THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, July 24, 1995 TAG: 9507240033
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Guy Friddell
LENGTH: Medium: 55 lines
I've been through an identity crisis.
No, not of my own, no such luck. I'm the same old cuss.
Your letters and calls are corrective enough to keep me from ever driving into the ditch of delusions, especially the anonymous letters. Though why, if you feel so vehemently, do you shrink from signing them?
You're shy, I guess. Or chicken. Take courage, friend, and affirm your beliefs like Luther nailing his tenets to the church door. It will clear your system of bile.
The uncertain identity which plagues me is that of a young woman who emerged a couple of months ago on the Saturday NBC ``Today'' show.
Her lavish features - heavy brows, large, prune-dark eyes (Spanish eyes, some would say), raven hair, flashing white smile - are striking.
She's swift, sure, natural while handling the schedule. In give-and-take with the co-host she appears at ease but throttled down, a new Rolls in an antique car parade, as if, should she let go, she would wreck the set.
One weekday morning, as I flipped among the three network shows while dressing, Dark Eyes appeared, subbing for Katie Couric, who was on vacation.
Couric comes back, Dark Eyes vanishes, and someone somewhat like her surfaces after a few mornings on the ``Today'' morning news-break. Except that the raven hair, which formerly fell to her shoulders like the Queen of the Junior Prom, is at half mast.
The updo hairdo accents the angularity of high cheek bones if, indeed, it were her, because it could be NBC recruited a cousin of hers, launching a line of darkest brunettes to offset the norm of blondes.
Saturday, Dark Eyes was back, if that's who she was, because her hair was now piled high, caught behind the neck, thinning her face to become spinsterish, schoolmarmish, but still attractive.
In the last segment Saturday, someone called her Giselle, although I have no idea how it is spelled. The vogue today among parents is to find a new way to frame old familiar names. There are at least six ways to spell Gisell.
A young friend, an observant collegian, noted that if the Saturday show were less formal that might explain why she put her hair up, as well as on weekdays when she is in a minor role on ``Today.''
What ``Today'' should do during an interview is ask Dark Eyes how to spell her name, where she grew up and went to school, how she entered broadcasting and wound up in New York, the individuals who most shaped her life, the reasons for the varying hairdo, and what it is about life that inspires her to smile with such exuberance.
Oughtn't to take more than seven minutes. Set our minds to rest, that early in the morning. by CNB