On The Story: Christiane Amanpour Rides A Bike, Joe Johns Sweats, Barbara Starr Receives Two Marriage Proposals

A new version of “On The Story” premiered on Saturday afternoon. Host Kyra Phillips promised that the show would “take you behind the scenes to show you how CNN covers the news,” and it did:

> Christiane Amanpour: When the London attacks happened, “I personally couldn’t basically get in to work, other than taking a bicycle, which then lost its pedal, which meant I had to walk…”

> Barbara Starr: “As we made our way down that street” in Afghanistan, “there were two inquiries” about marriage. “And that was about the nicest thing that’s happened to me in a warzone lately.”

> Joe Johns: When the O’Connor retirement news broke, “it’s blazing hot, and I’m trying to, like, hide the sweat on camera. There’s absolutely no sense in me even trying to put on makeup because it would wash right off.”

Here’s the transcript…

> Plus: An e-mailer says the show had a lively start: “While Christiane Amanpour was doing a stand up from the streets of London with Richard Quest, a perhaps drunken but definitely angry Londoner intervened and started telling them to make sure they tell the truth about the bombings: that they happened because of this fucking war in Iraq, etc. He obviously said lots of ‘fucks,’ all of which were bleeped out and continued when he left the screen, which interfered with some of Amanpour’s reporting. To her credit, Amanpour never missed a beat.”