Staging

Sarah Steffen

I agree with Dave Wertheimer that it is not okay to stage events. I thought the example of the NFL player who should pretend he just got the call he had received earlier was pretty drastic. That is staging at its best and reporters should not do this. I do believe that the audience can tell what's staged and what's not. That is hurting a reporter's (and network's) credibility in the long run.
However, I think it is something different to ask a person to walk in a certain direction, maybe because it works better with the light setting. As long as they are not acting I'm okay with it.
Also a lot of people are unexperienced what to do in front of a camera. In order to help them, you can ask what they would normally do in such situations and ask them to try to forget the camera. Whenever you want someone to do something specific you should disclose that. Wertheimer's advice: Just say "We asked so and so to show us how...".