Anthony Bourdain is grateful for the Peabody Award which was presented to his CNN show “Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown” today. But he tells TVNewser he leaves the programming, ratings and other network matters to others.
“I’m grateful that, for whatever reason, CNN has chosen to allow us the budget, the resources, and the support to go out and make some pretty strange and fun television,” Bourdain told TVNewser on the red carpet of the 73rd annual ceremony this afternoon. “Who’s watching it, whether males, 25-30, I frankly just don’t much give a f*ck.”
“I make the show. I’m glad that anyone’s looking at it,” said Bourdain, who is among several hosts taking over CNN’s 9pm timeslot starting tonight.
“CBS This Morning” co-anchor Charlie Rose also took home a Peabody Award for his interview with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
“This was the height of a very big story,” Rose said about his September interview which took place two weeks after a deadly chemical weapons attack in Damascus. “This was a man who thought at anytime, the Americans, along with their allies, might make a decision to attack.”
Tom Brokaw, who also spoke with us about his battle with cancer, accepted his personal Peabody on behalf of hundreds of others over the years who’ve helped him report meaningful TV from around the world. “I had wonderful colleagues, some of who are no longer with us unfortunately,” Brokaw told us. “You don’t do this on your own. You get to where you are when
you’re in my kind of job because you’ve got cameramen, and technicians, and producers, and editors back home, and even people making airplane reservations for you. It’s really a team effort.”
Other winners this afternoon were NBC News for its “In Plain Sight: Poverty in America” series, and Al Jazeera America’s “Fault Lines: Haiti in Time of Cholera” and “Fault Lines: Made in Bangladesh” reports.