John Berman has done almost everything an anchor can do at CNN. He guides viewers through breaking news during hours of “CNN News Central.” He’s filled in for Anderson Cooper, co-hosted a morning show and is trained to handle CNN’s “Magic Wall” on primary and election nights.
Berman has been hosting a new CNN program called “Office Hours” that runs periodically on the news giant’s nascent subscription product “CNN All Access.” During “Office Hours,” Berman interacts with subscribers and helps to answer their questions about elections, politics and more. On Wednesday evening, Berman will host a new edition of the program alongside Kate Bolduan and Sara Sidner, his “News Central” co-hosts.
“This doesn’t feel like television,” Berman says during a recent interview. “Even though there are cameras rolling.”
The new show puts Berman into situations he might not typically encounter on TV. During one recent “Office Hours” ostensibly focused on the coming midterm elections, the anchor found he kept getting questions and comments about President Trump’s proposal to hand out $5,000 checks to Americans if Republicans emerged victorious. “On TV, we talked about it and it went away,” he says, but “not for the people we were talking to.” With that in mind, Berman knew he could turn the interactions into a conversation the next time he was anchoring on TV. “I was getting direct feedback at night and turning it around in the morning.”
Now that Paramount Skydance has prevailed in its bid to take over CNN’s parent, there is certain to be new scrutiny on what elements of CNN’s current business plan new managers wish to keep. For a TV veteran like Berman, there is, for now, a chance to pivot when it comes to facilitating new kinds of interactions with news viewers. “I’m trying to respond to the people who are viewing it,” Berman notes. “I don’t have control, and I don’t mind that.”
