Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Score One For Jamie McCourt's Publicists

One week from the start of the McCourt divorce case, and Jamie McCourt's publicists are on the offensive. And one if the earliest to be ensnared is Carla Hall of the LA Times, who writes Tuesday's column one piece about the McCourt "love story gone off the base paths"--yet only gets quotes from Jamie, making the whole piece a pathetically biased valentine piece:

Crazy about sports, they would drive to Baltimore to watch the younger of her two brothers play Little League.

"They were incredibly in love," said Barbara Crocker, a Georgetown classmate and Jamie's close friend since childhood. "I can't remember a time when they weren't together."

There was, however, a period of skittishness. In college and later, when Jamie was in law school at the University of Maryland, she repeatedly broke up and reconciled with Frank, because her Jewish parents were mortified that she was dating a Gentile. Frank was raised Catholic.

Eventually, love trumped her parents' disapproval. Jamie moved to New York to practice corporate law, and in 1979, they were married by a rabbi in their co-op — without her parents' blessing. Frank's family attended and so did Jamie's two brothers.

Even now, she laughs when she remembers how Frank was late for the ceremony — and he was arriving from the bedroom.

Her parents long ago reconciled with the couple. The McCourts' four sons, now ages 20 to 28, were raised Jewish.

"I always tell my father, 'You were right, I shouldn't have married him — but you had the wrong reasons,'" she said with a rueful chuckle as she sat in the office of one of her lawyers, Bert Fields. (Frank, 57, declined to be interviewed for this article.)

Considering the story only contains quotes attributable to Jamie or her friends, it is unsurpring we learn of Jamie's love and dedication to Frank their sons and their family; we also learn of Jamie's educational pedigree and competitive athletic fire. Frank, unquoted for this piece, does not come across nearly as well.

Nice going, LAT. How about next time, if you're going to run a one-sided piece, you just sell the same space as an advertisement? (After all, you've already given up sectional front pages to Universal Studios' King Kong; why not make some extra coin if you're going to have Hall write such a puff piece?)

3 comments:

Fred's Brim said...

Off topic, because we should all be off this topic, Josh Wilker has a good post about Tommy Lasorda today

Paul said...

Stupid Bobby Valentine!

rbnlaw said...

Bad writing in the LAT?

You don't say.