Connie Chung

**Connie Chung** (born **Constance Yu-Hwa Chung** on August 20, 1946) is an American journalist. She has been an anchor and reporter for the U.S. television news networks NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN, and MSNBC. Some of her more famous interview subjects include Claus von Bülow and U.S. Representative Gary Condit, whom Chung interviewed first after the Chandra Levy disappearance, and basketball legend Magic Johnson after he went public about being HIV-positive in 1991.

In 1993, she became only the second female to co-anchor a network newscast as part of CBS Evening News. She was removed in 1995 as *CBS Evening News* co-anchor after a controversial interview with a fireman, during rescue efforts at the Oklahoma City bombing, which seemed inappropriately combative, and her interview tactics to get Newt Gingrich's mother to admit her unguarded thoughts about Hillary Clinton.

## Early life/career

Connie was born in Washington, D.C. as the youngest of 10 children to a Chinese immigrant couple less than a year after her family emigrated from China and was raised there in D.C.. Her father, William Ling Chung, worked in the intelligence department of the Chinese Government, and her mother was a homemaker. Five of her siblings died during wartime.

From early childhood, she had a deep interest in weather conditions and always wanted to become a Meteorologist. She attended the Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, Maryland, where she learned dancing as well, and then went on to receive a degree in journalism at the Univeristy of Maryland, College Park, in 1969.

### Early career

Chung was a Washington-based correspondent for the *Wikipedia:CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite* in the early 1970s, during the Watergate political scandal. Later, Chung left to anchor evening newscasts for KNXT (now KCBS-TV), the network's owned and operated station in Los Angeles. Chung also anchored the network's primetime news updates (*CBS Newsbreak*) for West Coast stations from the KNXT studios at Columbia Square during her tenure there.

### NBC-TV

In 1983, Chung returned to network news as anchor of NBC's new early program, *NBC News at Sunrise*, which was scheduled as the lead-in to the *Today* program. She was also anchor of the Saturday edition of *NBC Nightly News* and filled in for Tom Brokaw on weeknights. NBC also created two newsmagazines, *American Almanac* and *1986*, which she co-hosted with Roger Mudd.

### CBS-TV

In 1989, Chung left NBC for CBS, where she hosted *Saturday Night with Connie Chung* (later renamed *Face to Face with Connie Chung*) (1989–90), and anchored the *CBS Sunday Evening News* (1989–93). On June 1, 1993, she became the second woman (after Barbara Walters with ABC in 1976) to co-anchor a major network's national news weekday broadcast (the first solo national news anchor title in the United States goes to Katie Couric at CBS). While hosting the *CBS Evening News*, Chung also hosted a side project on CBS, *Eye to Eye with Connie Chung*.

## ABC-TV

After her unsuccessful co-anchoring stint with Dan Rather ended in 1995, Chung left CBS. She eventually jumped to ABC News where she co-hosted the Monday edition of *20/20* with Charles Gibson and began independent interviews, a field which would soon become her trademark.

### CNN

Chung briefly hosted her own show on CNN titled *Connie Chung Tonight*, for which she was paid $2 million per year. Though her arrival at CNN was heavily hyped by the network, her show was panned by critics. CNN changed her show from live to tape-delay to improve its continuity. Although it performed moderately well in the ratings (a 500,000 increase in viewers), her show was suspended once the 2003 Iraq War began. During the war, she was reduced to reading hourly headlines. Once CNN resumed regular programming, Chung requested that CNN resume broadcasting her show as soon as possible. The network responded by cancelling it, even though her contract had not yet expired. In an interview, CNN founder Ted Turner called the show "just awful."

### MSNBC

In January 2006, Connie and Maury began hosting a show titled *Weekends with Maury and Connie* on MSNBC. It was Chung's first appearance as a television host since 2003. The show was later canceled and aired its final episode on June 17, 2006. In this episode, Chung, dressed in a white evening gown and dancing on top of a black piano, sang a parody to the tune of "Thanks for the Memory." Video clips of the off-key farewell performance circulated on internet video sites. Chung commented, "All I want to be sure of is that viewers understood it was a giant self-parody. If anyone took it seriously, they really need to get a life.

On the June 27, 2006 episode of The Tonight Show, Jay Leno interviewed Chung about her "Thanks for the Memory" parody. During the interview, Chung poked fun at her show's low ratings, referring to the musical number as a "private joke for our two viewers."

## Personal/Family

Chung has been married to talk show host Maury Povich since 1984. Chung has not officially converted to Judaism but according to Povich, “She knows more Yiddish than you.” Chung has since become devoted to the faith, and she regularly attends synagogue with her family. Chung has noted publicly that she and Povich maintain a kosher lifestyle year-round. Chung announced that she was reducing her workload in 1991 in the hopes of getting pregnant. Together, they have one son, Matthew Jay Povich, whom they adopted on June 20, 1995.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1  https://wikipicky.com/tv-celebrity/connie-chung-married-husband-children-pregnant-and-salary.html
2. ↑ [1] Template:Webarchive
3. ↑ Connie Chung. *makers.com*. Retrieved on January 28, 2017.
4. ↑ NPR Staff (June 8, 2011). Connie Chung: On News, Family, Fighting With Humor. wBur. Retrieved on June 18, 2014.
5. ↑ "Busy Connie Chung Focuses on CBS's 'Eye to Eye'", *The Washington Post*, June 13, 1993. Retrieved on May 30, 2020.
6. ↑ Studio Briefing February 10, 2003.
7. ↑ Clark, Amy. ""Connie Chung's Serenade Gag a Web Hit".", *CBS News*, CBS/Associated Press (AP), June 20, 2006. Retrieved on May 31, 2020.
8. ↑ Waldman, Allison J. (2007-09-30). Maury Povich Through the Years. *TV Week*. Retrieved on 2008-08-25.
9. ↑ Template:Cite magazine