The Vows Heard Round the World

By Janice Castro

Commentary in 34 languages, with pretty pictures by the BBC

It was made for television and television knew it. Said Steve Friedman, executive producer of NBC's Today show: "We have a beautiful princess, a royal wedding, a glorious sight, all overlaid with the threat of violence." To capture this perfect script, TV journalists plotted their coverage for months, haggling over camera position, importing tons of equipment, steeping correspondents in royal arcana.

Some 750 miles of cable were set down, and scores of cameras were set up, 21 in St. Paul's Cathedral alone. By the time the sun rose over Buckingham Palace last Wednesday, three communications satellites over the Indian and Atlantic oceans were beaming images of the scene to 750 million viewers in 61 countries, from Sweden to Zambia. For most of the next 7% hours, the air waves crackled with commentary in 34 languages, much of it irritatingly trite. But the pictures were the important thing, and they were riveting.

The eye-catching shots came courtesy of the British Broadcasting Corp., which shared television rights to the ceremony with Independent Television (ITV) and had choice camera locations outside. The BBC supplied its all-day feed to 81 foreign broadcasting companies, including ABC, CBS and NBC. Especially remarkable were the BBC'S pictures inside the cathedral. They were orchestrated down to a nanosecond by Producer Michael Lumley, who directed the shifting of cameras from religious icons to the boys choir to the royal couple in a way that perfectly matched the music and pace of the ceremony. From a 6-in. square window near the top of St. Paul's golden dome, a BBC camera took some magnificent overhead shots of the procession up the aisle and the exchange of vows. The television gear was an intrusion--a camera clattered to the floor at one point--but it also lighted up the cathedral, revealing its art and architecture as never before.

Though the U.S. networks shared the BBC feed, the competition between them was as keen as always--and no wonder, with 55 million American viewers planning to get up early to watch the royal nuptials. The networks fielded their top commentators, as well as more than 300 correspondents, producers and technicians, at a reported cost of $5 million.

NBC'S Today show built an open-air studio across from Buckingham Palace and broadcast from there all week. Together the three networks deployed two dozen cameras at carefully selected positions along the route in hopes of getting exclusive shots of arresting moments. Explained ABC News Executive Producer Robert Siegenthaler: "The British feed tends to be stately rather than close-up and personal. Ours has more of a 'people' feel to it." Top ABC sports directors were called in to direct the wedding coverage, including Tuesday night's fireworks display, on the theory that they could lend extra pizazz to the event. This spirit carried over into the ceremony itself, where ABC treated the boys choir like a college basketball team, superimposing statistics on the screen as they sang, showing the number of choir members, the age of the youngest (ten) and how many hours they had practiced.

Prince Charles and Lady Diana granted one personal interview before the wedding, to Thames Television's Andrew Gardner and BBC's Angela Rippon, in which they revealed little more than the fact that they were "grateful for all those kind wishes." NBC Anchorman John Chancellor observed that "correspondents tend to tiptoe through interviews with royalty in this country. That's at the Palace's request." The U.S. networks tried to make up for their lack of access to the royal couple by hiring commentators such as Actors Robert Morley (ABC) and Peter Ustinov (NBC), Interviewer David Frost and Historian Lady Antonia Fraser (CBS). They did not always help. Morley joked cloyingly about his "missing invitation to St. Paul's." When Chancellor asked Ustinov why the British people love the royal family so, Ustinov said it was the same drive that makes them "rip out seats at football matches. I think they're trying to find their origins." CBS was the most restrained of the three networks in its anchor-desk prattle, preferring for the most part to pass along the elegant and understated coverage provided by the

BBC. But even Dan Rather felt compelled at one point to inform the viewers back home that the British "Life Guards [are] not to be confused with the American term lifeguards." This mindless small talk was enlightening compared with the shenanigans of the story-starved stars of the morning shows. At various times during the week, David Hartman of ABC played cricket, Willard Scott of NBC frolicked in the fountain at Trafalgar Square, and Joan Lunden of ABC toured London with a magician.

Poor taste was the occasional price of all this live television. Early on the day of the wedding, Tom Brokaw noted that Diana "appears to have very large feet." Guest Commentator and Biographer Robert Lacey piped in that Charles "has very large ears." Brokaw at one point cracked that the Welsh Guards are "a very early regal version of the Coneheads"--the daffy extraterrestrial family on NBC's old Saturday Night Live show.

The print press was also out in full force, running hard to match the stunning visual story provided by television. Nearly 1,000 foreign journalists operated out of the Overseas Press Center on St. James's Street, which was equipped with 50 typewriters, 126 telephone lines and eleven Telex machines. The London Sun, calling itself the Royal Sun for the big week, stationed 40 reporters with walkie-talkies along the processional route. Die Aktuelle, the West German women's magazine, ferried its reporters and photographers around in two planes, two helicopters, two speedboats (for the Thames) and a fleet of cars and bicycles.

Women's Wear Daily produced the most inventive coverage of the week, presenting a bogus drawing of Lady Diana's bridal gown the day before the ceremony. "We said this could be a hoax before we ran it," said Publisher John Fairchild. "I thought it made a very amusing story." Fleet Street was at its creative best, too, telling readers what Charles whispered to Diana at intimate moments. And how did the newspapers find out? They hired lip readers.

The wedding captured front-page headlines around the world. It even moved the gray Times of London to do the unthinkable: the paper published a color photograph of the royal couple as a souvenir front page on Thursday. The Economist had a color news page for the first time in its 138-year history. Japan's Yomiuri Shimbun (circ. 8 million), the largest newspaper in the world, deemed the wedding story important enough to rush in a color photo midway through its evening press run. But by week's end such energy had begun to dissipate. Most reporters were content to leave the saga of Charles and Diana on the note sounded in a Times editorial: "They have a marriage to build and a family to make. They, their advisers, the press and the public should give them room to do it." --By Janice Castro. Reported by Mary Cronin/London

With reporting by Mary Cronin

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