Posted on 07/12/2007 11:22:59 AM PDT by COUNTrecount
NEW YORK - CBS News President Sean McManus dismissed talk that Katie Couric may leave as "CBS Evening News" anchor by saying Thursday that he expected her to be doing the job through her full five-year contract. A candid Couric interview in New York magazine this week renewed questions about Couric's future, leading a prominent blogger to start speculating about who might replace her.
"She has a five-year contract with CBS to anchor the evening news," McManus told The Associated Press. "All of us, including Katie, expect her to be anchoring the evening news in her fifth year."
Couric began anchoring the evening news last September and the ratings have been a disappointment, with CBS still a distant third behind ABC's "World News" and the "NBC Nightly News." After unsuccessfully trying a few new ideas, the CBS program is being revamped under recently arrived veteran producer Rick Kaplan.
CBS News leaders have expressed frustration with New York magazine, which had a picture of Couric on its cover over the quote: "I have days when I'm like, `Oh my God, what did I do?'" The cover omits the rest of the quote, where she says, "but for some weird reason, they don't happen that often."
While Couric in the story denies rumors that she's looking to jump to "60 Minutes" full-time, New York says that "it's obvious that `60 Minutes' best reflects what Couric would like to do.'"
That led the influential industry blog tvnewser to begin posting suggestions this week on who would follow Couric as evening-news anchor. McManus said such speculation is "insulting and it's absurd."
He said he wondered why other anchors with ratings troubles—"NBC Nightly News" with Brian Williams has lost viewers and fallen to second place—aren't the subject of such speculation.
Brian Stelter, editor of the blog, said it's the blog's job to reflect what everyone is talking about.
"Maybe CBS is not thinking about who will succeed her," he said, "but everyone else is."
http://nymag.com/news/features/34452/
OH LORDY TOO FUNNY LOL!
I rather see computer generating Rod Serling or better YET Looter guy
LOL!!! Classic.
They’ve got to pay her for 5 years, they might as well keep her. CBS is pretty well cooked anyway. They might hire anderson cooper or olberboy to appeal to the far left, but that won’t help.
“He said he wondered why other anchors with ratings troubles—”NBC Nightly News” with Brian Williams has lost viewers and fallen to second place—aren’t the subject of such speculation.”
I saw something a couple of days ago about David Gregory being prepped to take over the anchor job some day.
They are in deep denial regarding the huge mistake they made in hiring Katie, so they will just keep digging a deeper hole for themselves.
Like a captain going down with the ship.
Should I cue Celine Dion singing the theme to Titanic?
Katie really is an anchor.
Any enterprise with a Brian in it is up to no good. Hate that name.
‘CBS News President Sean McManus dismissed talk that Katie Couric may leave as “CBS Evening News” anchor by saying Thursday that he expected her to be doing the job through her full five-year contract. ‘
Translation; ‘Since when did anyone get the idea we take news seriously at CBS? Cronkite made it up for a couple of decades, as did Danny Rather....’
Nobody’s watching anyway, might as well keep her at it.
My prediction: The networks will try a few attempts at changing the format by upping the Hollywood sleaze or turning the broadcasts into something akin to The Daily Show but it won't work.
Look for the first of the 3 to disappear within two years. There is a lot of programing that would make more money in the same time slot.
Shhhh! We’re whistling past the graveyard.
CBS News President Sean McManus - I think he doth protest too much!
They left out his full title....”Veteran Producer for Plunging Ratings, Rick Kaplan”.
Exatly, pretty soon the “Nightly News” will need air at 4PM before the senior early bird special starts at Dennys, etc.
well, Katie can resign if she’s unhappy, but would have to walk away from $15 million a year to do that. CBS would have to eat that much a year if they just took her off the air. Yep, most likely they would re-assign her to 60 Minutes as her full time assignment rather than eat the contract.
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