Robert MacNeil (1931-2024)
Robert MacNeil, a long-time television journalist, died this week at the age of 93. During his day job, he covered the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963 and hosted the MacNeil/Lehrer Report (later the PBS News Hour) for years.
MacNeil also had a spy entertainment footnote: He hosted PBS's presentation of the Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy miniseries in 1980. The miniseries debuted in 1979 in the U.K.
MacNeil made clear in his introductions that he was a big fan of David Cornwell/John Le Carre. In one of his Tinker Tailor introductions, he took a dig at Ian Fleming and James Bond. Bond was a cardboard figure, as MacNeil told it. Le Carre wrote well-developed, complicated characters.
Essentially, MacNeil mirrored a decades-long debate. In 2017, there was a debate in London about whether Le Carre or Fleming was the better spy novelist.
Personal note: That Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy miniseries is when I discovered Le Carre. I then bought some of the author's novels. They're all quite good. But I never liked how some Le Carre fans (such as MacNeil) felt the need to slam Fleming and Bond.
For more about MacNeil's career, you can view obituaries by The Washington Post and The New York Times. These are gift links meaning there should be no paywall issues.
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