On one sudden morning of July 15, 1974, the popular and prominent 29-year-old television presenter, Christine Chubbuck arrived at her local Florida station. She worked there as a television presenter for Channel 40. Something strange happened that day and it was completely unexpected.
When she arrived at her office she asked to change the running order of her show titled Suncoast Digest. The thing that happened was completely not expected by Christine’s Chubbuck colleagues and they did not even notice anything that would lead them to question what she asked them to do.
How Did The news reporter shoot herself air?
Christine Chubbuck’s program aired just like usual days and timings at sharp 9.30 am. However, within minutes the production team went through a technical issue and the prerecorded VT could not be rolled. There was a complete dead moment air until Christine returned back to her script. She started reading:
“In keeping with Channel 40’s policy of bringing you the latest in blood and guts and in living color,” she said, “you are going to see another first: an attempted suicide.”
Just after completing this sentence, Christine Chubbuck put out a .38 Calibre Smith & Wesson revolver from her office bag where she usually keeps her puppets and the next that happened was completely unexpected. The news reporter killed herself on air. It was just behind her right ear and the show was live and thousand of viewers witnessed this on live tv. Christine Chubbuck shoots herself video got viral all over the internet and was shared to different channels immediately.
After this sudden incident, the news reporter was rushed to hospital but was announced dead later. According to the reports, one of the coworkers even found a blood-soaked news story on her desk. It was actually Chubbuck’s account of her own suicide death, written in a longhand form.
Was There An Actual Christine Chubbuck shoots herself video?
As the news reporter killed herself on live tv- there was really actual footage of the whole suicide incident. It was circulated all around and within hours the entire story made headlines internationally. But just after a few months the news of the Christine Chubbuck shooting live was forgotten. The investigation was transferred to some morbid investigators of that time.
But as the internet age arrived and took hold, more and more people found out that Christine Chubbuck shoots herself video. It is still considered one of the most obscure historical footnotes. Especially when not one but there are two films about Christine Chubbuck that premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. The main actor Rebecca Hall has given a forensic account of entire Chubbuck’s final weeks. In fact, Hall had never ever heard about Chubbuck when she first met the director f her film.
What Was Hall’s Reaction To The Real Life Story?
Hall’s first reaction to the script was to hide the screenplay from herself and who would ever want to see any macabre project. Here’s what she said in an interview.
“My gut feeling was fear, “I didn’t know why you would make this film. There’s an endless circular irony to the things she did. Of course, she was suffering from a horrible, horrible mental illness, and this is the end result of that. But against that, the things she did have to be contextualized as a sort of primal scream against a world that was becoming more exploitative. She was literally exploiting her own suffering in front of the world. That demands a balancing act.
Why Did The News reporter shot herself air?
Many people raised the question of why did Christine Chubbuck do that? Especially after watching the film because the film had not given any easy answers to this question for the audience. Christine Chubbuck was essentially unknowable where there is so much potential of having false certainties about her as well. It’s about someone who was a true journalist who committed suicide. In short, it is still unknown why did a talented tv presenter actually kill herself on live tv. Thousand of the viewers witnessed the TV reporter’s suicide live on air. After her family’s request, all the videos were reputedly destroyed at the request of her family.
