"This Week" being revamped – George Will is out, pretty much

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Next Month With George and Tom
With a New Producer In, ABC's 'This Week' Roundtable Is Out

By Howard Kurtz

Over breakfast at the Four Seasons several months ago, Tom Bettag had what he calls his "first date" with George Stephanopoulos and tried to decide whether there would be a second.

The veteran "Nightline" producer had been asked to take over the former Clintonite's struggling Sunday morning show, "This Week," and he was blunt about what was at stake.

"It's going to be hard for you to have me messing around with stuff you put in there," Bettag told Stephanopoulos. If the larger "Nightline" staff took charge, "there's a whole ego issue here. . . . You will no longer have people you can call 'my people.' "

Stephanopoulos agreed to a lasting relationship, and the ABC program is expected to relaunch Sept. 7 with a new set, fancy graphics and one glaring omission: The journalists' roundtable, the opinionated give-and-take that has been the program's signature for 22 years, has been axed.

(snip)

The dropping of the roundtable means Bettag has had to find new roles for house conservative George Will, the last remaining member of the original show launched by David Brinkley, and panelists Michel Martin and Newsweek columnist Fareed Zakaria. Bettag says the three will still appear periodically -- by themselves -- for debriefing sessions with Stephanopoulos that will stress their reporting and analysis, not opinion-mongering. Other ABC News staffers will also pop up for these chats -- including "Nightline" correspondents and, on occasion, Ted Koppel -- along with reporters from other news organizations.

more…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A40353-2003Aug24.html