Jeff Zucker

Jeffrey Adam Zucker[2] (born April 9, 1965) is an American media executive. He previously served as president and CEO of NBCUniversal.[3] Zucker served as an executive in residence at Columbia Business School.[4] In November 2012, Zucker was picked to take over as the president of CNN Worldwide in January 2013 after Jim Walton's tenure.[5] Zucker oversees CNN, CNN International, HLN, and CNN Digital.[6]

Jeff Zucker
Zucker at the 2010 Tribeca Film Festival
Born
Jeffrey Adam Zucker

(1965-04-09) April 9, 1965[1]
Homestead, Florida, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
EducationHarvard University (BA)
OccupationChairman of WarnerMedia News & Sports
Years active1986–present
EmployerWarnerMedia
Spouse(s)
Caryn Nathanson
(
m. 1996)
Children4

Early life and education

Zucker was born into a Jewish family[7][8] in Homestead, Florida, near Miami, on April 9, 1965.[9] His father, Matthew, was a cardiologist, and his mother, Arline, was a school teacher.[2]

He was a captain of the North Miami Senior High School tennis team,[9] editor of the school paper, and a teenage freelance reporter ("stringer") for The Miami Herald.[10] Zucker also was president of his sophomore, junior, and senior classes,[11] running on the slogan "The little man with the big ideas."[12] He graduated from North Miami Senior High School in 1982.[9] Before college, he took part in Northwestern University's National High School Institute program for journalism.[10] Zucker went on to Harvard University. He was president of the school newspaper, The Harvard Crimson, during his senior year. As such, he encouraged the Crimson’s decades-old prank rivalry with the Harvard Lampoon, then headed by future NBC employee Conan O'Brien, which culminated in Zucker having O’Brien arrested.[13] Zucker graduated from Harvard in 1986 with a Bachelor of Arts in American history.[14]

Career at NBC

Researcher

When he was not admitted to Harvard Law School, he took a job at NBC in 1986 to research information for its coverage of the 1988 Summer Olympics.[15]

Producer of Today Show

In 1989, he was a field producer for Today, and at 26 he became its executive producer in 1992.[16] He introduced the program's trademark outdoor rock concert series and was in charge as Today moved to the "window on the world" Studio 1A in Rockefeller Plaza in 1994. He is credited with managing the show during its most successful years and launching it into its 16-years of ratings dominance.[17]

President of NBC Entertainment

In 2000, he was named NBC Entertainment's president.[18] A 2004 Businessweek Profile stated that "During that time he oversaw NBC's entire entertainment schedule. He kept the network ahead of the pack by airing the gross out show Fear Factor, negotiating for the cast of the hit series Friends to take the series up to a tenth season, and signing Donald Trump for the reality show The Apprentice. He is credited with the idea to extend Friends episodes by 10 minutes and convinced the cast to extend their contracts by two years. The Friends era was one of the most profitable ever for NBC.[19] The Zucker era produced a spike in operating earnings for NBC, from $532 million the year he took over to $870 million in 2003."[12]

Zucker introduced Las Vegas, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, and Scrubs. He originated the idea of airing "Supersized" (longer than the standard 30-minute slot) episodes of NBC's comedies and aggressively programming in the summer months as cable networks began to draw away viewers with original programming from the network's rerun-filled summer slate. Bravo changed its programming direction towards popularity gaining reality television, while the newly acquired Spanish network Telemundo was positioned to be more competitive with leading network Univision."

President of NBC Entertainment's News & Cable Group

In December 2003, Zucker became president of NBC's Entertainment, News & Cable Group as well.

President of NBC Television Group

Following the merger with French media empire Vivendi Universal, he became president of its Television Group in May 2004. During Zucker's tenure, shows that he championed such as Father of the Pride and the Friends spinoff Joey were considered failures.[20]

Chief Executive Officer of NBC

On December 15, 2005, Zucker was promoted by NBC to Chief Executive Officer of NBC Universal Television Group behind Robert Charles Wright, vice chairman of General Electric and chairman & CEO of NBC Universal.[21] Zucker was responsible for all programming across the company’s television properties, including network, news, cable, sports and Olympics. His responsibilities also included the company’s studio operations and global distribution efforts.

