Celebrity, Author, Reporter, Bored

By WILLIAM A. HENRY III

NBC's Judy Woodruff wants, and gets, out of the White House

Judy Woodruff leads one of the most glamorous lives in Washington. As a White House correspondent for NBC television, she has waltzed at state dinners, traveled with Presidents to New Delhi and Versailles. Acclaim has gilded every aspect of her life. Like many working mothers, Woodruff, 35, brought her infant son Jeffrey to the office one day; unlike other mothers, she was summoned to see President Reagan, who spent ten minutes bouncing the baby and chanting nursery rhymes.

Yet when excitement settles into a familiar routine, even the most thrilling assignment becomes just a job. The White House beat, for all its glories, is often repetitive and tedious, the equivalent of covering a fenced-off headquarters in a company town. Says Woodruff: "Access is very tightly controlled; inevitably, you are manipulated. You rarely see your sources. You wait for them to return phone calls." Last week, weary of it all after nearly six years, Woodruff gave up her coveted job to become a Washington-based reporter and interviewer for the morning news show Today.

To most of the public, and probably to many of her colleagues, Woodruff took a big step down. But as she contends in her newly published autobiography, "This Is Judy Woodruff at the White House " (Addison-Wesley; $12.95), covering her beat can be a stunted form of journalism. For a TV network reporter, who needs to worry about pictures at the expense of time for briefing and nuance, the problems are especially acute. Woodruff particularly chafed at "staging stakeouts along the White House driveway in boiling heat or pouring rain or sub-zero dawn, never knowing when a news subject is going to leave, or by what exit, or if you catch him, whether he will have anything to say."

Even worse were the hours spent following Presidents Carter and Reagan to functions devoid of news value, just in case something catastrophic might happen. Says Woodruff: "The practice is sometimes referred to ghoulishly as 'the death watch.' " When a crisis actually erupted, Woodruff was sometimes turned into a sort of impromptu anchor, transmitting information from other NBC reporters rather than going after it. Although she was an eyewitness to the attempted assassination of President Reagan, once she had scrambled back to the White House she spent most of the rest of the afternoon rooted to one spot, facing a camera, while fellow correspondents carrying updated information "shuttled between my chair and the press office."

That kind of "reporting" often prompts print reporters to dismiss their broadcast colleagues as "talking hairdos." Admits Woodruff, who zoomed up in eight years from cleaning film and clipping articles at an Atlanta TV station to covering the President: "From my first reporting job on, I found people were not inclined to take me seriously because I was a woman and because I had never worked for a newspaper." A senior White House aide describes Woodruff as "always a lady," not necessarily regarding that as an asset: "She seems uncomfortable trying to dig out a story, almost timid."

A correspondent need not be as brash as ABC'S Sam Donaldson to come up with scoops at the White House. But Woodruff is painfully aware that early in her career her politeness meant she could be suckered out of a story even after she had it. Her book cites several examples: Presidential Aides Ron Nessen and Hamilton Jordan stalled or fibbed to persuade her to forget leaks that could embarrass their Administrations; CBS Reporter Lesley Stahl overheard, and promptly duplicated, Woodruffs exclusive on the appointment of Shirley Hufstedler as the first Cabinet-level Secretary of Education in 1979. The news items were fleeting, but the lesson lasted. Says Woodruff: "As with most competitive pursuits, nice reporters tend to finish last." Woodruff has also learned from her husband Albert Hunt, the Wall Street Journal's highly respected congressional reporter, though he and she hardly have an open-notebook policy. Last year Hunt hoarded background information he gleaned from Budget Director David Stockman, while Woodruff tried vainly for days to get Stockman to return her phone calls. Says she: "People assume that we share everything. But sources are a reporter's most valuable possession."

Woodruff is perceived by colleagues as fair, decent and ingratiatingly candid. Her book, written with Washington Journalist Kathleen Maxa, is thoughtful if often inconclusive about common ethical problems for journalists: How much can one socialize with sources? How should one tell a negative story about a friend? Why is so much effort and air time devoted to ephemera rather than enduring problems?

Below the surface calm is a tinge of feminist anger. She doubts that many TV news directors today would dare tell a young woman what her first boss told her: the station already had its quota of one woman reporter. But it rankles that many people confuse her with her NBC colleague Jessica Savitch, with CBS's Stahl and Diane Sawyer and with ABC'S Catherine Mackin, apparently because all are blond. Indeed, President Reagan once addressed Stahl as "Judy" at a press conference. Says Woodruff: "I do not notice many people confusing Roger Mudd and Tom Brokaw." Moreover, she fears that aging will curtail her career: "Men gain credibility as they get older, but women are not accorded that treatment yet."

For now, Woodruff is returning to her first love, campaign reporting. On Election Night in November she will have the task of co-anchoring, with Mudd, Brokaw and John Chancellor, the network's evening-long coverage of Senate, House and gubernatorial races. Thereafter she will interview newsmakers on Today and ease into some coverage of her third consecutive presidential campaign. Sums up Woodruff: "I am hooked on Washington, but I have been pinned down at the White House. There is so much that I have not yet seen." Her boss, NBC News President Reuven Frank, agrees: "Judy will cover ideas and trends, not primarily spot news. The White House may be glamorous, but this is meatier." --By William A. Henry III

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