On Friday night at the Washington Convention Center, the folks at the Radio and Television Correspondents’ Association held their annual dinner, calling it the “celebrity free dinner” and boasting that, for the first time, the affair was planned by a cameraman. “We decided to un-stuff this dinner tonight,” the cameraman, CNN’s Jay McMichael, announced. So did it work? Here’s our yeas and nays: The Good: The cameraman’s party started with a boom, literally, as the Howard Thunder Machine, a group of drummer and dancers, paraded through the ballroom. There were growlers of Chocolate City Beer on each table. And the guest of honor, Speaker John Boehner, who doesn’t “do funny,” did funny. “It wasn’t much of a lift when they said to me that expanded media access didn’t mean I had to sit down and do an interview with Ed Schultz,” Boehner quipped. “And Ed’s having a real tough week — I don’t watch him either so I wouldn’t know, that’s what my staff told me to say.”
Recommended Stories
The Bad: The wine. CBS’ Bill Plante tried saving that fact using comedy and his own little mantra. “It holds that any wine is better than no wine at all,” he said before giving out one of the night’s award. Yeah, not so much.
The Lame: Comedian Wayne Brady replaced Louis C.K. as the entertainment after Greta Van Susteren threatened a boycott, and frankly, Brady is no Louis C.K. Also, Van Susteren didn’t show. She spent the weekend posting pictures of journalists’ dogs to her GretaWire blog.
