We thought our readers/viewers might like to learn about the folks who work at Idaho Public Television. Because there are so many people who work behind the scenes, you may have seen some of them, or maybe you’ve only heard about them. Today we would like to introduce Producer/Director Forrest Burger.
IdahoPTV’s Carol Beres sat down with Forrest to learn about his role in the production department. “I produce documentaries for Outdoor Idaho and Idaho Experience,” he says. “I started with Outdoor Idaho. Then, since Bruce Reichert retired, we’ve jiggered things a little bit so that Lauren Melink is taking over Outdoor Idaho and my main responsibility now is to produce pledge shows for Outdoor Idaho and Idaho Experience.” Forrest will still help with the other shows and the half-hour shows here and there.
Forrest grew up in a neighboring state. “I grew up in Hood River, Oregon,” he says. He went to college at the University of Oregon, where he earned a communications degree, and then moved to Tokyo, Japan. “I taught English for a year and a half. And then I landed a job with CNN Tokyo. And I worked there as a videographer/photojournalist/editor for three years.” Forrest and his wife decided to move back to America, near the Big Apple. “We lived in New Jersey for about eight years. My first job in New York was at WABC, which is ABC News’s flagship station…then I landed a job at CBS News as a video editor, and I worked there for almost eight years. The latter part of that, almost four years, was as a video editor at 60 Minutes.”
They eventually moved back to the West Coast when his wife was recruited for a job in Portland. Forrest decided to start his own video production company when they moved and he had it for almost 22 years. It was during the many trips to Idaho for their daughter’s soccer tournaments that their eyes were opened to the possibility of moving to the Gem State. “Our daughter played pretty high-level club soccer and they have regional soccer tournaments here. She went on to play soccer at the University of Montana. I was in between a couple of projects. I had been doing health care [videos] for a long time, and I just thought, ‘You know, how many more times can I make Dr. Smith look good?’” He laughs. “I kinda wanted to get back to my roots of being more in broadcast, and especially, more documentary-style [videos].” Forrest took their trailer for a stay in Boise to check out the town in depth. Before he arrived, he emailed IdahoPTV’s general manager at the time, Ron Pisaneschi, to let him know he’d be in town. Ron replied, “Oh sure, and while you’re in town, I want to introduce you to the H.R. person.” Forrest came to the station and met with everyone and they told him they had a job opening for Outdoor Idaho. And the rest, as they say, is history.
In his free time, Forrest likes to bike-ride a little and do some traveling. But his main hobby is to “shoot video and take pictures. I do what I love, so I’m fortunate enough; I think a lot of us here probably are fortunate enough to have a job that’s not a job. It is a passion.” He does admit to watching college football games and rooting on his beloved Oregon Ducks. Forrest’s favorite part of the Gem State? “The beauty and the diversity of the state. You have desert, you have high mountains. You have evergreens, you have lakes. You have rivers, you have everything like that.” He also expresses admiration for another part of Idaho: the people. “I grew up in Oregon in the 1970s; those were my high school years. And Idahoans today remind me of what Oregonians were, back in the 70s. It’s still a ‘please’ and ‘thank you,’ ‘How are you?’ ‘Can I help you?’ kind of state. Working for Outdoor Idaho and Idaho Experience, we get to travel the state and meet a whole slew of people. And for the most part, [they are] very, very nice, welcoming people.” He remembers when he worked on an Outdoor Idaho episode about barns. “I’d see a barn, drive down some long gravel driveway, and go up and knock on somebody’s door. And the [first reaction] would be ‘Who are you?’ ‘Why are you here?’ As soon as I said ‘I’m with Outdoor Idaho,’ it was like, ‘Oh, we love that show! Come on in! You want a cup of coffee? What can we do?’”
When the urge to snack comes up, Forrest likes a slice of pizza and some ice cream. “And I also like Thai food,” he adds. And the Sesame Street characters come to mind for his favorite PBS Kids characters, but the top one in his mind is Grover. “He’s a cool dude.”
Idaho Public Television News 