41 Facts About Maureen Orth

Maureen Orth was born on 1943 and is an American journalist, author, and a Special Correspondent for Vanity Fair magazine.

Maureen Orth is the founder of Marina Orth Foundation, which has established a model education program in Colombia emphasizing technology, English, and leadership.

Maureen Orth is the widow of TV journalist Tim Russert.

Maureen Orth was born in 1943, Berkeley, California, USA and grew up in the Bay Area of California, the daughter of Helen Orth and Karl Orth.

Maureen Orth has two siblings, Christina Orth and the late Dan Orth.

Maureen Orth studied at the University of California, Berkeley, where she graduated in 1964 with a degree in political science.

At Berkeley, Maureen Orth was a member of the Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority.

Maureen Orth later earned a master's degree in Journalism and Documentary Film from UCLA in 1969.

Maureen Orth began her journalism career in San Francisco in 1970 chronicling issues of the counter culture for the San Francisco Examiner.

In 1972, Maureen Orth joined TVTV, a pioneering video group that had obtained a PBS grant to cover both the Republican and Democratic Conventions in Miami, Florida.

Maureen Orth was hired as one of the first female writers for Newsweek, covering music, books and movies.

Maureen Orth was a plaintiff in a successful 1970 lawsuit claiming that the newsroom discriminated against women.

At Newsweek, Maureen Orth wrote eight cover stories in five years on subjects including Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Stevie Wonder, and The Godfather Part II film.

Maureen Orth was the only journalist to report from the notoriously chaotic set of Apocalypse Now in the Philippines.

In 1975, Maureen Orth took a brief leave of absence from Newsweek to be the assistant to director Lina Wertmuller, in Italy, during the filming of Seven Beauties.

Maureen Orth later wrote about the experience in an article for the magazine.

When news broke in August 1977 that Elvis Presley had died, Maureen Orth requested to be sent to Memphis, Tennessee to cover the story.

Maureen Orth wrote the first news piece to suggest that Presley's official cause of death might not have been a heart attack.

Maureen Orth was a contestant on The Gong Show and wrote about it for the magazine.

Between 1978 and 1980 Maureen Orth was a senior editor at New York, and New West Magazines.

Maureen Orth was a contributing editor at Vogue from 1984 to 1989, and a columnist for New York Woman from 1986 to 1990.

Maureen Orth has freelanced for the New York Times, Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal.

Maureen Orth has written for Vanity Fair since 1988 and has been a Special Correspondent for that magazine since 1993.

Maureen Orth secured the first interview with Thatcher just months after leaving office.

Maureen Orth has written articles on Tom Cruise and Scientology, Madonna, Tina Turner, Karl Lagerfeld and Conrad Black.

Maureen Orth chronicled the Colombian hostage rescue of Ingrid Betancourt in a November 2008 piece titled "Inside Colombia's Hostage War" and wrote about Elda Neyis, aka Karina, Colombia's most notorious FARC female revolutionary.

Maureen Orth was one of the first journalists to report on child molestation charges against celebrities Woody Allen and Michael Jackson.

Maureen Orth observed and wrote about two of Jackson's trials including a civil lawsuit filed against him in 2003 by concert promoter Marcel Avram, and the 2005 criminal trial on child molestation, for which Jackson was acquitted.

Maureen Orth reported extensively for Vanity Fair on the child molestation charges against director Woody Allen.

In 2013, Maureen Orth broke the news that a video of Dylan confiding to Farrow about what she said happened with Allen had been obtained by New York's Fox Channel 5 but was never aired.

Dylan discussed the impact the child molestation case had on her life and the Farrow family Maureen Orth interviewed eight of Farrow's children for the 9,400-word story which generated significant media interest in Farrow's son, Ronan, as possibly the biological son of Frank Sinatra.

Maureen Orth began conducting research and gathering information on Cunanan and spent nine weeks developing a story set to appear in Vanity Fair.

Two years later, Maureen Orth published Vulgar Favors: Andrew Cunanan, Gianni Versace, and the Largest Failed Manhunt in US History.

Maureen Orth dedicated the book to her late husband, Tim Russert, and their son Luke, as well as Orth's mother.

At the 2018 Emmy Awards, the series, based on Maureen Orth's reporting, won seven Emmy Awards including Outstanding Limited Series, Outstanding Casting, and Outstanding Contemporary Costumes.

Maureen Orth appeared onstage with the cast and producers to accept the award.

Maureen Orth is the dedicatee of her friend Larry McMurtry's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Lonesome Dove.

Maureen Orth has served on the Executive Board of the College of Letters and Sciences, University of California, Berkeley and been a Trustee of the University of California, Berkeley, Foundation since 2010.

Maureen Orth has served on the Boards of Internews and the National Council of Returned Peace Corps Volunteers.

Maureen Orth developed an interest in Colombia while a Peace Corps Volunteer in Medellin following college.

The Marina Maureen Orth Foundation serves 21 schools, and each K-5 primary school student their own laptop through the One Laptop Per Child program.