ON AIR IN CLEVELAND: Filming Knitting Daily TV

WHEN I WAS GROWING UP, I wanted to be an actress. I regularly appeared in every school drama production, and I set up and became president of my high school’s very first drama club. But like many, I lacked the necessary spine and drive to make it happen in the real world. The notion of constant rejection was just too much. Instead, I found comfort behind words.

How ironic, then, that decades later my writing career would land me on television. When it was all said and done, I appeared on thirty-nine episodes of Knitting Daily TV, a program that still airs on public television stations around the country.

Before YouTube, knitters relied on just a handful of VHS videos and even fewer television programs for any kind of “live” knitting information. Although Elizabeth Zimmermann began broadcasting her own programs on Wisconsin Public Television in 1966, the notion of knitting-related television programming never really took off. When Shay Pendray began filming Needle Arts Studio in 1996 on Detroit Public Television, it was big news—but it was even bigger news when she sold the show to Interweave Press in 2007. The program was relaunched as Knitting Daily TV and, in 2012, I was invited to join the show.

Shay stayed on for the first few years, but the producer role had been handed to Interweave’s head honcho, Marilyn Murphy. After my monumentally unmomentous trip to Loveland, Marilyn had actually become my friend and mentor—and it was because of her that I got tapped for the gig.

The idea was that I’d be their resident yarn expert in a five-minute segment called “Yarn Spotlight” that would run in every episode. Then-host Eunny Jang and I would sit at a table and chat about the yarns that just happened to be spread out in front of us—but with the brilliance and clarity expected when a camera is rolling and your show doesn’t have the words Real Housewives in its title. Having written about the science, mechanics, and magic of yarn for more than a decade, I loved the idea of leaving the page and jumping into freeform conversation.

Soon Marilyn and associate producer Annie Bakken presented me with a list of the yarns I’d discuss in the first season. I learned that each episode would be grouped by a theme, such as Superb Stitch Definition or Made in America or Brushed Yarns. I quickly discovered what would become my two biggest obstacles: I could only talk about yarns that had been placed there by an advertiser (difficult for someone whose career was built on unbiased criticism) and, because this was public television, I could never mention any of them by name. Advertisers still got to say, “That’s our yarn!” when their spot aired, but I could never acknowledge them on camera. All too soon, I felt like I’d switched from PBS to QVC—though I accepted the mental challenge of following the rules while staying true to my core.

A few weeks before it was time to shoot all my episodes for the season, yarn began showing up at my doorstep. I dutifully knit swatch after swatch after swatch, some in stockinette, others in colorwork or lace, cables or ribbing, so that each yarn could be shown in what I felt was its ideal knitted state.

Then came wardrobe. While everyone else wore beautiful handknits on set, Marilyn thought it would be fun if Eunny and I did the segment in lab coats. “You know,” she smiled, “like you’re in the yarn lab with Clara and Eunny?”

Interweave had just entered the knitting conference fray with its Interweave Knitting Lab conference, and event staff all wore lab coats. All we had to do was stick white labels over the black Knitting Lab logos and we were good to go. As dreadfully unflattering as they were, and as much as they trapped perspiration under the bright lights (causing the stickers to peel off), in hindsight these lab coats ended up being a godsend. While everyone else grappled with costume changes, all I needed to bring was a few jewel-toned T-shirts to wear underneath.

The show was filmed in a suburban Cleveland studio whose claim to fame was that Bob Dylan had once filmed something there. The studio was near the back of a 1970s brick building with seedy, deeply tinted windows. It looked like a cross between a porn studio and a setting for a mob hit.

Each season had thirteen episodes, all of which were filmed over the course of one week. We shot two seasons per year, one in the spring, one in the fall. Marilyn, Annie, Eunny, and I stayed at a chain hotel by the freeway, and one or two other guests would pop in and out for their spots. Marilyn played chauffeur, renting a big car and coordinating arrivals so that we could all pile in at the airport. Before we even reached the hotel, we’d make our first stop of the week: Whole Foods.

Due to an unbearably early start time and abundance of junk food at the studio, we were encouraged to stock up on our own breakfast and snack supplies. Eunny and Annie, both being tiny women who subsisted mostly on cigarettes, would get out with a bag of grapes, perhaps some almonds and a yogurt. I, on the other hand, staggered out with at least three bags containing everything but dish soap.

The next morning, long before sunrise, we’d meet in the lobby. Eunny was always the last to arrive.

“She’s like the child genius,” Annie joked. “She stumbles in at the last minute and then totally hits it out of the park.”

Marilyn would drive us to the studio in the rental car, her knowing the way, Annie shouting directions regardless.

The first item on the agenda was makeup, administered by a friendly freelance makeup artist in a brightly lit, mirrored room by the bathrooms. She would then give our hair a quick once-over with a brush before sealing it down with a giant can of Aqua Net. Returning from makeup was like Halloween, everyone turning excitedly to see what you’d become. People assured me I looked great, but I felt like Ronald McDonald in drag.

