Mary McNamara

Mary McNamara is the force behind “TV Crush”, the widely-read blog found inside “Multichannel News”, the magazine known as “the cable industry’s book-of-record”. MCN is the bible by which TV insiders, advertisers, programmers and media decision-makers navigate their complex industry. “TV Crush” is perhaps the only dissenting voice those executives will hear. MCN is owned by one of the world’s largest publishing companies, Reed, which also owns Lexus-Nexus and dozens of widely read magazines, including “Variety”. Mary was born and raised in Keokuk (Iowa), watching TV on a black-and-white Zenith that pulled in two channels. Even as a kindergartner, Mary was a fan of westerns and recalls her first big TV disappointment — George Maharis’ departure from the cast of “Route 66”. Her first crush was “Man from Uncle”, but her one true love was the original “Star Trek”. Mary majored in Anthropology at the University of New Mexico and minored in skiing the back bowl of Taos. After many years of working in corporate and entertainment PR, she switched sides to indulge her life-long passion for programming.