CBS This Morning - History

History

The original CBS This Morning made its debut on November 30, 1987, with hosts Harry Smith, former GMA news anchor Kathleen Sullivan, and Mark McEwen, a holdover from the show's infotainment-intensive predecessor The Morning Program. Sullivan was replaced by Paula Zahn on February 26, 1990. Beginning on October 26, 1992, in an effort to stop affiliates from dropping the program, CBS increased the amount of time available during the broadcast for local stations, most of which have their own early morning newscasts before the national news. Despite a far more successful team in Smith, Zahn, and McEwen, CBS This Morning remained stubbornly in third place. It was, however, far more competitive than any of its predecessors. A new set and live format introduced in October 1995 had little effect on the ratings.

Smith and Zahn left in June 1996, and CBS News correspondents Harold Dow and Erin Moriarty anchored the show for seven weeks until a new format was in place. In August 1996, the show was revamped again, as simply This Morning, with McEwen and Jane Robelot as co-hosts, news anchor Jose Diaz-Balart (succeeded by Cynthia Bowers and later Thalia Assuras, and finally Julie Chen) and Craig Allen (of WCBS radio and television stations in New York City) doing weather. A new format was created where local stations could opt to air their own newscast from 7 am to 8 am, with inserts from the national broadcast. Then from 8 am to 9 am, affiliates air the second half of the national broadcast uninterrupted. Ratings went up slightly, and at one point the show even moved ahead of Good Morning America in 1998. But its ratings success was also brief, and it was replaced by The Early Show.

Jane Robelot left This Morning in June 1999 after it was revealed that the show would be replaced. Thalia Assuras was co-anchor and Julie Chen newsreader for the show's remaining five months. McEwen left the show at the end of September 1999 to prepare for the launch of The Early Show and was replaced by Russ Mitchell. The original This Morning ended on October 29, 1999, after 12 years. The Early Show debuted the following Monday, November 1.

Though it had occasional peaks in ratings, The Early Show was a perennial third-place finisher behind NBC's Today and ABC's Good Morning America, shows known for including light stories and infotainment with their news coverage (an approach The Early Show would shy away from in its last year). On November 15, 2011, CBS News confirmed that The Early Show would be canceled, and that the news division would overhaul its morning news as of January 9, 2012. CBS News chairman Jeff Fager and president David Rhodes revealed at the November 15 announcement that the revamped and retitled program would "redefine the morning television landscape"–meaning that rather than replicate Today and GMA, the new format would feature a mix of hard news (a CBS News hallmark), analysis, and discussion.

On December 01, 2011, the title of the new show was was revealed as CBS This Morning.

The executive producer of CBS This Morning is Chris Licht, who was hired by CBS in spring 2011 after serving as executive producer of MSNBC's Morning Joe. Licht's move to CBS led to speculation that Joe co-hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski would follow Licht, as their contracts with MSNBC were expiring; though Scarborough and Brzezinski confirmed contemplating offers from CBS and other networks, they re-signed with MSNBC out of a belief that their interview-intensive approach could not be duplicated on broadcast television. Instead, CBS would tap a trio of noted TV veterans for the weekday editions of This Morning: Early Show holdover Erica Hill, Gayle King, and Charlie Rose (Licht describes Rose, who hosted CBS's overnight program CBS News Nightwatch in the 1980s, as "an incredible interviewer").

Licht has promised an "outside the box" approach to CBS This Morning, insisting that the show would not include forced anchor banter, cooking segments, "comedic weather forecasters, cheering fans on an outdoor plaza." Instead, the show begins with brief introductions and teases by Rose and O'Donnell, along with a second hour tease by King ("When I see you at 8..."). After the intros comes the "Eye Opener" ("Your world... in 90 seconds"), a quick-cut montage of sights and sounds from the past 24 hours of news, employing no on-screen anchor and a limited voiceover from Rose. The first hour of the show, co-anchored by Rose and O'Donnell, is news-intensive and includes more original journalism and analyis, with regular contributors including John Miller, Rebecca Jarvis, and Jeff Glor. (Jarvis co-anchors This Morning's Saturday edition and Glor serves as the Sunday anchor of the CBS Evening News.) When King joins the show for the second hour, the show shifts to an approach of interviews and discussion (a la Morning Joe) and lighter fare.

True to Licht's "no comedic weather" promise, the show does not include any stand-alone national weather segments, though time is allotted for CBS affiliates to insert their own local weather (with national maps and forecasts provided for affiliates who do not insert their own weather updates). The first half-hour also includes a thirty-second segment following the local weather break, during which temperatures for various cities are scrolled alongside an inset advertisement. The Saturday edition of the program uses an on-camera meteorologist for national weather segments.