Talking Dateline: Conversations at CrimeCon
Dateline NBC
In this special edition of Talking Dateline from CrimeCon 2026, host Josh Mankiewicz shares a live conversation with NBC News correspondent a
Key takeaways
- Dateline's shift to in-depth murder cases was not initially Mankiewicz's idea but became a powerful way to connect with audiences emotionally and socially.
- Covering crime allows deeper exploration of human emotions like love, hate, greed, and grief—insights that political journalism couldn't provide.
Main topics
- Evolution of Dateline from varied stories to focused crime coverage
- Emotional and societal impact of true crime storytelling
Notable quotes
"If you want to understand human emotion... then you need to be covering crime."
"You know, unless you are very well known. Your murder is probably not going to get a tremendous amount of ink in your local paper."
Conclusion
Josh Mankiewicz reflects on how Dateline has evolved into a platform for deep human stories,
Transcript preview
Speaker 2 (0:04) Hey everybody, it's Josh Mankiewicz, and today we have a special edition of Talking Dateline. This week, instead of going behind the scenes of a particular episode, we want to take you back to a live conversation from CrimeCon 2026 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Now, I'm known at CrimeCon as the mayor of CrimeCon. I did not give myself that title. I actually would be thrilled if I could get rid of that title and somebody else could take it. At the moment, I haven't. So I'm not the self-appointed mayor. I'm appointed by others. So at this session of CrimeCon, I sat down with Ellison Barber, who was an NBC News correspondent, but also the host of the Netflix original podcast called Allegedly. That's produced by our colleagues at NBC News Studios. Now, Ellison and I sat down and discussed all things Dateline. Everything from how Dateline began covering murder cases to how I got my own start. To my colleague and my frenemy, Keith Morrison. I don't even like to say his name out loud. We talked about all of that. So, here we go. Hi, everybody. I cannot see you because of these lights, but I hear you out there. So, one of you... Speaker 2 (1:27) made me the key to CrimeCon City key. It says mayor on it here. I just want you to know I have it and it's a cherished possession. Although I do believe that the mayor of CrimeCon, like other offices that we all hold dear, should probably have term limits. Anyway, but thank you. And wonderful to see everybody. Speaker 4 (1:53) Let's talk Dateline. Yes. When you think about your career, why did you want to start covering these cases and focus on crime in the first place? Speaker 2 (2:02) I did not want to start covering these cases. Speaker 4 (2:04) Really? Speaker 2 (2:05) Who Speaker 4 (2:05) made Speaker 2 (2:05) you? Our now retired executive producer, a guy named David Corvo. Speaker 2 (2:14) Said to me one day like we're gonna you know I've been at Dateline ten years and we'd done as many of you probably remember we were doing all kinds of stories within an hour and we were doing like five or six stories within those 60 minutes and they were all unrelated and he said to me we're gonna start trying to do these these sort of Murder cases over over an hour. I don't think you are what we were doing that I was thinking like he's gonna want to watch that So clearly, yeah, you want to come to me for ideas about where America is going. And now, like, look where we are, right? So I certainly did not see this coming. But then I went to Reno, Nevada, and I did the story of Brianna Dennison, Speaker 3 (3:02) who Speaker 2 (3:03) had vanished and then subsequently was found, murdered, and then we did the story again. there had been that sort of giant change to it. And that was sort of the first, I think that was the first hour on a murder case that I did. And the reaction from the audience, there was not any mistaking that. And that was when I, and also I got some satisfaction out of covering that story in a way that I had not anticipated. And then we were kind of off and running because all the other stories were getting a sort of, you know, similar response. And it was a... I suddenly realized we had sort of tapped into something that I had not seen out there. So I can't really take any credit for this because not Speaker 4 (3:44) only was Speaker 2 (3:44) it not my idea, I thought they were nuts. Why Speaker 4 (3:48) have you stayed with it? How has that changed for you? Speaker 2 (3:50) You know... When I started in journalism, which was 50 years ago, I was first I was working on the assignment desk in the middle of the night and weekends and that kind of thing. And the first job that I was ever promoted to, I was at ABC News. And I was the off-air reporter covering the U.S. House, which I did for three years back in the late 70s. And I really thought at the time that sort of covering Washington was the be-all and end-all of journalism, and that if I was lucky, you know, I'd be the White House correspondent someday, something like that. But I was a political reporter for a long time. And then I came to Dateline and did these other kinds of stories for a couple of years, and then we started on crime and the criminal justice system. And I saw how that connected with people in a way that Washington coverage didn't. Speaker 2 (4:40) But that was a way of sort of like recognizing, I sort of came to recognize how, you know, if you want to understand human emotion, if you want to understand, you know, love and hate and greed and lust and the things that drive people, then you need to be covering crime, which I didn't realize, but it's unquestionably true. And it's been very, very, very satisfying. It has been. Speaker 4 (5:10) You had the first live event in Nashville. Tell us about that. I mean, I imagine some of the people here have been there as well. What was that like for you? Are there going to be more? Speaker 2 (5:21) Yes, there are going to be more. There's going to be another one. I don't know exactly when it's going to be. I don't think it's going to be in Nashville again. I think it's going to be somewhere else, but I'm not sure where that is. But look, it's, I mean. It was like sort of concentrated crime con because a lot of people are here for a lot of different reasons. But everybody who was there in Nashville at that event was there just to see us and talk with us. And that was great. There was a very long period of time in television in which you really could only guess at what the audience was thinking or what they liked. And that was through the ratings. But of course, that's a really imprecise way of doing it because if there's a football game on opposite you, you're not gonna do as well as if some other program is on. And that doesn't really have anything to do with how well you're presenting your story. So events like this and the thing we did in Nashville