Piers Morgan

• 2010: CNN announced that British journalist Piers Morgan would replace Larry King after the talk show host’s retirement, prompting public praise of Morgan from Donald Trump. “After months of speculation, CNN announced Wednesday that it had hired Piers Morgan, the British newspaper editor best known to U.S. audiences as a judge on NBC's ‘America's Got Talent,’ to take over its 9 p.m. talk-show slot currently hosted by Larry King. […] Real estate impresario Donald Trump, who cast Morgan in the 2008 celebrity edition of ‘The Apprentice,; which he won, said the Brit has more of an instinct to go for the jugular than King. That's a characteristic he's going to have to temper a bit on CNN, Trump added. ‘When you do a show five or six nights a week, you can't kill everybody, because you're not going to get anybody to come on the show,’ he said. ‘But Piers will have a great take on it.... He's going to know just how far to go.’” (Los Angeles Times, September 9, 2010)
• Donald Trump, who had been personal friends with both Larry King and Piers Morgan, claimed that both men were “great interviewers” and told journalists Morgan would be a strong replacement for Larry King. “Sitting in his office, which looks out over the Manhattan skyline, the silver-haired, sharply dressed Brit is here at CNN's New York offices to discuss his new talk show ‘Piers Morgan Tonight,’ which takes over Larry King's old time slot on Monday. […] Morgan will tell anyone who listens that he's ready to ‘fill Larry King's suspenders.’ Donald Trump, a good friend of Morgan's and King's, agrees. ‘Larry King was one of the great interviewers, so you need a great interviewer to replace him, and that's Piers,’ says Trump, who crowned Morgan the winner of ‘Celebrity Apprentice’ three years ago and will soon appear on ‘Piers Morgan Tonight.’ ;He's going to be more caustic than Larry. He'll be able to get things out of people that few are able to do.’” (Los Angeles Times, January 17, 2011)
• The long-time executive producer of Piers Morgan’s British interview show claimed that he refused to read briefings about his subjects prior to interviews, preferring to maintain his ignorance so that he could be “surprised” by his subjects. “Piers also developed ‘Life Stories,’ the U.K. talk show that is ‘Larry King Live’-ish, in that it consists of lengthy one-on-one sit-down interviews with celebrities and politicians, including Prime Minister Gordon Brown. That show, CNN said, has been the No. 1-rated talk show in Britain for the last two years. […] In a June interview that coincided with King's announcement of his decision to step down from his CNN prime-time show after 25 years and more than 40,000 interviews, his longtime senior executive producer Wendy Walker told The Post's Howard Kurtz (who also works for CNN), ‘I'll try to brief him, but he really doesn't have any interest.... His theory is that if he's not surprised, he won't ask the right questions.’” (Washington Post, September 9, 2010)
• Piers Morgan was elevated to the editorship of a British tabloid at a young age by Rupert Morgan, but later lost his job in disgrace after his paper published fake photographs of American servicemembers committing human rights abuses in Iraq. “Morgan began his career as a reporter for The Wimbledon News, and, when he was 28 years old, Rupert Murdoch appointed him the youngest ever editor of the yeasty tabloid News of the World. He moved to the Daily Mirror, where he served as editor in chief until 2004. In its announcement CNN acknowledged his departure from that publication was ‘controversial’ without elaborating. According to Washington Post clips at the time, Morgan exited after the newspaper printed photos of alleged Iraqi prisoners being allegedly abused by alleged British soldiers that turned out to be a hoax. But, like so many before him, Morgan rose from the ashes like the phoenix, to become an author, a media columnist, host of interview programs and judge alongside Simon Cowell on Britain's No.1-rated show ‘Britain's Got Talent.’ Our fave Morgan show, based on name alone, is the British program ‘You Can't Fire Me, I'm Famous.’” (Washington Post, September 9, 2010)