How COVID-19 changed life at home for Sunrise’s Natalie Barr
Sunrise newsreader Natalie Barr is accustomed to covering huge global news stories but COVID-19 is a story that has affected her personally as well as professionally.
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Sunrise newsreader Natalie Barr is a seasoned journalist who is accustomed to covering huge global news stories.
However reporting on the affects of COVID-19, both on the Channel 7 breakfast program and the nightly news, has been one of the most personal stories she’s ever worked on.
The usually private Barr told The Saturday Telegraph that like so many Aussies, the virus wreaked havoc on her husband, Andrew Thompson’s, business.
Thompson is a film and television editor, who was nominated for an Oscar for his work on short film The Eleven O’Clock.
“It was a personal because like everyone else’s family, it was affecting my family. My husband has a business in the entertainment industry and it had to go into hibernation,” she said.
“The whole entertainment and advertising industry shut down worldwide, so they had no work. They had to stand down all their staff.”
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Barr said she understood “the trauma” her viewers were going through, as she was living a similar life in her home.
“I was talking to business owners out on the road and how their lives were turned upside down and then I was going home and living that with my husband,” she said.
Barr stepped in to host the No. 1 rating breakfast program alongside David Koch when the peak of the global pandemic hit, while Sam Armytage took time off to recover from a respiratory infection.
However Barr’s experience at home only made her more determined to get answers and advice from the guests who would come on the program;
“It’s really important (to me) to think like someone at home would be thinking. Not to ask the smart arse question, not to get a headline but trying to get the information to the viewer,” she said.
And her approach proved effective, with Sunrise seeing a spike in viewers during the peak of the pandemic.
The show is still the No. 1 breakfast show in the country, averaging over 300,000 five-city metro viewers a day, ahead of ABC News Breakfast and Today.
Originally published as How COVID-19 changed life at home for Sunrise’s Natalie Barr