Plugging the Strike Hole : CBS, ABC Look to More News Shows to Fill Gaps

NEW YORK — To fill time that may be left open this fall by the writers’ strike, CBS has ordered two additional installments of its highly rated “60 Minutes” news magazine and ABC News may do four to six prime-time specials, network officials said Friday.

Saying it had “explored every possible angle to fill programming gaps caused by the strike,” CBS unveiled a list of first-run programs that it will have available for scheduling come fall, consisting mostly of previously announced movies and miniseries. But it also mentioned two special editions of “60 Minutes.”

CBS News spokesman Tom Goodman said it wasn’t known yet when those two specials would air. In addition to “60 Minutes,” CBS News has two other prime-time series returning in the fall, “West 57th” and “48 Hours.”

Meanwhile, ABC News President Roone Arledge said his network may air four to six prime-time news specials in the fall.

The 18-week-old strike of film and TV entertainment writers has crippled TV production and delayed the start of the new TV season, but network news programs aren’t affected by the walkout by the Writers Guild of America.

Arledge indicated that he was awaiting the go-ahead from ABC brass, saying, “We’re going to try to do some more major news specials--I had a meeting about it yesterday--probably in September or October.”

He spoke at a news conference called for another matter--to introduce Paula Zahn and former “CBS Morning News” co-anchor Forrest Sawyer as the new co-anchors of ABC’s “World News This Morning.”

The program, which airs weekdays from 6 to 7 a.m., has been based in Washington since it began 10 years ago. But starting Monday, when Sawyer and Zahn start anchoring it, the program will originate on a permanent basis from New York.

They also will do news inserts for the two-hour program that follows it, “Good Morning America,” which originates from New York.

CBS’ announcement Friday seemed aimed at assuring affiliated stations and advertisers that the network would be providing first-run programming even if the strike continues.

Included were two prime-time college football games scheduled for Sept. 3 and Sept. 10, three episodes of “Murder, She Wrote,” an animated “Charlie Brown” miniseries, three four-hour miniseries, a bevy of TV movies and such theatrical films as “Out of Africa,” “Agnes of God” and “Cocoon.”

CBS also has scheduled first-run episodes of two sitcoms that were ordered last season but never aired: “The Cavanaughs,” which starts Aug. 8, and “First Impressions,” premiering Aug. 27. Both will run through October, the network said.

In a prepared statement, CBS Entertainment President Kim LeMasters, echoing what his NBC counterpart, Brandon Tartikoff, said last week, said he is exploring “other program alternatives” that include “reality-based programs” and foreign production. He gave no details, however.