‘Early’ Stumps CBS-- Again

Vintage bands Chicago and Foreigner have played; Harry Smith and Deborah Norville have been anchoring. Viewers of CBS’ “The Early Show” might understandably be feeling they are in a time warp this summer.

It’s been two months since co-host Bryant Gumbel left “The Early Show,” and what at first seemed likely to be a quick process to find his replacement has now bogged down in what appears to be one of CBS News’ every-few-years exercises in attempting to put together a durable morning program that can challenge NBC’s top-rated “Today” show and second-place rival ABC’s “Good Morning America.”

Gumbel and co-host Jane Clayson had anchored the show’s most recent iteration since 1999, making it more competitive, particularly among younger viewers, but still failing to lift the program from a distant third.

After Meredith Vieira balked at leaving ABC’s “The View” for CBS, the network began rotating possible new hosts through the anchor chair, including Tom Bergeron of “Hollywood Squares,” Josh Binswanger of the History Channel and CBS White House correspondent John Roberts. More recently, however, the chair has been occupied by Norville, the host of “Inside Edition” who is best known for her year anchoring NBC’s “Today”--in 1990. Smith, who now is host of A&E;’s “Biography,” is filling in this week, returning to a job he held from 1987 until he and then co-host Paula Zahn were dismissed in 1996.

CBS executives insist there is a lot of activity taking place behind the scenes, even if it appears that the process has stalled. One contender, Russ Mitchell, anchor of the show’s Saturday edition, just got additional duties as a “CBS Sunday Morning” correspondent, taking him out of the running for the weekday job. Lyne Pitts, who had been the show’s executive producer before taking an extended medical leave this spring, will return Tuesday, reporting to senior executive producer Michael Bass.

Moreover, executives say, making the right decision is much more important than making a quick one.

Still, each month--or even each year--that CBS fails to come up with a winning combination leaves it more vulnerable to the competition. In the last year, Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends,” with an irreverent, occasionally nasty format akin to radio’s “morning zoo,” has more than doubled its audience, attracting about 723,000 viewers on average each morning in July. CNN has had more modest success starting a more traditional morning program; “American Morning With Paula Zahn” averaged about 441,000 viewers in July. CBS’ program drew 2.32 million viewers on average for the first three weeks of July, up slightly from last summer.

Another casualty of the drawn-out process could be Clayson, who has been left in limbo while CBS debates the show’s future.

She has adapted adroitly through the summer to co-hosts as markedly different as Roberts and the bubbly Norville, and executives were pleased with her grilling of contributor Martha Stewart on the domestic diva’s controversial stock sale. But Clayson’s contract is up in early September, and CBS’ delay in renewing it has set off rounds of undermining whispers, some of which have made it into print, only to be categorically denied by CBS.

If she were to follow Gumbel out the door, CBS would end up with changes in both the host roles, which some executives think goes against morning viewers’ desire for continuity and familiarity.

A CBS News spokeswoman said executives aren’t going to discuss their strategy publicly. The process itself appears to have taken on a chicken-and-egg quality, as executives grapple with whether to settle on a new format and then find hosts to fit, or find the personalities and then shape the show around them, as CBS did with Gumbel, tailoring the show to his strong newsmaker interview skills. It’s complicated by the relatively limited number of candidates available.

Senior executive producer Bass, who started at the beginning of the summer and previously worked at NBC’s “Today,” has adjusted the format, adding a couch and more unstructured time for the anchors to chat informally, something that Clayson and Gumbel never seemed comfortable doing.

Executives have debated adding even more time for informal chatter, along the lines of ABC’s popular morning gabfest “The View.” They’ve talked about having two female hosts, instead of a standard male-female combination. And people familiar with the situation say the success of “Fox & Friends” hasn’t escaped anyone’s notice, proving that a departure from the tried-and-true could succeed.

Nonetheless, whatever CBS comes up with--and no decision is expected imminently--is likely to include more traditional elements of newsmaker interviews, entertainment and, of course, weather.

Meanwhile, turning to familiar faces such as Smith and Norville this summer has proven to be a successful strategy in one key sense: It has helped stave off the precipitous ratings decline that often follows a host’s departure, making the rebuilding task even harder.