CNN has made the changes to its morning
lineup official, announcing Thursday that Soledad O'Brien would return to
hosting the network's mornings along with tapping Ashleigh Banfield and Zoraida
Sambolin for the early hours, as previously reported by B&C.
O'Brien will front 7-9 a.m., where she
previously hosted CNN's American Morning
from 2003-07, while Banfield, an ABC News correspondent, and Sambolin, most
recently a local news anchor in Chicago, have been tapped to host the 5-7 a.m. hours.
The as-yet-untitled programs, which effectively dismantle American Morning, will be launched sometime
in 2012. CNN has hired Shannon High from NBC's peacock Productions to be executive producer of both programs.
This anchor shakeup is the latest in a
long line of changes to American Morning
in the last year. After co-anchor John Roberts left the network to join Fox
News in January, CNN chief business correspondent Ali Velshi started filling in
alongside co-host Kiran Chetry. When Chetry left in July, Christine Romans and
Carol Costello joined Velshi on the program.
Ken Jautz, executive VP of CNN/U.S. says the new morning
show will be more conversational and interview-based instead of the
prompter-driven format traditional of many morning shows, including American Morning.
"It will be broader than any of the other morning cable news
shows," he said in an interview with B&C.
"It will of course include political coverage but not be narrowly focused on
the political developments of the day. And it will bring the full range of
CNN's newsgathering apparatus, both domestically and internationally, to bear."
Jautz called the revamp of the morning programming the
"final piece" in the lineup changes he has pushed though in an effort to
improve ratings since being tapped to head the network in September 2010. Among
all its anchor changes, American Morning
had become mostly an afterthought in the morning ratings race dominated by
NBC's Today and cable entries like
Fox News' Fox & Friends.
MSNBC's Morning Joe,
which has seen the most year-to-date growth of any of the cable morning shows,
has had success with a conversational format that relies on in-studio guests, though
Jautz says CNN's show will be less politically focused and cover a broader
range of news.
"We think there's an opportunity in that so much of the
morning is narrowly focused on domestic politics and the political squabbling
of the day," he said. "It will definitely not be an inside-the-Beltway feel or
limitation."
The format will also play to O'Brien's strengths, who since
leaving the mornings in 2007 has been producing documentaries for the network
like her In America series.
"I think particularly with her many documentaries in recent
years, she has proven herself that she can talk to anybody, from all
backgrounds and walks of life," Jautz said. "She's a very good interviewer."
O'Brien will continue to produce some documentaries in additional
to her new primary morning role, though she will necessarily do fewer.
The selection of O'Brien along with Banfield and Sambolin
underscores CNN's desire to fill its lineup with anchors who are proven
journalists, as evidenced with its primetime lineup changes in July that
canceled the show fronted by former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer and introduced
one with former CNBC anchor Erin Burnett.
At ABC News, Banfield has reported for programs like Good Morning America and 20/20; prior to that she was an anchor
for CourtTV (now truTV) and gained attention for her coverage of the Sept. 11
terrorist attacks and subsequent Iraq War for NBC News.
Sambolin was most recently co-anchor of the morning program
at the NBC affiliate in Chicago and fill-in anchor for Telemundo Chicago, where
she worked at the NBCUniversal-owned English and Spanish-language stations
simultaneously.
After the new programs debut, Velshi will no longer be a
part of CNN's mornings, and instead will launch a daily business show on CNN
International, World Business Today. He will continue in his role as chief business correspondent and
do segments across CNN daytime and primetime programs.
Romans will provide business reporting for the new morning block and Costello will continue as an anchor and correspondent for CNN. All three current anchors will continue to lead American Morning until the new morning lineup launches in 2012.
