• Get involved.
    We want your input!
    Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.

    After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
    If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.

    After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
    https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/

    Thanks in advance and have fun!
    RadioDiscussions Administrators

CNN TRYS TO PLUG PIERS MORGAN'S SINKING BOAT

gregg75

gregg75

CNN has hired a new talent booker in an attempt to get "better guests". from deadline.com

It was an eventful day in Piers Morgan news world. After hitting a ratings and an all-around low for his interview with the Kardashian sisters last week, it became clear that Morgan should be going for better guests. His producers agree, hiring a new booker, 15-year ABC News veteran Katie Thompson who worked primarily with Barbara Walters, including on her 1999 interview with Monica Lewinsky.

COMMENT:
I saw some of his coverage of EGYPT and I think the Road Runner could have done better.
 
I said this when the show debuted, but when you build a canned interview show like this, it puts 100% of the weight of the show on the quality of the guests. You must deliver top quality superstar guests every night. And that's hard to do. Unless you have another rabbit in the hat, it's all about the guests. You can do that like Barbara Walters does every now and then. But it's impossible to keep that level every night. They need another gimmick to make the show work so they can take the pressure off the quality of guests. Larry took phone calls. No one else does that. Anderson Cooper goes on location. No one else does that. Talking to one big supertar guest for an hour? Even Oprah doesn't do that every day. She shakes it up. That's what this show needs to do.
 
Couldn't agree more with you TheBigA. As big as the superstar is, how long can the average viewer tune in and go on with the mundanities of life that Piers prods for?

By the end of the hour, what is really left? Hit the big questions first and get them out of the way.

There has to be something else that can be done.
 
I would like to think that tripe like the Kardashians, Useless (er, I mean Paris Hilton), heck even annoying Perez Hilton, would be of little interest and bottom feeders, ratings-wise, on most stations not named "E".
 
Even before his show aired I predicted that Piers Morgan wouldn't last the summer. Perhaps I was premature in my prediction. Now I believe that Morgan will be gone by the end of spring.
 
I'm watching the show now with Barbara Walters. She's a fine guest, but it's just her. One on one. That might be fine on the BBC, but it's pretty boring TV here in the US. Group discussions are better for TV. Move things along a bit quicker.
 
One thing sadly missing from Piers Morgan as opposed to Larry King is the phone calls. That was what made King's interviews interesting half the time is the unplanned, unscripted questions from callers.
 
We should take bets on how long this show will last. I think CNN knew this was only
a temporary FIX, but someone forgot to tell Piers..............he's just warming up the
seat for someone else.
 
TheBigA said:
Like who? The problem isn't the host. It's the format.
Click to expand...

Agreed. For some reason, Larry King became an important person, and "important" people - either celebrities or news makers - seemed to want to appear on his program. No knock on Larry - I enjoyed his show from time to time, but really - he was an intellectual light weight. I used to listen to his Mutual network radio show in the 70s (prior to his CNN success), and I remember that it was light-weight at best. I'm not saying that every interview program has to be up to Charlie Rose PBS quality, but still...

Piers Morgan doesn't have Larry's history as the go-to interviewer, so his show is suffering. No surprise there. IMO - CNN will not be able to re-create Larry King's format for a new generation. I'll predict that they'll eventually give up on Morgan's show, and go a different direction.
 
Even David Lee Roth had to know sooner or later that he ultimately wasn't going to be Howard Stern's long-term replacement.
 
Lkeller said:
Piers Morgan doesn't have Larry's history as the go-to interviewer, so his show is suffering.
Click to expand...

THat's not what I was saying. The problem isn't Piers. They're getting good guests. But the show is stilted and dull. One hour, one-on-one, in a formal location. They might as well serve tea and crumpets. Shake things up a little bit. Break format. Take Piers outside his box and put him under fire in Cairo like Anderson. That's exciting TV.
 
TheBigA said:
...One hour, one-on-one, in a formal location. They might as well serve tea and crumpets...
Click to expand...

Hell, they might as well film the show in England - that ought to save CNN a few hundred thousand bucks, right?
 
Lkeller said:
Larry King became an important person, and "important" people - either celebrities or news makers - seemed to want to appear on his program.
Click to expand...

Some of it was Larry, because he was an easy interview. Comfort level with him knowing he wasn't Mike Wallace. He wasn't a journalist, he wasn't looking to "get" the guest. To get big guests, you need an interviewer they know and are comfortable with. But another aspect is access and audience. CNN has a certain level of reach. Put Larry King on Fox Business Channel or Bravo and see if he gets big star interviews.
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom