Joel Cheatwood is an American
television
Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...
executive.
Cheatwood served as
news director
A news director is an individual at a broadcast station or network or a newspaper who is in charge of the news department. In local news, the news director is typically in charge of the entire news staff, including journalists, news presenters, ...
at
WSVN
WSVN (channel 7) is a television station in Miami, Florida, United States, affiliated with the Fox network. It is the flagship station of locally based Sunbeam Television. WSVN's studios are located on 79th Street Causeway ( SR 934) in North ...
in
Miami
Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a coastal metropolis and the county seat of Miami-Dade County in South Florida, United States. With a population of 442,241 at ...
(the
flagship station of
Sunbeam Television
Sunbeam Television Corporation is a privately held broadcasting company based in Miami, Florida, that owns three television stations in the United States.
History
Sunbeam Television was formed on December 16, 1953, by Sidney Ansin, who inherite ...
) starting in 1989, soon after it had switched to
Fox
Foxes are small to medium-sized, omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull, upright, triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or ''brush'').
Twelve sp ...
. Cheatwood was often criticized for an emphasis on sensationalistic reporting, but his "7 News" format revived a station that had low ratings while it was an
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...
affiliate and had a strong influence on what Fox stations' newscasts would eventually look like.
In 1993, Sunbeam Television bought
WHDH-TV
WHDH (channel 7) is an independent television station in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. It is owned by Sunbeam Television alongside Cambridge-licensed CW affiliate WLVI (channel 56). WHDH and WLVI share studios at Bulfinch Place (nea ...
in
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
. Cheatwood relaunched the station with a considerably watered-down version of the WSVN format, which led to a ratings boost, especially after the longtime
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...
affiliate switched to NBC in 1995. WHDH-TV, which later became an
independent station in 2017, soon rose to second place in the Boston ratings, and for the last decade has regularly traded first place with long-dominant
WCVB-TV
WCVB-TV (channel 5) is a television station in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, affiliated with ABC and owned by Hearst Television. The station's studios are located on TV Place (off Gould Street near the I-95/ MA 128/Highland Avenue ...
.
In 1997, Cheatwood moved to
WMAQ-TV
WMAQ-TV (channel 5) is a television station in Chicago, Illinois, United States, airing programming from the NBC network. It is owned and operated by the network's NBC Owned Television Stations division alongside Telemundo outlet WSNS-TV (c ...
in
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
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, an NBC
O&O, as vice president of news and promotion. Cheatwood was criticized for bringing
Jerry Springer
Gerald Norman Springer (born February 13, 1944) is a British-American broadcaster, journalist, actor, producer, former lawyer, and politician. He hosted the tabloid talk show '' Jerry Springer'' between September 30, 1991 and July 26, 2018, an ...
on as a commentator. The station's longtime anchor team,
Carol Marin
Carol Marin (pronounced "''marine''") (born October 10, 1948) is a television and print journalist based in Chicago, Illinois.
Career
Marin began her journalism career in 1972 at WBIR-TV in Knoxville, Tennessee working as a reporter, anchor, an ...
and
Ron Magers, resigned in protest.
Springer only made two commentaries before being let go, and station management later admitted that his hiring was a mistake. Cheatwood took the fall for the management's decision and was later moved to serve as a consultant for NBC.
In 1998, Cheatwood left NBC and became station manager for
KYW-TV, the CBS owned-and-operated station in
Philadelphia
Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...
. Two years later, he became the news director for
WCBS-TV
WCBS-TV (channel 2) is a television station in New York City, serving as the flagship of the CBS network. It is owned and operated by the network's CBS News and Stations division alongside Riverhead, New York–licensed independent station W ...
in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
. Also, Cheatwood doubled as executive vice president of news for all of
CBS's O&Os. In August, he rebranded the station as the "CBS 2 Information Network," using "content partners" such as ''
U.S. News & World Report'' and
VH1. He also moved most of the station's newscasts to the
CBS Sports
CBS Sports is the sports division of the American television network CBS. Its headquarters are in the CBS Building on W 52nd Street in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, with programs produced out of Studio 43 at the CBS Broadcast Center on W ...
studio and renamed the 11pm newscast "Nightcast," giving it its own graphics and music.
During his tenure at WCBS-TV, Cheatwood was known for running the stations operations throughout the
September 11, 2001
The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commerc ...
crisis, providing a sizable portion of footage that otherwise would have been unavailable. In February 2002 he opened a full-time news bureau in
Jerusalem
Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...
,
Israel
Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
, hiring former
CBS Radio reporter
Kimberly Dozier
Kimberly Dozier (born July 6, 1966) is a contributing writer to ''The Daily Beast'' and a contributor to CNN. She was previously a correspondent for the Associated Press, covering intelligence and counterterrorism, and prior to that, a CBS News co ...
as correspondent.
After finishing his contract with CBS, Cheatwood was hired as executive director of program development at
CNN
CNN (Cable News Network) is a multinational cable news channel headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable news channel, and presently owned by ...
. At
CNN Headline News, he worked on shows for
Glenn Beck and
Nancy Grace
Nancy Ann Grace (born October 23, 1959) is an American legal commentator and television journalist. She hosted '' Nancy Grace'', a nightly celebrity news and current affairs show on HLN, from 2005 to 2016, and Court TV's ''Closing Arguments ...
.
In April 2007, Cheatwood joined the
Fox News Channel as Vice President of Development to focus on shows for Fox News Channel and the soon-to-be launched
Fox Business Channel
Fox Business (officially known as Fox Business Network, or FBN) is an American business news channel and website publication owned by the Fox News Media division of Fox Corporation. The channel broadcasts primarily from studios at 1211 Avenue ...
.
On April 6, 2011, Fox News's and Glenn Beck's syndicator,
Mercury Radio Arts
Blaze Media is an American conservative media company. It was founded in 2018 as a result of a merger between TheBlaze and CRTV LLC. The company's leadership consists of CEO Tyler Cardon and president Gaston Mooney. It is based in Irving, Te ...
, announced that Joel Cheatwood would be leaving Fox News and would become an Executive Vice President for Mercury Radio Arts to work as the liaison between Beck and Fox News. He officially joined MRA on April 24, 2011.
Glenn Beck to leave Fox News program
Paul Farhi, ''The Washington Post
''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...
'', 6 April 2011
On March 2, 2015, Cheatwood officially parted ways with TheBlaze
Blaze Media is an American conservative media company. It was founded in 2018 as a result of a merger between TheBlaze and CRTV LLC. The company's leadership consists of CEO Tyler Cardon and president Gaston Mooney. It is based in Irving, Tex ...
.
References
External links
Joel Cheatwood
collected coverage at the ''Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the U ...
''
Joel Cheatwood
collected coverage at ''The New York Observer
''The New York Observer'' was a weekly newspaper printed from 1987 to 2016, when it ceased print publication and became the online-only newspaper ''Observer''. The media site focuses on culture, real estate, media, politics and the entertainmen ...
''
Joel Cheatwood
collected coverage at the ''NY Daily News
The New York ''Daily News'', officially titled the ''Daily News'', is an American newspaper based in Jersey City, NJ. It was founded in 1919 by Joseph Medill Patterson as the ''Illustrated Daily News''. It was the first U.S. daily printed in ...
''
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cheatwood, Joel
Blaze Media people
Living people
American television executives
Year of birth missing (living people)