Posted by Bh
FREE ZONE MEDIA CENTER WFZR
EDITOR: I KNEW HIM, HE WAS A FRIEND.
NEW YORK – The death of Dick Clark on Wednesday marked the end of his
courageous effort to recover from a stroke suffered in December 2004.
His efforts to battle back to health were far greater than publicly
known.
In 2004, this reporter was a producer at ABC’s “Good Morning America” and had been assigned to cover Dick Clark’s health crisis.
Early in December, reports surfaced that Dick had been hospitalized in Los Angeles after suffering a “minor” stroke.
His publicist, Amy Streibel, told reporters Dick was “just fine.”
Some reports speculated Dick might even return to host his “New Year’s
Rockin’ Eve” show later that month.
But we at GMA knew better.
Word had surfaced at ABC that Dick’s condition was far worse than
publicly reported. We even had doubts Dick would ever return to host his
fabled show.
Our challenge was to balance our obligations to report what we knew
to our audience, while respecting the privacy of Dick’s family as they
and his doctors decided how to handle his dilemma.
Earlier in the year, Dick revealed he had diabetes.
In the end, a decision was made by senior officials at “Good Morning
America” to respect the family’s privacy. ABC brass huddled and Regis
Philbin was selected to guest host “New Year’s Rockin’ Eve” that year.
Nothing was ever said about what we knew until now, after Dick’s passing.
In November 2005, we at ABC were pleased to learn Dick, after a
difficult year of intense physical therapy, had all intentions to return
to the studio facility just above Times Square to again host his annual
show.
But, just what would Dick do? His role on the show was a guarded
secret. The program was a property of Dick Clark Productions, not ABC,
so gossip at the network was rampant. In fact, most of the production
crew at the Times Square facility worked for Dick, and they weren’t
talking.
Were they trying to hide something, or were they simply trying to boost TV ratings for Dick’s return?
In retrospect, it was a little of both.
CLICK BELOW TO READ MORE