A Guide to Our Reporting Staff

by Robin Rowe

Gosh!TV is a news magazine that’s authoritative in entertainment news, entertainment business, and entertainment technology.  GoshTV is fun and exciting because we interview top celebrities and report news before it happens.

Our reporting style is to be authoritative, quote heavy and get the big VIP quotes. For example, here’s a story with exclusive interviews with the chairman of NBC, the president of FX, and the executive producer of the hit reality series The Biggest Loser:

http://www.goshtv.net/?p=227

Here’s an exclusive interview with actress Lucy Hale:

http://www.goshtv.net/?p=192

Our reporting tone is upbeat and empowering. We prefer to report good news. We prefer to report the news before it happens.

1. Read articles at GoshTV.net and at the GoogleNews Entertainment Section.
2. Preferred story angle is celebrity quotes. Quote stars in order of how famous they are.
3. Skim the provided notes and audio files. Ignore the synopsis notes. Don’t summarize the plot. Do not describe the plot in detail, give spoilers, or make the story about your opinion.
4. With audio or video notes, Quicktime is better for playback because the space-bar will stop/start playback and J and L will rewind and FF. Makes it easier to transcribe. Don’t transcribe everything because that takes too long. Significant quotes only.
5. Write a feature story on the assigned film.
6. You don’t need to see a film to write a feature because the story is about the filmmakers and stars.
7. A film review has a rating, such as three stars ***. A feature story does not. A good film is three stars. A great film is four stars. A bad film is two stars. We don’t review one-star films. There are no five-star films.
8. You must see the film if reviewing/rating it. Use as many celebrity quotes as possible.
9. Use hyphens to combine words that become a single adjective, as with ‘five-star’ example above. Don’t over-hyphenate.
10. Capsule stories are two short paragraphs, mostly quotes. Feature stories are 650 words typical, 450 to 950 words best, sometimes longer.
11. Put the most important information first.
12. Who, what, when, why, where, how much.
13. Give the name of the distributor. Make sure you get the distributor right. The studio that makes the film is often not the studio that distributes the film.
14. Mention the name of the film often.
15. Mention the names of stars often
16. Use the film’s character names as little as possible. Use the stars’ names a lot.
17. Always use “says” followed by name when quoting, e.g., “says Indiana Jones director Stephen Spielberg”. Always “says Spielberg” and not “Spielberg says” unless it’s the start of a sentence. Don’t get flowery and use words like “exclaims” or “explains” where “says” will do. First quote includes title and first name, in that order. Following quotes use last name only.
18. Get film details, especially running time, at http://movies.yahoo.com
19. If you go to a screening, time the film from the beginning of opening credits to the last closing credit. Studios may report incorrect running times. Use the real running time if you have it.
20. Formatting: Turn in properly formatted stories with title, subhead and byline. Don’t be surprised if your editor changes your title and subhead.
21. Never a period in a subhead.
22. One dash after date, not two.
23. Avoid m-dashes. Use commas or ellipses.
24. Do not give an actor’s age unless it’s relevant to the story.
25. Remove Hollywood publicist-speak. Nobody is a “love interest” or a “veteran Hollywood actor”. Actors are stars. Nobody “laughs”, “explains”, or whatever other colorful verb the publicist inserted. It’s just “says”.
26. Avoid passive verbs such as ‘is’, especially in titles. Don’t start a sentence with, “There is…”.
27. The format for the lead i’s distributor, complete film title, title, name. “Quote 1″, says Universal Pictures ‘Hellboy II: The Golden Army’ star Selma Blair. “Quote 2″.
28. It’s the complete official name of the movie in paragraph one. In the title and in later paragraphs it’s shortened (e.g., ‘Hellboy 2′).
29. Don’t summarize the plot. The story is about what the celebrity says.
30. In the last paragraph, and maybe the second paragraph, include background on the star. When writing background highlights refer to Wikipedia, IMDB, and Google search.
31. Turning in a story sooner is better. Be fast. Stay ahead of the deadline.

Resources

• Always do a Google News story search first. Be current in your story topic.
• Upcoming Movies:
  BoxOffice Mojo
  The Numbers
  Sci-Fi Movie Page
  Yahoo
• EPK: www.epk.tv electronic press kits
• CineFex:
  Upcoming Effects Films by date
• Upcoming TV: The Futon Critic Televsion
• Upcoming DVDs:
  JoBlo
  Amazon
  DVDverdict
  FilmBuff
  DigitalBits
  VideoETA
  VideoBusiness
• Upcoming Books:
  Publishers Weekly
  Barnes & Noble
  The Couch Potato
• Bestsellers:
  Amazon
  Barnes&Noble
  Booksense
  NY Times
  Publisher’s Weekly
  USA Today
• Book Deals:
  Publishers Marketplace
• IMDB:
  Upcoming Movies
  Around the World
• The Futon Critic:
  Upcoming Television
• StoryLink:
  Upcoming Events
• Tapings:
  On Camera Audiences
  TVTix.com
• IMDB IMDBpro

Style Guide

1. Make the story sexy. Make it short. Make it compelling.
2. No Q&A format unless the story is assigned that way. Writing out the questions would make the reporter part of the story. Focus on the celebrity.
3. Don’t quote in chronological order. Use quotes in the order that makes sense for the story. However, do not re-order quotes in a way that would change the meaning. You can drop “and”, when it doesn’t add meaning, and false starts or “um”. Don’t change anyone’s meaning. Never make up a quote.
4. Check Google News. Avoid writing a me-too story. Find a fresh angle. Find a quote or fun fact about film or star.
5. Add perspective like “this is his comeback film…” Add analysis like “This is the fourth film made from the original Body Snatchers and the only one to … “
6. Refer to IMDB so you can mention upcoming films or TV shows at the end of the story. If you are a subscriber to IMDBpro, you get much better info.
7. Be clever, funny and knowledgeable, but don’t make the story about how clever and funny you are.
8. AP Style unless otherwise noted.
9. Headline: About eight words, title case. Name the star or film. Make the head fanciful, not just descriptive.
10. Subhead: Sentence case. No period.
11. Dateline: HOLLYWOOD, CA (Gosh!TV) 8/17/2009 – Don’t forget
    to change city and date as appropriate.  The city is where the story is filed.
12. No paragraph indentation, just a line break between.