President and CEO of NBC Universal

On February 6, 2007, Zucker became president and CEO of NBC Universal.

Main article: 2010 Tonight Show conflict

In 2010, in response to a public controversy over the network's reported rescheduling of late-night hosts Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien, Los Angeles Times reporters Meg James and Matea Gold wrote that Zucker's tenure had led to "a spectacular fall by the country's premier television network" and dubbed the intra-network feud and subsequent public relations fallout "one of the biggest debacles in television history".[22] Under Zucker NBC fell from being the number one rated network to the lowest rated of the four broadcast networks and was occasionally being beaten in the ratings by programming on some of the more popular cable channels.

Days later, The New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd wrote that in Hollywood "there has been a single topic of discussion: How does Jeff Zucker keep rising and rising while the fortunes of NBC keep falling and falling? ...many in the Hollywood community have always regarded him as ...a network Napoleon who never bothered to learn about developing shows and managing talent." She explained that Zucker "is a master at managing up with bosses and calculating cost-per-hour benefits, but even though he made money on cable shows, he could not program the network to save his life."[23]

Dowd also reported that an unnamed "honcho at another network" stated that "Zucker is a case study in the most destructive media executive ever to exist... You’d have to tell me who else has taken a once-great network and literally destroyed it."[23]

On June 2, 2010, the New York Post reported that Zucker would be paid between $30 million and $40 million to leave NBC Universal shortly after Comcast completed its 51% acquisition in the company.[24]

Career at Disney–ABC

Katie Producer

Zucker worked with fellow NBC alum, former Today host Katie Couric, producing her daytime talk show for Disney-ABC Domestic Television, Katie.[25][26] However, Zucker left the show to be the president of CNN Worldwide.[27]

Career at WarnerMedia

President of CNN Worldwide

Zucker became president of CNN Worldwide on January 1, 2013. His appointment was widely welcomed by the network and its anchors. Anderson Cooper told colleagues that Zucker was "the first CNN president to actually watch CNN".[28] In December 2013, Zucker stated that his goal for the channel was to offer an "attitude and a take" to viewers, with a larger focus on reality-style documentary series (expanding upon the success of its documentary acquisition Blackfish, and new series Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown). Zucker explained that he wanted CNN to appeal more to regular viewers of factual networks (such as A&E, Discovery, and History), and make larger investments into the network's digital properties.[29][30]

With the 2014 cancellation of Piers Morgan Live, CNN experimented with airing factual programming in primetime as an alternative, with Zucker stating that it would cater to younger demographics than pundit-oriented programs. However, Zucker still insisted that news remained CNN's first priority, and that these programs could be preempted for continuing coverage of breaking news events when needed.[31][32] 2014 saw an increase in daytime and primetime viewership of CNN; by October 2014, CNN had overtaken MSNBC in primetime key demographic viewership, placing second behind Fox News Channel.[33][34][35][36]

During the 2016 presidential election campaign, a large focus was placed upon on-air debates between partisan pundits surrounding issues relating to the candidates (including, in particular, Republican candidate Donald Trump). In an interview with The New York Times, Zucker stated that aspects of its election coverage were influenced by sports channels (with the Times citing, specifically, debates between pundits reminiscent of shows such as ESPN's First Take, and large outdoor "pre-game" shows for the presidential debates), explaining that "the idea that politics is sport is undeniable, and we understood that and approached it that way."[37] In 2016, CNN reached a monthly average of 105 million unique visitors to its web and mobile properties.[38]

WarnerMedia News & Sports

In March 2019, CNN parent WarnerMedia announced a reorganization in which Zucker would become chairman of the company's news and sports division, overseeing Turner Sports, Bleacher Report and AT&T SportsNet, in addition to maintaining his role as head of CNN.[39]

