New York News was a newspaper drama which was broadcast in the United States by CBS as part of its 1995 fall lineup.
New York News was the story of the fictional New York Reporter, a struggling tabloid in the nation's largest, most competitive newspaper market, New York City. Major characters included Jack Reilly (Gregory Harrison), an old-style newspaperman (so old-style that he actually went sneaking around in a trench coat); Angela Villanova (Melina Kanakaredes), a young writer who seemingly alternated between admiring Reilly and being in love with him; Nan Chase (Madeline Kahn), a gossip columnist somewhat in the vein of Rona Barrett; and Tony Amato (Anthony DeSando), the paper's leading sports columnist.
Supervising all of these talented, high-strung people was Editor-in-Chief Louise Felcott (Mary Tyler Moore), the "Dragon", who kept the pressure up on these employees and others, including their immediate boss, Managing Editor Mitch Cotter (Joe Morton). The paper's budget cutting and the related attempt of ownership to sell it took their toll on Cotter, who suffered a minor heart attack in the early episodes.
Moore was reportedly very unhappy with how her character was written, as a tough, unsympathetic, and unglamourous woman who peered out at her subordinates through thick "Coke-bottle" glasses. She was reputedly in negotiations to get out of her contract to do the program when this was made unnecessary by CBS's cancellation of it due to low Nielsen ratings two months after its premiere.
New York News marks Moore's final venture in an ongoing leading role in a regularly-scheduled series as of 2006, and was the last of five less-than-successful ventures of that type following her triumph in The Mary Tyler Moore Show.
Mary Tyler Moore was very displeased with the autocratic, unsympathetic manner of her character, and requested to be written out of the series. Before her request was acted on, the series was canceled, freeing Moore from the series in any event.
