Hints at how the forthcoming “Murphy Brown” revival is shaping up continue dripping into the press, and I can’t help but think the whole project is tone deaf.
Few people see journalists as the protagonists in today’s political theater, meaning there won’t be much of an appetite for a show that casts the press as the good guys, glossing over the industry’s glaring faults to give reporters a primetime pat on the back. Unlike the short-lived “Roseanne” revival, the characters on “Murphy Brown” are overrepresented in popular culture, where journalists are already afforded a degree of admiration that’s out of proportion with public opinion. (Elite Washington journalists aren’t exactly as sympathetic as the Conner family among people who are not elite Washington journalists.)
