Vice Media’s immersive Charlottesville report gets traction
NEW YORK — For all the words flowing since last weekend in Charlottesville, the most striking television reporting has been Vice Media’s insider account of the white nationalist movement and what it has wrought.
Correspondent Elle Reeve’s initial story of the weekend violence took up the entirety of HBO’s half-hour “Vice News Tonight” broadcast Monday and by Thursday had been viewed more than 36 million times on TV and online. Reeve’s expertise from reporting on the intersection of the internet and white supremacy movement over 18 months helped vividly illustrate attitudes and tensions.
In the process she put the alternative nightly newscast, which debuted last Oct. 16, on the map.
“What distinguishes us is being on the road and trying to be in the middle of an event as much as we can just to show people what is happening,” said Josh Tyrangiel, executive vice-president of news at Vice. “It felt very much like a moment for us.”