This morning TIME publishes its annual TIME 100 issue, listing a hundred of the world’s most influential people in politics, science, public service, business, blah blah blah—and most important, of course, television. Some of those honorees (depending how you define “TV personality”) include Stephen Colbert, Claire Danes, Chelsea Handler, Matt Lauer and Louis CK. (In the “depending how you define ‘TV personality'” category, the list also includes, for instance, Kristen Wiig, though largely on the strength this year of a movie, Bridesmaids.)
First, the standard disclaimer/CYA: I didn’t choose any portion of the list, though like most members of the staff, I recommended candidates. Who shouldn’t and shouldn’t be on the list is certainly open to debate. That said, I’ve been writing a lot in this space over the past year about the likes of Louis CK and Danes, and each of the names above in their own way has had a lot of direct and indirect influence on the medium; on top of that, we’ve found some intriguing pairings of writers to pen tributes to the subjects this year.
For instance, Matt Lauer’s choice might be curiously timed this year, considering that last week Good Morning America appears to have beat Today in the ratings for the first time in 16 years. Then again, that was 16 years, no small thanks to Lauer (who was, maybe not coincidentally, on vacation the week Today dropped), and here’s some of what what his celebrity profiler, Howard Stern, had to say about him:
We all wondered, Was it over? It’s over, it’s over, he’s losing his hair! It’s got to be over! But we were wrong! The strength was still there, perhaps stronger still, crashing pillars to earth with innate strength and charm and class—Matt Lauer, 54, the anti-Samson, going up against pretty guys and girls, the hairy people. He was still the smartest, the strongest, the classiest.
Meanwhile, Danes—who plays brilliant but erratic anti-terrorism agent Carrie Matheson on Homeland, gets a pairing I’m particularly proud of, having her praises sung by former covert operative (whose cover was famously blown) Valerie Plame Wilson:
[Y]ou can’t take your eyes off her. You root for her because those very despicable qualities also make her extraordinarily good at her mission. Danes breathes life and realism into a character who, for once, goes against the clichés of what a female CIA officer is supposed to do and look like. No sequined gowns or casual gunplay for Carrie—she works in the real world of gathering intelligence.
The whole issue is out now, so I’ll request an intel briefing from you: who would you add to, and take off from, the list?