News anchor Rune Kjos turns 50. Around 20 of these have been spent in TV 2. He looks back on a career that has contained a lot.
Now he shares robber stories and opens up about his most demanding working days in this portrait interview with TV 2.
GET READY: Before Kjos goes on air, he has to go to the dressing room and go to the make-up artist. Photo: Goran Jorganovich / TV 2
Touching tribute
This week several of Kjos’ colleagues had turned up to sing, eat cake and celebrate the anniversary.
Speeches were made that garnered a lot of laughter.
Colleagues describe Kjos as a warm man with a lot of consideration for those around him.
– It was violent. I was very moved. I never thought there would be so many people. There were both new colleagues and old colleagues. It was very, very nice.
He is also described as a man who is well above average concerned with having a good atmosphere in the workplace, and who does not want unnecessary conflicts and confrontations.
– How is it then to have a job, where a large part of the job is to ask critical questions?
– I have thought about this many times, that the combination is a bit strange, considering that I shy away from conflict. But I take on a role when I step into the role of journalist. Then it is perfectly fine to ask critical questions and engage in confrontation.
The story of why Kjos became a journalist is also out of the ordinary.
FAMOUS STYLE: TV viewers often see Kjos in this chair. Photo: Goran Jorganovich / TV 2
Garbage and DJ
Kjos became a father when he was 20 years old. To support his family, he took a job that is far removed from the industry he works in now.
– We had to have food on the table! So I got a job in Oslo’s cleaning service as a rubbish bin repairer. If a wheel fell off a bin, they called in a team. Then a colleague and I moved out to repair the rubbish bins.
He didn’t have this job for very long. He can somewhat surprisingly thank the military for that.
– In the 90s I got a job in radio. I was going to do military service, but I had just become a father. Therefore, I did not want to join the military, so I chose so-called civil service. In those days you could get a job in radio, instead of being in the military.
– That arrangement has now been removed, but that’s how I ended up at Radio Classic. To this day, I regret not joining the military, because I probably would have benefited from it.
After getting his first radio job, his career went up quickly. Kjos became a well-known radio profile in Drammen, and he was also hired as a DJ in several places.
In 2004, TV 2 decided to create a radio channel, Kanal 24, and the radio spire from Drammen was brought into the heat.
DEMANDING: Kjos often works long days. He himself is more of a fan of evening shifts than the earliest shifts. Photo: Goran Jorganovich / TV 2
“Dad! You killed Nick!”
To celebrate the Kanal 24 job, the self-proclaimed sauna enthusiast threw a little party for himself in the family’s sauna.
What he thought was “a party for one”, was unfortunately a party for two. Kjos just didn’t know.
– We had a hamster at the time, and it is a nocturnal animal. So the hamster made a lot of noise at night. The most soundproof room we had in the house was the sauna. Then the hamster Nick could run around in his wheel at night in peace and quiet. The day after we had placed him there, I was supposed to celebrate that I had got a job. So I fired up the sauna, he says, and continues:
– I turned up the temperature to 80 degrees. Then I had a beer and talked to the man who was to become my boss. 45 minutes later I entered the sauna again, and by then the damage was done. Nick was dead. I had forgotten he was there.
Kjos became very distressed, and was soon visited by crying children who shouted: “Daddy! You have killed Nick!”.
Kjos says that the dear family member was never replaced, but that they have since got a dog.
He jokingly says that he was eventually forgiven by both the children and his wife, and that they have gotten over the sauna fad.
ON THE GO: In certain incidents, Kjos is also sent out into the field. He doesn’t always work from the studio. Photo: Goran Jorganovich / TV 2
Sometimes things go wrong
Kjos has also had many more opportunities to celebrate job news, as since his employment in 2003 he has worked in several departments at the TV 2 house.
– I joined the Nyhetskanalen adventure in 2007. At the time, no one believed in the Nyhetskanalen. We had enormous team spirit and were keen to disprove the critics. We learned as we went, and made mistakes, which we learned from. Now we are still Norway’s third largest channel, and I am very proud of that. There are incredibly good people at all levels, who have worked hard for many years for this.
When you are live on TV for so many hours straight, a few mistakes and blunders occasionally happen.
Kjos takes this with crushing calm.
– I guess I myself feel that I am overrepresented in the blunder videos for TV 2. I say a lot of strange things from time to time. When almost your entire working life is about being on, something must go wrong. That’s part of the charm. When someone asks if they can make a funny case out of a mistake, I always say yes. I hope the viewers just find it funny that we make mistakes too. TV 2 must have a twinkle in its eye.
– It’s almost a lifestyle, being live so much. I need to see a red light, indicating that I am alive. It’s a shot in the arm, he says with a laugh.
Don’t forget the July 22 case
Although things occasionally go wrong on live TV, it usually goes well for Kjos. He is considered one of the most experienced and confident news anchors in TV 2, and was therefore one of the anchors assigned to work on the 22 July trial.
When asked what is the most demanding thing he has done in his career, it is precisely this trial that is mentioned.
– It will always be with me, no matter what. To sit and listen to the terrorist Breivik talk about his theories. To listen to the despair in the voice of the next of kin. We sat day in and day out, listening to all this. It was incredibly demanding, but also felt to be very important. Then you feel our social mission.
COMMUTER: At the end of the working day, drive Kjos home to Drammen. He has been commuting this way for a number of years. Photo: Goran Jorganovich / TV 2
Kjos’ long experience of going live, both from radio and TV, is now also used in a new form. It is Kjos who trains newly employed TV 2 reporters, and holds courses several times a year.
– I hold live courses, where people my children’s age come. I would not have become familiar with these if I had not taken the course. Many of these talented people work in completely different departments than me. When I started at TV 2, there were so-called “seniors” you could ask for advice. At first I thought it was scary that I have become a senior, that I have become so old that people come to me for advice. But it’s not scary, it’s just so nice. I feared this at first, but now it is one of the things I appreciate the most.
