The Man Who Would Not Shut Up: The Rise of Bill O'Reilly

by Marvin Kitman

Fair? Balanced?

To some, Bill O’Reilly is a semi-demented cable TV talk show host who can be an obnoxious, insufferable, opinionated, rude loudmouth whose views, the kinder ones say, are typical right-wing drivel.  But there is much more to O’Reilly than what meets eye.  O’Reilly is the paradigm of idiosyncrasy in television journalism.

On the rough road to the top, O’Reilly learned how to give the public what it wants and thinks it needs. From his early education at the hands of nuns to an advanced degree in public policy from Harvard, from working at local television stations and rising through the ranks to network news, O’Reilly spent nearly twenty-five years learning his craft before he became an overnight star at Fox News.

In this very intimate look at the man and what matters to him, veteran media critic Marvin Kitman explores all the experiences that led to the making of Bill O’Reilly—a nonconformist in a business that demands conformity as the price of success, and a man who has risen to the top by not playing by the rules of broadcast news. Kitman shows that O'Reilly is not a knee-jerk conservative, but an “independent” freethinker with a mind of his own, and he believes what journalism needs is more Bill O’Reillys.  Not screamers, the blowhards like the current O’Reilly clones rushed on the air since his success, but trained journalists, reporting the news and telling us why, in their opinion, the world is a crazy place.

Supported by twenty-nine interviews with O’Reilly, Marvin Kitman chronicles a descent from reporter of news to spewer of views.

Genres: Biography, Politics, Nonfiction

336 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2007

About the author

Marvin Kitman was an American television critic, humorist, and author.

Reviews

[Michael]

Learning about his childhood experiences helped me understand the roots of O'Reilly's behavior as a TV bloviator. Basically, as a tough New York punk, he learned that being a bully worked, so he grew up as a bully. Now he gets paid big money to shoot his mouth off and insult people who are smarter, nicer, and better-informed than he is. He can dish it out, but he can't take it. He throws tantrums. He's still a punk.

[Regular Joe · Rating 4 out of 5]

I knew Marvin Kitman had written an "unauthorized" biography of Bill O'Reilly a couple of years ago entitled "The Man Who Would Not Shut Up," and I honestly never really viewed it as a serious or worthwhile read. But after reading the one or two sane reviews on Amazon.com, I decided to give it a try. I was not only surprised, I was for the most part pleasantly surprised.

I think it was initially the book title that probably caused me to give the book a pass. But after seeing the tremendous amount of time and research Kitman put into this book, which included almost thirty interviews with O'Reilly himself, I was ready to give it a serious look. Kitman beautifully lays out the book in five very informative and chronological parts. He spends more than half of the book (Part I) taking a detailed look at O'Reilly's pre-The Factor life. He appropriately titles this section "The Making of an O'Reilly." If you have already read O'Reilly's latest biography, "A Bold Fresh Piece of Humanity," a lot of the information in Kitman's book is familiar ground, yet is presented from a different and a very interesting point of view. In this part, Kitman mostly just lays out the biographical facts, while inserting only a limited amount of opinions, observations and analysis from the biographer.

Kitman makes no attempt to hide the fact that his is a liberal and has little in common with Bill O'Reilly. But I believe most readers will at least be satisfied that he certainly did his homework in compiling the research and interviews for this book. Kitman spent five years of researching background material, conducting interviews and locating classic black and white pictures and legal documents in preparation for writing this book!

The book is filled with revealing quotes from O'Reilly himself (Of course), and a virtual "who's-who" of O'Reilly's childhood friends, teachers, schoolmates, coworkers, employees, bosses, rivals, friends and foes alike. Kitman really went all out with interviewing those in O'Reilly's past. This is what I found to be the strongest and most impressive aspect of the book.

Though Kitman admits most of those in broadcast news write O'Reilly off as little more than a demented, obnoxious, insufferable loudmouth (and Kitman admittedly agrees with them), but during the writing of this book he also admits that there is much more to O'Reilly than meets the eye; a much deeper person and journalist than the blustery and physically imposing man (6'4", 200+ pounds) he first encountered. This book is no simple caricature of Bill O'Reilly, but an intimate and sometimes moving look at the man and what really matters to him. He follows O'Reilly through his rough years at home, in school, his experiences as a high school teacher in Florida, and as a nonconformist in the world of written journalism and broadcast news.

In Part II, Kitman covers O'Reilly's rise to the position of senior anchor and "boss" of The O'Reilly Factor on the FOX News Channel. Most people in broadcast news try to simply pigeonhole O'Reilly as just another rigid conservative and not worth listening to. But Kitman believes journalism needs more unconventional, independent freethinkers like O'Reilly; trained journalists, reporting the news others won't touch and providing balanced analysis, coupled with their own viewpoint in addressing as many of the public's tough questions as possible.

I enjoyed getting to know more about O'Reilly's family, sister, wife, and two children, something O'Reilly has stayed far away from talking about. I least enjoyed the latter chapters of the book (especially Part III) where Kitman seems to lose focus as a biographer and begins to join the other "anti-Spinheads" by launching his own personal insults at O'Reilly. I felt this departure from standard biographical form detracted from an otherwise excellent book.

