 |
| The
tipster: this man owns a mechanical shop near the broken water
main, the subject of our big story. He’s the one who called
TVA with news that it had been left unrepaired by the City for
three weeks. |
It’s a Monday, and not a busy news day
apparently because all there is to cover is a broken water main.
Southern Montreal is enduring a drought and water rationing has been
imposed, yet it appears that municipal officials have allowed a broken
water main to go unrepaired for three weeks. Our task is to find
residents with browned out lawns to express indignation on camera.
Jacques is paired with reporter Normand
Rheaume. Normand had been covering national politics in Ottawa until
recently. His transfer to the nightly news does not sit well with him
and he openly expresses indignation about going from covering prime
ministers to covering water leaks.
We clamber into the news truck and after
a drive across town arrive in the affected neighborhood. We cruise the
streets with Normand on the lookout for someone watering their lawn.
TVA’s newscast is modeled on CNN’s
Headline News and is known by the acronym "LCC". It stands for
Le Canal Nouvelles ("The News Channel"). Normand
snortingly derides it as "Low Cost News" while scanning for
his lawn-waterer.
 |
| Jacques
gets a close-up of the water main break. Normand is off getting
reactions from mechanics. |
We spot one, and Jacques pulls the van
over and gets his camera ready. The lawn-waterer, pole axed with
excitement at the prospect of being on TV, stares at us while water
pools at his feet. The interview begins. It is marvelous how Normand, so
sour and deflated just moments ago, is now a picture of command and
authority, his posture ramrod straight, chin jutted out. It’s as if
when the camera was turned on it blew him up like a balloon.
Though I am working hard to learn French,
I have no idea what they’re saying. Maybe if they swore some I’d do
better. This much I get; for the lawn-waterer, this is his big moment
and he’s not about to blow it. I get the feeling he’d say whatever
he thought Normand wanted him to say.
 |
| Normand
rises to the occasion. Normand Rheaume, until recently a
national political correspondent for TVA, is crushed with
disappointment at his diminished status. Yet when the camera
turns on, so does Normand. It’s as if someone has blown him up
like a balloon. |
After the interview is done Jacques takes
a few close-up shots of a browned-out lawn. I ask Jacques and Normand if
people ever refuse to be interviewed. Yes, they do; about one in five
will refuse to talk on camera, they say.
What concerns him most as a cameraman?
Protecting his camera, Jacques answers. The camera is worth over $40,000
— $18,000 for the lens alone. Not long ago a TVA crew was robbed of
their equipment, purportedly by Latin American pornographers creatively
financing their productions.
We find our way to the water main break
and take some more footage and then it’s back to TVA headquarters.
Jacques hands Normand the videocassette, and Normand leaves us,
grumbling about having to be editor, producer and reporter all in one.
 |
| Woodward
and Bernstein, watch out: Jacques gets a close-up of a lawn
sprinkler operating in defiance of water rationing rules. |
Jacques and I now cruise the streets of
downtown Montreal in the news van waiting for Jacques’ pager to go off
with news of our next assignment. We buy lunch at a Couche-Tards (the
Québécois 7-11) and eat in the van while parked at the corner of
Montagne and Notre Dame streets, where home plate was to have been for
the as-it-happened-not-to-be new downtown ballpark for the Montreal
Expos. Too bad: home plate would have had a magnificent view of the
Montreal skyline.
Jacques, a fervent Expos fan, is wistful
when recounting the Expos’ dimming prospects. The team, now owned by
an American, is winning few games, experiencing dreadful attendance and
seems likely to be soon moved out of town.
CONTINUE
