Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Tuesday, July 26, 1994                 TAG: 9407260045
		SECTION: DAILY BREAK              PAGE: E2   EDITION: FINAL 
SOURCE: LARRY BONKO
DATELINE: LOS ANGELES                        LENGTH: Medium:   71 lines

EXTRA DAY OFF KEEPS KOPPEL FROM BURNOUT

   HE ADMITTED it. He shared his secret with the world. Ted Koppel confessed 
to a gathering of TV critics here that he's darn near burned out - almost worn
down to a nub - after doing ``Nightline'' on ABC for 14 years and four  
months.
   Trying to get in a word edgewise with Ross Perot will do that to you.
   Seeing how we observe TV with the eye of an eagle, it didn't take long for 
TV critics to notice that of late, Koppel hasn't been working on Mondays. He's
also been absent on a Friday or two.
   After negotiating his last contract with ABC, Koppel, a TV newsman for 31 
years, got the OK from his boss, Roone Arledge, to work a four-day week. He 
was talking about leaving ``Nightline'' to do something else. 
   ABC couldn't have the best interviewer in the business walk out,  so the 
network gave Koppel the kind of a deal Johnny Carson had.  Only better. Carson
worked four hours a week. Koppel works two.
   ``I don't know if any of the viewers could see it, but I began burning out 
about three and a half years ago,'' Koppel said when meeting with the 
Television Critics Association. ``It has made all the difference in the world 
to be able to take one extra night a week off.
   ``But if a huge news story is breaking, I'll be there. Trust me.''
   And if Koppel isn't there on ``Nightline,'' it will be Forest Sawyer, 
Barbara Walters, Cokie Roberts, Sam Donaldson or somebody else. ABC assured 
the TV reporters that ``Nightline'' will be on the air five nights a week, 52 
weeks a year, no matter how badly it's getting clobbered in the ratings by 
David Letterman on CBS.
   This is a great place for a news flash: CBS announced that it is giving the
12:35 a.m. time slot immediately after Letterman's ``Late Show'' to Tom 
Snyder, who will earn considerably more than the $500,000 a year he is making 
now on cable with CNBC.
   Koppel looked annoyed when reminded that Letterman is now king of 
late-night television with a national rating of 5.9. Hey, Koppel said to the 
TV reporters, hasn't anyone noticed that ``Nightline'' is just two-tenths of a
percentage point behind Letterman and that ``Nightline'' is way ahead (1.7 
percentage points) of Jay Leno and the ``Tonight'' show on NBC?
   ``For a boring news program, that's not bad,'' said Koppel.
   One more thing. Koppel asked that people in print please stop referring to 
him as a talk-show host. He was a tad upset when a publication ranked him tied
with Leno and Phil Donahue as the country's sixth-most-popular TV talk-show 
host. 
   Talk-show host, indeed.
   ``For the last 35 years, I've thought of myself as a reporter, not a 
talk-show host,'' he said. ``What troubles me is that people cannot make the 
distinction between the two. The line between what I do and what talk-show 
hosts do has become terribly fuzzy.''
   So, please, never ever confuse ``Nightline'' with ``Hard Copy,'' ``A 
Current Affair'' or ``Donahue,'' or Koppel will come to your home and bite 
your ear. He can be a testy interview.
   Note: ``Nightline'' has won 23 Emmys and was nominated for more last week.
   The show has reinvented itself in its second decade. Once upon a time, 
``Nightline'' was strictly about weighty affairs, but then Koppel interviewed 
Jim and Tammy Bakker (remember when they worked for a Portsmouth TV station?),
and the new ``Nightline'' emerged.
   Today the show could be about anything from the World Cup soccer hysteria 
to the horrors in Rwanda to health care reform.
   ``Long after MTV is tired of interviewing political candidates, I'll still 
be there interviewing political candidates,'' said Koppel.
   But only four nights a week, and almost never on Monday.

MEMO: Television Columnist Larry Bonko is in Los Angeles for the twice-yearly 
      press tour.