Once your face was on, you had to be careful. No rubbing or scratching, no messing with your plasticized hair, no drinking except through a straw, and God help you if your nose started to run. It was like walking around with wet nails, only instead of nails it was your entire face. Once the makeup artist was done, she packed up her brushes and left for the day, giving each of us a little stash of powder and lipstick for emergency touch-ups.

Next came the clothes. A studio assistant had already pressed and hung our polyester lab coats, so it was just a matter of picking a shirt that matched whatever shirt Eunny would wear under her lab coat, and I was set for the day. For the rest of her shoots, Eunny came in and out, swapping one sweater for the next from a vast heap of Interweave Knits extras.

In keeping with theater tradition, the studio had a “greenroom” where we all waited our turn. The walls were painted an unflattering shade of yellowish neon green that made your eyes hurt. Tables were arranged around the perimeter, and we each claimed one as our temporary desk for the week, setting up laptops, notes, bags, and snacks.

Out came the trays, giant jelly sheets like bakeries use. Each segment got one tray, and I would set about assigning all my swatches and yarns and sample garments to their proper positions. I wanted my trays to overflow with samples so that I would have enough to talk about once the cameras started rolling. The worst thing that could happen was an empty table and no words to fill your time.

Marilyn patrolled behind me, fingering the swatches.

She was not prone to effusive praise or criticism, so you had to read the signals closely. “Well, this is a lovely stitch,” was cause for rejoicing.

“Is this all you have for Episode 8?” Out came the needles. Occasionally she and Annie pitched in. This was definitely a team effort.

Tables along the middle of the room were heaped with boxes shipped from Interweave. They held all the garment samples, more samples, more yarns, more props in case we needed them. They’d been filming long enough to know that more was always safer.

Soon, Eunny’s face would appear on the big TV at the far end of the room, just above the mini-fridge and plastic tubs of pretzel sticks and Twizzlers. It was a live feed from the studio next door.

Eunny was a pro. A star blogger, she’d been hired by Interweave right out of college, and the TV gig was dumped on top of her magazine-editing duties—but she took to it like a fish to water. Her voice was always steady and calm, her face smiling and assured. Unflappable, she spoke confidently and without ever muttering “um” or “uh.”

As I sorted my swatches, Eunny would begin recording one of her segments in the next room. She’d go over stitch techniques or the steps of whatever garment was being featured in a knitalong for that season. Lace, modular knitting, cables, mosaic, intarsia, all were fair game.

Once the cameras began rolling, Marilyn migrated to the control room, where she’d sit with a local producer and the switcher who pieced together each segment, from camera to camera, as it was being filmed.

Soon I’d get the call that it was my turn. As a rule, we always started with the second episode, holding off on that first episode until the very end, after we were warmed up. I’d gather a tray, take a deep breath, and go in.

The studio had a red ON AIR light by the door. Inside was a huge space with concrete floors, unused props shoved to the side, cords and cables and lights galore, and several cameras atop camel-sized tripods on wheels. At the very back, in the center of it all, was a brightly lit, human-scale dollhouse of a “room,” which was our set. It had wallpaper and bookshelves and baskets, and way up top, a false ceiling complete with skylights.

At this point a handsome young man would approach me and start fishing under my lab coat. He was just clipping a microphone battery pack to the back of my waist, then running the wire around and up to my chest. But it always felt like an awkward first date, with him pinning his tiny corsage of a microphone to my collar. Once you had that mic, you really had to be careful. Any noise you made was immediately broadcast into the earpieces of the camera crew and everyone in the control room. I need not tell you how imperative it was that you turn off your mic before going into the bathroom.

Because distances on screen appear greater than in real life, Eunny and I had to sit knee to knee, so close that I was almost in her lap. There were rules of conduct, the most important one being that I could never, ever look at the camera. She was the only person allowed to address the audience. My job was to sit in her lap, my torso angled toward her but my face pointed toward the camera I wasn’t allowed to look at, and be intelligent and succinct and charming in one take, without ever mentioning the actual name of the product I was discussing. Easy, right?

Resplendent in our white polyester lab coats, we’d go over the premise of that episode. The theme is halo, I’d tell her, and these are the yarns I had to work with. This one (I’d point to the purple sample) has angora, this one (pointing to the green) is all about the qualities of mohair. I’d tell her what I knew and what I wanted to say, as well as what I didn’t know, like why the purple angora didn’t bloom more after I washed it, so she wouldn’t steer the conversation into dangerous territory. She was genuinely curious, taking in what I had to say, fingering the swatches, sharing my surprises and asking good questions. Sometimes, her eyes would go blank when I was in the middle of explaining something. A few seconds later she’d nod, tap her ear, and look back at me, “I’m sorry, what were you saying?”

