I GOING PLACES

WEEK OF
OCT.27-NOV.2

SPECIAL EVENTS

BIRMINGHAM
COMMUNITY HOUSE

380 S. Bates, Magical
Matt's Family Magic
Show, 1 p.m. Saturday,
admission, 644-5832

PALACE

One Championship Drive,
Auburn Hills, WWF
Superstars of Wrestling, 8
p.m. today, Rowdy Roddy
Piper vs. Ravishing Rick
Rude, Ultimate Warrior
vs. Andre the Giant, and
more, admission,
377-0100.

GREENFIELD
VILLAGE

Dearborn, "Fifty Years of
TV," through Jan. 2, -
admission, 271-1620.

THEATER

JEWISH COMMUNITY
CENTER

Cheryl Chodun on her way to report a news-breaking story.

6600 W. Maple Road,
West Bloomfield, West
Side Story, through Nov.
5, admission, 661-1000.

DETROIT INSTITUTE
OF ARTS

5200 Woodward Avenue,
Marivaux's The
Provincial Heiress and
The Island of the Slaves, 8
p.m. Wednesday,
admission, 832-2730.

PERFORMANCE
NETWORK

408 W. Washington, Ann
Arbor, Trane: Beyond the
Blues, Thursday through
Nov. 12, admission,
663-0681.

ADRIEN CHANDLER

C

Special to The Jewish News

rack infested neigh-
borhoods. Murder
trials. Police investi-
gations. Political in-
trigue. Covering
these subjects is what Chan-
nel 7 (WXYZ-TV) reporter
Cheryl Chodun likes to do
best. "My adrenalin pumps
when I'm on a breaking
story," Chodun explains.
Chodun describes herself as
tough, energetic and focused.
Her colleagues and co-
workers describe her as gut-
sy and non-stop. WXYZ-TV
News Director Rob Rowe calls
Chodun "a truly gifted
reporter."
As the "cops, crime, courts,
and local government"
reporter for Channel 7, it is
not unusual to find Chodun

No matter the danger involved,
Channel 7's Cheryl Chodun
doesn't miss a beat.

in the middle of a political
fracas or a volatile situation.
Take, for example, last fall's
Springle Street barricaded
gunman incident, in which a
Detroit police officer was
fatally shot during the stan-
doff. Chodun was there
throughout the ordeal. She
won an Emmy for coverage of
the story, in her first year as
a television reporter.
Chodun's TV news repor-
ting career didn't follow the
usual path.
A graduate of Wayne State
University, Chodun's first
news assignment happened
almost on a whim. She mar-

ried young and had two
children right away. Chodun
was doing some public rela-
tions work for the nursery
school where her children
were enrolled. While dropp-
ing off a press release at the
Birmingham Eccentric,
"something buzzed inside my
head. 'Could I do some free-
lancing?' " she wondered. The
paper agreed, and Chodun's
first free-lance assignment
was the Oakland County
child killer. "What a story!
My first free-lance story was
the lead story. After that, I
was hooked on the news
business."

Six months later, while on
an assignment for the Detroit
News "Sunday Magazine,"
Chodun's work came to the
attention of then-WXYZ-TV
news director Phil Nye, who
hired her to be a TV writer.
She had no television writing
experience. "Phil Nye said,
`We'll train you; we'll help you
out.' But of course in this
business, nobody ever trains
you," she says. "It's like
throwing you into a sea full of
sharks, and you sink or swim!
But I was a quick study and
learned quickly."
Chodun soon discovered her
true love was reporting. But
with no on-camera ex-
perience, it appeared unlike-
ly she would make it on-the-
air. She decided she had to try
and knocked on a lot of news
room doors. "People kept tell-
ing me, 'Cheryl, you've got to

.

RIDGEDALE
PLAYERS

205 W. Long Lake Road,
Troy, The Prisoner of
Second Avenue, through
Sunday, admission,
644-8328.

FARMINGTON
PLAYERS

32332 W. 12 Mile Road,
Farmington Hills, Mr.
Roberts, through Nov. 18,
admission, 538-1670.

HILBERRY THEATER

Wayne State University,
Detroit, The Philadelphia
Story, through Nov. 25;
Wenceslas Square,
through Nov. 24,
admission, 577-2972.
BONSTET A
THEATER, Wayne State
University, Detroit, My
Sister in the House,
Continued on Page 83

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

77