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 The
media landscape is in the midst of profound change.
Newspapers are being challenged
by digital technologies and the growth of alternative media.
Will “new
media” carry the banner of the Fourth Estate? Will citizens – and
the democracy they require – be served as they once were by the robust
debates and rambling rants of the most-protected speech in the world?
The People & The Press,
a new four-hour documentary series that looks at the glorious and
colorful history of the "Fourth Estate."
Since
the first rabble-rousing newspapers shot from single-sheet presses
in the colonies, American newspapers have evolved into one of the nation’s foremost institutions. Uniquely American, enshrined in the
Constitution, the “Fourth Estate” has reflected – and profoundly
influenced – government and its citizenry, commerce and culture –
for 250 years.
America’s
newspapers have confronted presidents, chronicled wars, exposed
corruption. While building community and helping to set the public
agenda, the popular press nurtured a literate and democratic-minded
populace like no other in history.
But,
too, they’ve offered advice to the lovelorn, comics to the
laugh-hungry and a yardstick by which to measure artistic and athletic
accomplishments. They mark life’s major passages – from birth to
marriage to death – and mirror the minor triumphs and tragedies in
between.
And
as businesses, they became the main engine that drove the success of the
American consumer economy, fueled by a distillation of advertising and
marketing.
The People & The Press
will tell this story through the fascinating characters who took freedom
of expression to the heights – and to the brink. We will walk from
pantheon to pub with press barons and street reporters, columnists and
critics, editors and gossipmongers.
Through
previously unrevealed facts and revealing insights,
The People & The Press
will throw open a window on an
institution that guards its secrets with the ferocity it employs in
exposing those of others.
The People & The Press
will document the evolution of newspapers from Revolutionary-era
broadsides to today’s far-flung media conglomerates. It’s a
compelling history – with a future that’s seemingly at risk.
The
story of the press in America is, in all its manifestations, the story
of America – her people, her spirit and her dream.
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