This week's New York magazine contains an in-depth profile/cover story of a somewhat downtrodden Katie Couric. And while pointing out Couric's misgivings is certainly nothing new, the article admirably strives for a fair and unbalanced portrayal, coming off at times as sympathetic and at times unrelentingly critical, occasionally offering rationalizations for Couric's disappointing tenure at CBS but generally following those up with tacit acknowledgments of their equally convincing counterarguments.

As a result, the tone of the piece hovers on uneven, with Couric's public persona of cheerfulness occasionally infiltrated by her dry sarcasm, as when she details the Evening News' struggle to find its audience ("'My parents,' she says drily. 'I know they're watching'") or when she describes her efforts to tone down her wardrobe ("I try to give them as little to talk about as possible, without becoming Pat on Saturday Night Live").

Most interesting, perhaps, are the aspects of the article that project a certain unspoken vernacular onto Katie's prechoreographed responses.

Would she have taken the job if she had known it would turn out this way? Couric hesitates. If Moonves had offered her the job she’s doing today, she admits, she would have thought twice about it. “It would have been less appealing to me,” she says. “It would have required a lot more thought.”

It makes you wonder if she doesn’t have days when she wakes up and wishes she hadn’t jumped to CBS News. “I mean, of course. I’m human. I’m not going around, ‘Dee-da dee-da dee,’” she says. “I have days when I’m like, ‘Oh my God, what did I do?’”

She pauses.

“But for some weird reason, they don’t happen that often.”

And that's where the article excels. The dramatic pauses. The involuntary hesitations, the unconscious admissions that perhaps Couric got more than she bargained for with her multimillion dollar contract, including the bitter coworkers, unforgiving media critics and the microscope inexorably focused on her personal life, journalism credentials and liberal application of eyeliner.

Ultimately, the piece looks to end on a high-note.

"She summons a smile. Even now, her optimism is irrepressible."

Then again, it's impossible to know for certain what's genuine and what isn't, and the profile seems to deliberately conclude ambiguously, with Couric's camera-ready optimism—as well as her shining star at CBS—coming into question.