“Entertainment Tonight“ correspondent Denny Directo admits to feeling a bit of whiplash as he races around Tuscon covering Nancy Guthrie’s disappearance,
“A week ago I was at the Grammys and interviewing Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy, and now I’m chasing leads on a heartbreaking story,” he told TheWrap on Wednesday.
Directo is one of the throngs of reporters, producers, photographers and independent journalists who’ve descended upon Tuscon, Ariz., to cover the abduction of Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of “Today” co-anchor Savannah Guthrie. The saga, now in its 12th day, has included FBI Director Kash Patel heading to the scene and the nation’s top anchors breaking into scheduled programming with updates — all as investigators comb the city for clues and audiences stay glued for each new development.
The appetite for updates speaks to the shocking circumstances of the abduction, but also to the presence of Savannah Guthrie, a warm, familiar face to millions of viewers each morning. Ratings for “Today” have shot up 23% year-over-year in the week ending Feb. 6, Variety reported, as the show closely tracks the story. The nature of the tragedy has also forced journalists to confront the challenge of reporting on a fellow colleague in the midst of a family crisis.
“I don’t think we can ignore the fact that this is Savannah Guthrie’s mother,” Ed Lavandera, a senior national correspondent for CNN, told TheWrap. “There are millions of Americans who wake up and start their day watching the ‘Today’ show. They feel a connection to that great team, and rightfully so.”
Guthrie’s abduction has led a groundswell of news coverage from across the media spectrum, including national outlets such as CNN and Fox News; local outlets such as Tucson’s KVOA; and celebrity entertainment shows like “Inside Edition” and “ET.” Some outlets, like TMZ and fellow local affiliate KOLD, have even received purported ransom notes demanding millions of dollars in Bitcoin.
While most journalists appear to have acted professionally, there has been a media-circus element at times, such as when someone had a pizza delivered to Guthrie’s front door.
The incident prompted the Pima County Sheriff’s Department, one of the law enforcement agencies leading the investigation, to scold reporters on X: “We can’t believe we have to say this, but media on scene: please do not order food delivery to a crime scene address.”
Long days, few clues
Lavandera arrived in Tucson on Feb. 2, hours after the news of Guthrie’s disappearance broke on “Today.” He estimates working 15 to 16 hours each day, contributing reports to CNN’s daytime and primetime programs. The network has four reporting crews on site, Lavandera said.
The long hours are common for many of the journalists stationed outside Guthrie’s home, from where they will often appear live for their respective shows. CNN anchor and Guthrie friend Jake Tapper arrived this week in Tuscon, where he has hosted “The Lead.”
Some reporters drive 10 minutes to the home of Guthrie’s other daughter, Annie Guthrie, where Nancy Guthrie was last seen, for footage for their TV packages, according to Directo. Authorities have conducted additional searches at both homes and their surrounding areas.
When the FBI and the sheriff’s department release new information, Directo said he’ll confer with former law enforcement sources, such as FBI or CIA experts, who can help contextualize it for their viewers.
“With so much information coming from every direction, I will say there is double the responsibility to vet all that information and then ask the right questions,” said Directo, who acknowledged the story differs from the typical celebrity fare of “ET.”
“Getting the facts straight and asking the right questions” is critical, he stressed, and to keep “trying to cover our bases.”
Brian Entin, a senior national correspondent for NewsNation, told TheWrap that he believes the few clear details about how Guthrie disappeared has inspired much of the interest in the case. While some criminal cases may offer an early signal that points at a suspect, Entin said, “it seems like every day there’s been a new twist and turn” in the Guthrie saga.
“Even now…we still don’t know what happened to Nancy, and I think that’s got people concerned and interested and sort of just glued to the coverage to see what’s going to happen next,” said Entin, who’ll host a NewsNation special on Saturday analyzing the case.
Updates can come at any hour, such as Tuesday’s late-night development that authorities had detained a person of interest in Rio Rico, an unincorporated area about an hour’s drive south of Tucson.
The news led Entin to drive down to the area to document the scene, though the person, named Carlos Palazuelos, was later released. Entin spoke to Carlos’ mother-in-law, who proclaimed her relative’s innocence, while “ET” news director Brenda Rodriguez joined a gaggle outside Palazuelos’ home and peppered him with questions about his detention.
“We’re just kind of rolling with whatever happens and putting sleep on the back burner at this point,” Entin said.
Sprawling coverage
Significant developments, like Palazuelos’ initial detention on Tuesday, have prompted outlets to break into their standard programming. ABC News’ “World News Tonight” anchor David Muir led the network’s coverage of the detention late Tuesday, while NBC’s Hallie Jackson interrupted the Winter Olympics, one of the network’s most lucrative events.
The abduction has hit close to home for Savannah Guthrie’s NBC and “Today” family, who’ve been vocal about the personal toll of this ordeal and have pleaded with viewers to contact the FBI’s tipline if they have any information.
“Our ‘Today’ family continues to navigate uncharted territory, balancing the updates on the search for Savannah’s mom with all the other stories of the day, like we normally do,” Craig Melvin told viewers on Monday. “But we know things are far from normal right now, so folks, we are asking for your grace as we continue to do this.”
“Today“ has relied primarily on NBC News reporters Tom Winter and Liz Kreutz for updates, and it has enlisted the show’s fourth-hour host Sheinelle Jones and former co-anchor Hoda Kotb to fill Guthrie’s seat. (NBC declined to make anyone available for comment.)
A “Today“ spokesperson also routinely sends out updates to a list of journalists, keeping them in the loop on the latest comments from the sheriff’s department or Instagram video posted by Savannah. The videos, which show Savannah and her siblings speaking directly to the camera and pleading for information on their mother, have been the only public comments from the Guthrie family since the ordeal began.
Entin said the family has long been respected in the city, owing to Nancy’s decision to move there in the early 1970s from Melbourne, Australia, and raise Savannah and her two siblings. “There’s a pride factor there with people that I talk to who are from here,” Entin said. “They knew Savannah was from here, they knew that Nancy lived here — that was a point of pride.”
Lavandera, the CNN correspondent, also said that neighbors believe the intense media presence “will help investigators get what they need to bring Nancy Guthrie back home to her family.” But after the FBI released the unsettling images of the alleged masked assailant, those same Tucson neighbors have grown more fearful over what’s transpired in their backyard.
“At the heart of all of this is [a] story of an 84-year-old woman who is a mother living alone and abducted from her house in the middle of the night — I mean, it’s the stuff of nightmares,” Lavandera said. “We all have mothers, and this is the stuff that keeps people up at night.”
