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Syler Departs – Will 'The Early Show' Change Its Formula?

By Brian Montopoli

December 5, 2006 / 11:30 AM EST / CBS News

(CBS/The Early Show)

The big news at CBS today is that René Syler is leaving "The Early Show." If you greeted that news with a "wait…who?," it wouldn't be entirely surprising. "The Early Show," which has struggled in the ratings, has long suffered from a lack of strong, distinct personalities. This isn't Syler's fault – the show has never really made a point of bringing out the unique traits of its anchors. "Today" had Katie and Matt (and now has Matt and Meredith), while "Good Morning America" had Diane and Charlie (and now, well, still has Diane. And Sam Champion!) Ask people about "The Early Show," by contrast, and they're likely to mention Harry Smith – and a whole bunch of ladies, including that one who is married to that chairman guy, right?

That now seems to be changing. CBS News Vice President of Morning Broadcasts Steve Friedman, who was brought on to help revamp "The Early Show," tells Variety that the show will move towards the four-anchor format of its competitors. (Those anchors would be Smith, Julie Chen, Hannah Storm, and weatherman Dave Price.) And those anchors are going to have more defined roles. "The show is moving in the right direction but it lacks definition because we had four people who were basically interchangeable, and that's a tough way to do a morning television program," said Friedman.

I'm one of those who would like to see "The Early Show" become newsier – though that's certainly not widely seen as a path to better ratings. (The newsiest morning show around – CNN's "American Morning" – has struggled to find an audience.) The good news on that front is that Friedman plans to make the beginning of "The Early Show" more of "a hard-hitting news half-hour."

Syler, meanwhile, is gearing up for the publication of her first book. Her last day is December 22.