Theresa Duncan on Journos: "I Talked Rings Around Them"

Anthony Ramirez of the New York Times was one in a long line of journalists who were dazzled by the late Theresa Duncan’s real intelligence, beauty and wit. He replies to Amy Alkon’s questioning why he didn’t check out Duncan’s claims to a degree from the University of Michigan, and an impressive sounding thesis (neither did Chris Lee at the LA Times). He wrote:

but a point of information: most people don’t lie to us or need to, especially in a light feature story about children’s cd-roms. if ms. duncan had seemed emotionally troubled at the time, or something else seemed amiss, we probably would have checked her resume. but there are only so many hours in the day and she wasn’t exactly running for high office.

One of the many people interviewed for the LA Weekly piece, film editor Jonathan Alberts recalled Duncan as coming back to work one day after an interview and saying

I talked rings around that guy!

More from Alberts, who was the editor of The History of Glamour below:


“She liked to talk and dish about people in a way that always made you feel that if you were absent or out of the room she might have had some choice words to say about you. Her demeanour was always amenable and friendly and working with her made you feel that, in some way, you were protected because you were on her side.
It was great to see her in action since she had such balls and apparently no concern or worry about slagging on someone she didn’t find up to snuff.”

Like those journos she fooled.