By the time you near the end of this book, you will probably realize that Kitman genuinely likes O'Reilly. Not his arrogant persona, mind you. He really likes O'Reilly, the journalist. Note the following quotes:

** "Every night he brings passion to the tube....Those are the things that won me over. I liked O'Reilly's anger. He goes after the dragon, what Fred Friendly, Ed Murrow's producer at CBS News used to say was the true function of news. O'Reilly has the fire of a reformer, a man who got angry at social injustice, as he saw it. He wasn't afraid to get involved."

** "I think it's probably a better world having people like him (O'Reilly) on the TV news.

** "O'Reilly is a serious journalist who doesn't play by the rules of objectivity. He is not alone in considering news and analysis valid journalism. Actually, he is a throwback to the way it was in the old days when CBS News was the paragon, the model for all TV news."

I believe the quotes above speak for themselves.

I do have one minor administrative note for your reading entertainment. This is the second book I have read this year where the writer, or maybe the publisher, chose to use, in my opinion, a near useless format for their End Notes. There are no notations in the text to even indicate there are any End Notes. Then, when you find there are pages and more pages of notes (22 pages in this book!), the only indicator what each note is referencing to is a page number. No indication on what line or what specific information on the page the note is referencing to. This was very aggravating for me since I see real value in footnoting. I realize the traditional form of Footnotes or End Notes (The kind most of us learned in high school and college) take more time and effort, but in this book anyway, the author would have garnered the undying gratitude of readers like me if the traditional method was used. Enough grumbling about that. The book also contains and excellent Bibliography and an Index.

In closing, whether you are a "Spinhead", an "Anti-Spinhead" or just too busy watching reruns of American Idol to care either way, there is something for every reader to either really love and/or really despise in The Man Who Would Not Shut Up (The Rise of Bill O'Reilly). Go ahead and take a chance; You simply can't go wrong here.

[Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even as someone who rarely agrees with the man, I've been fascinated by O'Reilly for close to 15 years and yet hadn't gotten around to this book until now, largely because I somehow missed its existence. It's quite remarkable in that, although it isn't an authorized biography, O'Reilly provided extraordinary access to himself, his friends, his family over a period of several years. (To his credit, he even suggested former adversaries who could be interviewed.) The result is probably the best look we'll ever get at the development of O'Reilly, right back to his birth, and particularly his philosophy as a journalist. The latter provides the bulk of the content, and the author -- a liberal newspaper journalist -- makes it clear that at his core, O'Reilly is actually a highly skilled journalist, particularly as an investigative reporter. This assessment is backed up by former co-workers and supervisors, including esteemed figures like Peter Jennings, who especially grew to respect O'Reilly's talents when O'Reilly was a correspondent for Jennings' "World News Now." The book goes so far as to argue that what journalism really needs is more O'Reillys -- in the sense that it needs more investigators, populists, and people with actual viewpoints and emotion. (An interesting comparison is drawn between O'Reilly's intensity and the anger of Brian Williams and Anderson Cooper in their Hurricane Katrina coverage.) The book has some juicy tidbits without being tawdry -- let's just say O'Reilly's little black book was quite thick before marrying in his forties -- and gives a good sense of his personality. But most of all, this is the story of a dying breed of journalist and the side of O'Reilly you'll wish we could see more of, because it indeed sounds like a good force. The one major drawback is that the book is dated now, so of course there's no discussion of his divorce, the Dr. Tillman incident, his fondness for President Obama, his feuding with Sean Hannity, and some other topics that would be particularly good to explore. Since O'Reilly can't shut up, hopefully interviews are already in progress for a follow-up.

[Rick Mullenax · Rating 5 out of 5]

At first glance, you'd think this book was mocking Bill O'Reilly but in reality it's surprisingly kind as an unauthorized biography. At first, Bill O'Reilly was working along side author Marvin Kitman, but O'Reilly dropped out after Kitman refused to omit a sex scandal case involving Andrea Mackris. You'd think Mr. Kitman was exposing O'Reilly, but surprisingly he was fair in his reporting, calling Andrea Mackris a liar and extortionist who was just trying to entrap the King of No Spin.

So if you're a fan of Bill O'Reilly, don't let O'Reilly's negative remarks towards the bio prevent you from reading it. You'll be surprised how well O'Reilly comes out from it and you'll be inspired how hard he worked to be the top rated news guy in cable news. If you hate O'Reilly and you're looking for a smear book, you'll be very disappointed. If you don't know him and you want an objective look at the most successful guy currently in the cable news biz....this is the book.

[Jane · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author penned neither an expose nor a paen to O'Reilly. He admired his work ethic and made the point that O'Reilly says on tv what most journalists say to each other in bars. I find his manner very abrasive and hard to take, and I do not remember now if the author addressed that fact. O'Reilly evidently lives very simply and in a non ostentatious fashion, which was mildly surprising.

[Jim · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book was not objectively written. The author was a total "hero worshipper". The sections of the book that dealt with Bill O'Reilly's early history was interesting.

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

Found this book highly entertaining