To Catch a Falling Star

Any day now, the Federal Communications Commission will make a long-awaited ruling that could turn Washington, D.C., into a one-newspaper town. The agency is expected to decide whether or not Texas Multimillionaire Joe L. Allbritton, who bought a controlling interest in the stuffy, money-losing Washington Star (circ. 370,000) last fall, can also acquire the parent company's six moneymaking radio and television stations as well. The FCC has a rule against perpetuating such local monopolies when ownership changes hands, but Allbritton has pleaded for a waiver, saying that he needs profits from the stations to keep the paper alive.

The FCC has not yet had to test its cross-ownership rule, but the Star is, to put it mildly, a special case. For one thing, the paper is the capital's only alternative to the fat, influential and steadfastly liberal Washington Post (circ. 536,000). For another, the Star is in the middle of a remarkable transformation. Allbritton, 50, took over the paper last September with a $5 million payment to descendants of the Adams, Kauffmann and Noyes families that have owned it since 1867, plus a $5 million loan to the paper. He brought in James Bellows, 52, the highly regarded former editor of the old New York Herald Tribune and associate editor of the Los Angeles Times, to put some light back into the burnt-out Star.

Bellows has since brightened the paper's makeup, hired irreverent Pulitzer-prizewinning Cartoonist Patrick Oliphant away from the Denver Post, added a progressive, young editorial-page editor and dropped a few antediluvian columnists, and proffered readers a daily front-page "Q and A" column (one surprise subject: Post Publisher Katharine Graham) and "The Ear," a brassy capital gossip column.

One of Bellows' most visible innovations has been what he calls the Star's "writer in residence," a big-name author come to town for a stint as a columnist. The Star's first star: Jimmy Breslin (How the Good Guys Finally Won). He has been sitting in the city room since June 13, belching forth morale-boosting obscenities, and writing lively front-page impressions of such local scenes as an unnamed bureaucrat's failed seduction of a coworker. Breslin will be followed next month by Sportscaster Dick Schaap, and in the fall by Writer Nora Ephron and New Journalist Tom Wolfe. Most of those celebrities were attracted not so much by the money ($500 a week) as by their long friendship with former Trib Colleague Bellows and by the Star's fight for life. "The Star is the only place I would come to write in Washington," says Breslin. "It's no fun at the Post. Too big and successful, like an insurance company."

Texas-Size Losses. Successful is one thing the Star is not. The paper lost $15 million in the four years before Allbritton arrived. It is expected to lose another $8 to $10 million this year, despite an unprecedented agreement last fall by 540 employees to work a four-day week--at a 20% cut in pay--rather than face layoffs. Daily circulation has dropped 3% since Allbritton took over, and recession-hit 1975 advertising revenues are down 11% from last year. According to the purchase agreement, Allbritton can pull out of the deal at any time and get back his $5 million loan. He has carefully avoided threatening to withdraw if the FCC refuses to give him relief, but he would have little incentive to suffer Texas-size losses. In the absence of any other acceptable buyer, the Star's owning families could elect to fold it and live off broadcasting.

The word in Washington last week was that FCC members may order public hearings before they rule. Further delay, however, may be the last thing the cash-starved paper needs. Still, Jim Bellows does not think his Star will fall. Says he: "There are enough people in this area who don't move their lips when they read to support two quality newspapers." Breslin is also cheering hard. "Things are changing here," he told TIME Correspondent Arthur White. "The editorial policy no longer sounds like it was written by Jefferson Davis' press secretary. The morale is good. People work hard." Breslin has only one complaint: "Allbritton hasn't even bought me a drink yet. Tell him I want that drink."

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