Personal life

In 1996, Zucker married Caryn Stephanie Nathanson, then a supervisor for Saturday Night Live,[2] with whom he has four children.[40] Diagnosed at ages 31 and 34 with colon cancer, Zucker successfully underwent surgery twice and chemotherapy after the first surgery.[12][41] In July 2018, Zucker took a six week leave of absence from CNN to recover from heart surgery.[42]

gollark: I disagree entirely.
gollark: We have the worst of both worlds in many places, with nigh-identical rows of houses which are apparently still built slowly and inefficiently.
gollark: If it was made of multiple cuboids, you could even put them together in exciting ways.
gollark: It isn't like you couldn't paint a cuboid to look nice.
gollark: Do you actually spend enough time admiring your house that the substantially greater cost would be any use?

References
  1. Rappaport, Jill (6 November 2007). Mazel Tov: Celebrities' Bar and Bat Mitzvah Memories. Simon and Schuster. p. 41. ISBN 978-1-4165-5427-1.
  2. "WEDDINGS;Jeffrey Zucker and Caryn Nathanson". The New York Times (New York ed.). June 2, 1996. p. 47. Retrieved June 4, 2009.
  3. Carter, Bill. "Zucker Announces Departure From NBC". NYT. Retrieved February 16, 2018.
  4. "Jeff Zucker Named Executive in Residence". Columbia Business School Newsroom. January 23, 2011. Archived from the original on February 19, 2014. Retrieved November 28, 2012.
  5. Shapiro, Rebecca. "Jeff Zucker CNN President: Network Officially Hires Former NBC Universal Chief". the Huffington Post. Retrieved February 16, 2018.
  6. CNN: Jeff Zucker profile; accessed January 16, 2015
  7. "Stars of David: Prominent Jews Talk About Being Jewish" By Abigail Pogrebi pg. 367|Zucker grew up in Miami where he was bar mitzvah and confirmed at Temple Israel - "the most Reform synagogue in South Florida." His family's weekly tradition was Hebrew school and football....He's currently a member of Temple Emanu-El in New York City.
  8. Jewish Virtual Library: "Jeff Zucker" retrieved March 10, 2015
  9. "Pioneer Newsletter January/February 2005". The Greater North Miami Historical Society. January–February 2005. Retrieved September 28, 2014.
  10. Zhou, Li S. (May 25, 2011). "Jeff Zucker". The Harvard Crimson. Retrieved September 28, 2014.
  11. Farhi, Paul (April 9, 2013). "Jeff Zucker is remaking CNN. Are viewers tuning in?". The Washington Post. Retrieved September 28, 2014.
  12. Grove, Ronald (September 27, 2004). "Jeff Zucker: Life Without Friends". BusinessWeek. Archived from the original on January 5, 2010. Retrieved January 15, 2010.
  13. Finke, Nikki. "NO JOKE: Jeff Zucker Had Conan Arrested –". Deadline.com. Retrieved May 14, 2011.
  14. "Jeff Zucker". CNN. January 3, 2015. Retrieved January 21, 2015.
  15. "CEO of NBC Universal shares insights into his path to success". BizNews. January–February 2005. Retrieved December 9, 2010.
  16. Carter, Bill (December 3, 1991). "NBC Names Executive Producer of 'Today'". The New York Times. Retrieved May 6, 2010.
  17. Fung, Katherine (May 10, 2013). "Jeff Zucker: 'New Day' Hosts Remind Me Of Winning Team At 'Today'". Huffington Post. Retrieved May 10, 2013.
  18. Carter, Bill (December 25, 2000). "Network Heat Gets Even Hotter; At NBC, an Executive Moves From News to Entertainment". The New York Times. Retrieved May 6, 2010.
  19. "Jeff Zucker May Actually Be Crazy Enough To Save CNN". Businessweek.com. June 19, 2013. Retrieved January 14, 2015.
  20. "Now Jeff Zucker Must Prove Himself Yet Again". Businessweek.com. February 19, 2007. Archived from the original on April 18, 2011. Retrieved May 14, 2011.
