentence and if you can’t think fast on your feet, you
end up looking like an idiot.”
When it comes to looking smart, the camera doesn’t lie. In
another case, the teleprompter fails to tell her the location of an
upcoming shot and she must recognize it as the Los Angeles
International Airport on her own. Without missing a beat, she gets
it right, because she knows Los Angeles. She went to UCLA as an
undergraduate communication studies student.
Since Oct. 23, Rico has been co-anchor for KCBS’s morning
show from 5 to 7 a.m. with Kent Shocknek, a man whose name and
likeness bears a striking resemblance to “The Simpsons”
bumbling anchorman, Kent Brockman. Shocknek graduated from USC, and
the school rivalry is a running joke.
“I didn’t know USC turned out (students) that
smart,” Rico said as a pseudo-compliment to Shocknek.
The energetic lightness of the morning show exists both on and
off the camera.
“I think people want a little bit of energy and some
friendly faces to wake up to,” Rico said. “Viewers can
sense when people do get along and are friends on-air as well as
off-air.”
Rico and Shocknek are friends (Rico spends weekends with
Shocknek and his family), even though Rico’s only been at
KCBS for three weeks. They play off each other, and when off-air
Rico says the light glistening off a shot of cars on the freeway is
beautiful, Shocknek incorporates that into a live cut-in traffic
segment, saying “but she doesn’t have to drive in
it.”
Indeed, she doesn’t. Rico wakes up around 3 a.m., goes to
work an hour later, and is on the air at 5 a.m. five days a
week.
“I’m in bed by 8:30 p.m.,” Rico said.
“It’s not good for the social life. It’s the
exact opposite of what I did at UCLA, which was late nights and
late mornings.”
Rico didn’t know what she wanted to do after graduating
from UCLA and tried advertising for a year. After watching the news
one day, she decided she could do it and went to graduate school at
San Francisco State. Her first reporting gig was in Sacramento, the
19th largest TV market in the country. She had jobs in Chicago and
San Diego before moving back to Los Angeles, the second largest
market.
While 5 a.m. may not seem like a time teeming with news, Rico
and Shocknek beg to differ. After all, an entire day of news has
already happened around the world, and writers come in from 10 p.m.
until dawn to make sure Rico and Shocknek are up to speed.
“It’s a competitive game in news, but especially in
the mornings,” Rico said. “There is so much breaking
news going on. If you don’t have a big rig over the side,
you’ve got a fire going on. It’s a really fast-paced,
loose show because you never know what’s going to
change.”
The morning show is a stabilizing change for Rico, who is used
to running around the world covering everything from the Columbine
shootings to the Sept. 11 attacks. She was at Ground Zero working
16-hour days for 10 days on story after story.
“I wanted to (work that much) because I didn’t want stop
long enough to think about what was happening,” Rico said.
“When I did stop, I would go back to my hotel, sit there and
cry. I realized that the world had completely changed from the way
we knew it.
“They didn’t have to drag me,” Rico continued.
“If something happens, (an earthquake or fire), my first
reaction is I’ve got to be there and be a part of
it.”
During breaks, Shocknek provides lemon-flavored vitamin Cs to
Rico, who is usually powdering her face, fixing her hair, and
looking over and revising what she’ll be reading from the
teleprompter. Occasionally, there will be periods of ad-libbing to
fill time, and at these moments Rico shines.
“If we have to ad-lib for a minute over the Iraqi
resolution at the United Nations, we need to know the history,
what’s coming up, and what both sides are saying,” Rico
said. “Bottom line is you’ve got to know your stuff,
because if you don’t, you’ll get hung out to
dry.”