Eunny wore a translucent earpiece that connected her to the control room. Instructions were constantly being fed to her by not one but two different people. Even during filming, while the cameras were rolling, she’d get whispered words of counsel. Too slow? She’d nudge my leg. Too fast? She’d nudge my leg. Did I say something wrong? She’d nudge my leg. I became terrified of leg nudges.

Then the countdown would begin, “Five . . . four . . .” and a silent three, two, and one in our heads. Eunny and I would gaze intently at something on the table, smiling, heads bent in pretend conversation, before she’d raise her head and toss a smile, “Welcome back!”

On our very first taping, she did her slick intro and threw it to me. I got twenty words in before she tapped her ear, looked at the camera, and said, “I’m sorry, we have to stop.” What had I done?

“You said the name of the yarn,” she said. Dammit.

My mind sprang to action. “If I can’t say this is Harrisville yarn,” I asked, “can I say it was spun in Harrisville, New Hampshire?” After a pause for deliberation, I was given an affirmative.

Cameras back on, we plowed through the rest of the episode in one take. I looked at Eunny, waited for her eyes to lose that distant look. Finally, word came through her earpiece, “We’re good.” Annie came in to take a promotional picture of us with those samples before whisking them away and replacing them with the next tray.

Sometimes Marilyn would come in and offer feedback or request a reshoot. “That was great,” she’d say, but usually it was more like, “Remember to breathe,” or “Try to watch the pace of your speech,” or “We’re picking up a drumming noise whenever you pound the table.” Once she silently unfolded a note reminding us that our microphones were live and asking us to please clean up our banter between takes. Just in case we still didn’t understand, she tapped on her chest where our microphones were pinned. We nodded.

The microphones would go off at lunch, the lab coats would be hung up, and we’d head upstairs to a rooftop break area whose tinted sunroom allegedly came from a Burger King that was being demolished. Meals were brought in. Depending on the day, it was either taco salads, which put everyone in a good mood, or Italian, which left us in a carb stupor for the rest of the afternoon. Crew tended to eat with crew, office staff with office staff, “talent” with support staff and producers.

Once the recycling was sorted and tables wiped clean, we’d return downstairs to powder our faces, reapply our lipstick, spray our hair back in place, don the next outfit, and resume shooting. My afternoons were usually spent in the greenroom mainlining M&Ms and going over my notes and swatches for the next day’s taping, while the big screen showed Eunny with a guest, or her crochet host, Kristin Omdahl, espousing steeks or crochet edgings or any one of an endless supply of topics.

When all was done for the day, we’d pack our bags and pile back into Marilyn’s rental car for dinner. This being the suburbs and us being tired, we’d usually head to one of the strip malls nearby. We’d go for Greek food or to a burger joint with alcoholic milkshakes and big jugs of pickles—and, always, at least one P.F. Chang’s.

Dinnertime conversation was a lesson in diversity. Annie would tell us about her latest fitness regime. (“I tried the Brazilian Butt-Lift, and it lifted my butt, but now it’s bigger!”) They’d talk sports or dating, and gradually Marilyn would steer us toward affordable healthcare or women’s reproductive rights. A waiter would appear and ask whose birthday it was. We’d shake our heads, and he’d say, “Awesome, so it’s just a ladies’ night out, huh?”

Once, at P.F. Chang’s, we did bother to explain that we were there on business, having finished a day of shooting a TV show for PBS. We had to explain what PBS was—“Yeah, like Sesame Street”—pointing to Eunny—“She’s the host”—and Marilyn—“She’s the producer.” Unawed, he continued to call each of us “honey” for the rest of the night.

I’d leave them all shivering by the hotel door, Eunny and Annie puffing away. Marilyn would sometimes join them for her one cigarette of the year, pinching it between her fingers like Groucho Marx.

Collecting my complimentary chocolate-chip cookie in the lobby, I’d go up to my room and set the alarm extra early for the next day. As Eunny and I grew more comfortable with the segment, it took less and less time to shoot. Eventually, I only came for a few days. I always felt sad leaving them behind.

Filming Knitting Daily TV was some of the best fun I’ve ever had. I loved the pressure of the camera rolling, the tight constraints of subject matter, even the obscure PBS filming rules and not being allowed to look at the camera. It was like speed-dating through everything I knew and loved, with one hand duct-taped behind my back. More than that, I loved being part of a team.

I was there when Eunny signed off for her last episode before leaving Interweave, and I was there when Marilyn shook hands with the crew for the last time before she handed over the producer role to Karin Strom (who, too, has since left). I figured that transition was as good a time as any for me to hang up my lab coat, too, and let them reshape the show from scratch with a new host, new producer, new studio, segments, and crew.

I may not have won us an Emmy, but I did have a woman point at me once and exclaim, “Hey! You come on right after Designing Women!”