Things are tough in the newspaper industry. Falling circulation, layoffs, drops in ad revenue have taken their toll as tempers fray. And now the newsroom at The Washington Post has erupted into fisticuffs.
Politico reports:
Washington Post executive editor Marcus Brauchli found himself in the middle of an altercation Friday evening between Style reporter Manuel Roig-Franzia and editor Henry Allen, but will not say whether the two have been reprimanded by the paper.
"We take this incident seriously and will address it appropriately," Brauchli told POLITICO, declining to comment further.
Reports that Allen punched Roig-Franzia surfaced Monday morning on FishbowlDC, Washingtonian and City Paper (which reported Brauchli was traveling).
Multiple Post sources independently confirmed to POLITICO that Roig-Franzia got hit while defending colleague Monica Hesse from harsh criticism leveled by her editor, Allen.
Allen, according to the Washingtonian, had told Hesse that a piece she had written was "the second worst story I have seen in Style in 43 years."
Roig-Franzia, also working a story with Hesse that ran Saturday, told Allen not to be such a "c—sucker."
Allen swung twice, with one punch hitting Roig-Franzi, according to sources. Next, staffers on the 4th floor -- including Brauchli, whose office is temporarily across from the Style section -- jumped in to break up the altercation.
Allen, a Pulitzer Prize-winning editor who already took a buyout, has just three weeks left on his contract, and was not in the office Monday. Roig-Franzia is in the office.
Allen, who is 68, commented that he was shocked at the media attention the scuffle engendered. He said that in the old days, expletive-filled newsroom scuffles were everyday occurrences. Ah, the good old days.
