Licht Vows New Direction For CNN

Without mentioning CNN Plus, new CNN CEO Chris Licht set out the company’s plans for the rudderless news network, reports NextTV.com.

Those plans involve a morning show, a Sunday-night showcase and avoiding the kinds of advocacy journalism that has infected cable news.

CNN was shocked by the sudden firing of its president Jeff Zucker because of an undisclosed relationship with another CNN executive and by the abrupt decision to shut down streaming subscription service CNN Plus after just 33 days.

New owner Warner Bros. Discovery hired Licht, who had been executive producer of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, to fix the original cable news network.

“When [WBD CEO] David Zaslav put me in this role. He gave me one simple directive: enhance CNN's leadership as the definitive source for reliable news and exceptional, journalism globally,” Licht said at Warner Bros. Discovery’s upfront Wednesday.  

“This organization is unrivaled in its fact-driven coverage, its ability to gather and report news where it happens and its commitment to telling meaningful stories about our people and events in our world,” Licht said. 

“The next chapter of CNN is one where we aspire to be a beacon for the kind of journalism essential to a functioning democracy,” he said.

Licht said CNN would be making changes in its morning show. “We are seeking to be a disrupter of the broadcast morning shows in this space and we believe we have the people and resources who can do it,” he said.

He also plans to establish a CNN Sunday franchise that will feature Chris Wallace’s interview show, retrieved from the CNN Plus scrapheap, and a new “topical long-form" show, which will showcase our existing correspondents and contributors “telling new stories they enterprise from around the world.”  He wants the show to become an “exciting outlet for the stories that can have real impact and blister the CNN brand.”

Who's Talking to Chris Wallace and the new long-form show will be joined by existing CNN originals like Stanley Tucci's Search for Italy; Say It Loud, about the history of Black television from LeBron James and Maverick Carter; and The 2010s, as wells as CNN Films.