CBS: Gingrich Fallout May Hit Chung

Under a barrage of criticism from national TV critics and reporters, CBS executives acknowledged that Connie Chung’s credibility as a journalist has suffered as a result of her interview with House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s mother and her recent coverage of sensational news figures.

“Yes, there is a concern that Connie had been damaged,” CBS News President Eric Ober said Saturday during a winter gathering of TV writers from around the country to preview midseason network programming.

CBS executives would have preferred to talk about the dynamic moves CBS is making to regain its position as the top-rated network, including an aggressive development slate, but instead they spent much of their time defending Chung.

Howard Stringer, president of CBS Broadcast Group, hefted the blame onto the broad shoulders of his network. CBS put a lot of pressure on Chung, Stringer said, by asking her to anchor the national evening news, as well as star in her own prime-time newsmagazine.

“She has been held up to an astonishing standard,” he said. “She is smart and hard-working and perhaps one of the best on-air anchors that television has seen. But I’m telling you, I don’t care if you’re the Angel Gabriel . . . if you put too much stress on the angel, you will clip her wings.”

Chung became the subject of national news stories last week for her interview with Kathleen Gingrich, in which Gingrich said her son had called First Lady Hillary Clinton “a bitch.” Gingrich whispered the comment after prompting from Chung, who told her the remark would be “just between you and me.”

For promotional punch, CBS News released transcripts of the interview before it aired last Thursday on prime-time’s “Eye to Eye With Connie Chung.” Stringer said he may be at fault for putting too much pressure on all of the network’s magazine shows to produce ratings. “I sent a clear signal to the organization that we have to be aggressive this season,” said Stringer, whose network trails ABC in the season-to-date prime-time ratings.

Still, most of the blame fell on Chung. Some writers at the press conference criticized her ethics and professionalism in the Gingrich interview. Others perceived her as a lightweight for covering such tabloid characters as Tonya Harding, Faye Resnick and Heidi Fleiss. Chung even became the target Friday of David Letterman’s Top 10 list on CBS: “Top 10 Reasons Connie Chung Is Going Nuts.”

Andrew Heyward, vice president and executive producer of “CBS Evening News With Dan Rather and Connie Chung,” agreed that Chung has been saddled with “a potential image problem.”

Stringer turned the tables on TV reporters in the room, however, by pointing out that their publications have covered the same sensational subjects. “It becomes very hard to stop this treadmill to journalistic oblivion,” he said dryly.

Stringer said he would call Chung over the weekend to let her know that CBS stands behind her, and he was considering whether to lighten her responsibilities at CBS. Ober vowed that intense efforts would be made to repair Chung’s professional reputation with more substantive, investigative stories and projects. “It’s our obligation to do everything we can to get her past this,” Ober said.

In other news, CBS Entertainment president Peter Tortorici had writers scribbling furiously to keep up with the dizzying array of projects and talent lined up. “Going into this season, we had planned that this was going to be a very important rebuilding year for us,” Tortorici said.

CBS has signed deals with best-selling authors Dean Koontz, Mary Higgins Clark and Sidney Sheldon to produce TV movies based on their books, while Francis Ford Coppola will produce a TV movie of Robert Louis Stevenson’s “Kidnapped.”

Rhea Pearlman from “Cheers,” film actress Joan Cusack and “Sleepless in Seattle” writer-director Nora Ephron are all working on comedy series. Dramatic series in development include one based on author John Grisham’s “Pelican Brief,” and another written by “Forrest Gump” screenwriter Eric Roth. Don Johnson, former Raider Howie Long and Scott Bakula are also planning to star in their own dramas.

CBS has often been criticized for drawing a disproportionate amount of older viewers. CBS brushed off the criticism in the past. This time, Tortorici acknowledged a need for change. “Our problem right now in terms of our demographic performance is a problem of imbalance,” he said. “We don’t have enough programming on our schedule that goes after the younger adult audience.”

But he stressed that the way to reach younger viewers, which he designates as between 25 and 54, is through hit shows. When asked how he expected to finish the season, Tortorici seemed to sum up the feelings for the entire network by saying: “On my feet.”