  21. Levine, Greg (December 15, 2005). "Zucker Named NBC CEO; CBS Tops Fox NFL Pre-Game". Forbes.
  22. James, Meg; Gold, Matea (January 9, 2010). "How Zucker's Leno quick fix got NBC into a quagmire". Latimes.com. Retrieved May 14, 2011.
  23. Dowd, Maureen (January 12, 2010). "The Biggest Loser". The New York Times. Retrieved January 21, 2010.
  24. Atkinson, Claire (June 2, 2010). "NBC boss eyes $30M+ exit deal from Comcast". New York Post. Retrieved June 2, 2010.
  25. Alex Ben Block (23 January 2012). "Katie Couric and Jeff Zucker: New Talk Show Isn't Regis or Oprah". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 28 November 2012.
  26. Guthrie, Marisa (3 June 2011). "Katie Couric's New Talk Show Deal Likely to Be Announced Monday". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 4 June 2011.
  27. Nellie Andreeva (17 October 2012). "Katie Couric's Syndicated Talk Show Seeks Executive Producer As Jeff Zucker Eyes Exit". Deadline Hollywood. Retrieved 28 November 2012.
  28. Gabriel Sherman (5 October 2014). "Jeff Zucker Has Endured Cancer, Hollywood, and Being TV's Wunderkind. So Why Not Take on CNN?". NYMag. Retrieved 28 November 2014.
  29. Simpson, Connor (2013-12-03). "Jeff Zucker Ushers CNN Into New 'Attitude' Era". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2019-03-04.
  30. "CNN's Jeff Zucker Reveals Plans to Change from News Network into Place with 'Attitude'". mediaite.com. December 3, 2013. Retrieved 24 January 2014.
  31. Flint, Joe. "CNN unveils new prime-time lineup, moves away from 9 p.m. talk". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2019-03-04.
  32. "Jeff Zucker: News still first at CNN". politico.com. September 24, 2014. Retrieved 15 January 2015.
  33. "Jeff Zucker Strikes Back: CNN Chief Takes on Critics of Original Series, News Facelift". The Wrap. Retrieved 9 March 2015.
  34. "CNN Shows Most Growth in Cable News". AdWeek. Retrieved 16 January 2015.
  35. "CNN lays off more than 40 journalists". The Guardian. Retrieved 24 January 2014.
  36. "How Jeff Zucker Is Seeking to Reshape CNN". The New York Times. October 3, 2014. Retrieved 15 January 2015.
  37. Mahler, Jonathan (2017-04-04). "CNN Had a Problem. Donald Trump Solved It". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2019-03-04.
  38. "CNN Chief Jeff Zucker Unveils Plan to Dominate Digital". Hollywood Reporter. March 1, 2017. Retrieved 1 March 2017.
  39. Hayes, Peter White, Dade; White, Peter; Hayes, Dade (March 4, 2019). "Bob Greenblatt Joins WarnerMedia, Jeff Zucker & Kevin Tsujihara Add To Roles As AT&T Reorganizes Leadership Team". deadline.com.
  40. Carter, Bill (September 24, 2010). "NYT article, Zucker quote as saying he has 4 children. Retrieved Sep 25, 2010". Mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com. Retrieved May 14, 2011.
  41. Sherman, Gabriel (October 5, 2014). "Jeff Zucker Has Endured Cancer... Retrieved Sep 30, 2015". nymag.com. Retrieved September 30, 2015.
  42. "CNN Chief Jeff Zucker to Take Leave for Heart Surgery". variety.com. July 19, 2018.

Further reading
Business positions
Preceded by
Garth Ancier		 President, NBC Entertainment
2000-2004		 Succeeded by
Kevin Reilly
Preceded by
position created		 President, NBC Universal Television Group
2004-2007		 Succeeded by
unknown
Preceded by
Bob Wright		 CEO of NBC
2007-2011		 Succeeded by
Steve Burke
Preceded by
Jim Walton		 President, CNN Worldwide
2013-present		 Succeeded by
incumbent
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