Who is Jeff Zucker?
Detailed Jeff Zucker Biography
What is Jeff Zucker Age?
Who’re Jeff Zucker Family Members?
Who’re Jeff Zucker Children?
Who’s Jeff Zucker Wife/ Husband?
What is Jeff Zucker Net Worth 2020?
Jeff Zucker Social Media Accounts
Facebook @
Instagram: @
Twitter: @
Jeff Zucker Biography
Jeff Zucker born Jeffrey Adam Zucker is an American media executive who previously served as president and CEO of NBC Universal. He served as an executive in residence at Columbia Business School. In January 2013, he was picked to take over as the president of CNN Worldwide after Jim Walton’s tenure. He supervises CNN, CNN International, HLN, and CNN Digital.
Jeff Zucker Age
Jeffrey Adam Zucker was born into a Jewish family in Homestead, Florida, U.S. on April 9, 1965. He is
Jeff Zucker Early Life
Zucker was born in Homestead, Florida, near Miami. He was born to Matthew, a cardiologist, and his mother, Arline, who was a school teacher.
He attended and graduated from North Miami Senior High School in 1982. While there, he was a captain of the North Miami Senior High School tennis team, editor of the school paper, and a teenage freelance reporter (“stringer”) for The Miami Herald. He was about 5-foot-6-inch (1.68 m) and also was president of his sophomore, junior, and senior classes, running on the slogan “The little man with the big ideas.”
Before he attended college, he took part in Northwestern University’s National High School Institute program for journalism. Zucker went to Harvard University, and was the president of the school newspaper, The Harvard Crimson, during his senior year and as such he encouraged the decades-old prank rivalry with the Harvard Lampoon, headed by future NBC colleague Conan O’Brien. He graduated from Harvard in 1986 with a Bachelor of Arts in American history.
Jeff Zucker Wife
Zucker is married to Caryn Stephanie Nathanson, who was a supervisor for Saturday Night Live. They got married in 1996, and together they have four children. In January 2018, he announced that he and his wife were separating, though it is not well clear yet.
At the ages of 31 and 34, Zucker was diagnosed with colon cancer. He successfully underwent surgery twice and chemotherapy after the first surgery. In July 2018 he had to move away from CNN’s leadership to recover from heart surgery.
Jeff Zucker Career
At NBC
After his failed admission to Harvard Law School, he took a job at NBC in 1986 to research information for its coverage of the 1988 Summer Olympics.
In 1989, he was a field producer for Today, and in 1992, he became its executive producer at 26 years. He introduced the program’s trademark outdoor rock concert series and was in charge as Today moved to the “window on the world” Studio 1A in Rockefeller Plaza in 1994. He is credited with managing the show during its most successful years and launching it into its 16-years of rating dominance.
President of NBC
In 2000, he was named NBC Entertainment’s president. A 2004 Business week Profile stated that “During that time he oversaw NBC’s entire entertainment schedule. He kept the network ahead of the pack by airing the gross-out show Fear Factor, negotiating for the cast of the hit series Friends to take the series up to a tenth season, and signing Donald Trump for the reality show The Apprentice.
Jeff Zucker Photo
He is also credited with the idea to extend Friends episodes by 10 minutes and convinced the cast to extend their contracts by two years. That era was one of the most profitable ever for NBC. His era produced a spike in operating earnings for NBC, from $532 million the year he took over to $870 million in 2003.
He also introduced Las Vegas, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, and Scrubs. He originated the idea of airing “Supersized” (longer than the standard 30-minute slot) episodes of NBC’s comedies and aggressively programming in the summer months as cable networks began to draw away viewers with original programming from the network’s rerun-filled summer slate.
Bravo changed its programming direction towards popularity gaining reality television, while the newly acquired Spanish network Telemundo was positioned to be more competitive with leading network Univision.”
Entertainment’s News & Cable Group
In December 2003, Zucker became president of NBC’s Entertainment, News & Cable Group as well.
President of NBC Television Group
In May 2004, after they merged with French media empire Vivendi Universal, he became president of its Television Group. During Zucker’s tenure, shows that he championed include Father of the Pride and the Friends spinoff Joey were considered failures.
Chief Executive Officer of NBC
On December 15, 2005, Zucker was promoted to Chief Executive Officer of NBC Universal Television Group behind Robert Charles Wright, vice chairman of General Electric and chairman & CEO of NBC Universal.
He was responsible for all programming across the company’s television properties, including network, news, cable, sports, and Olympics. His responsibilities also included the company’s studio operations and global distribution efforts.
President and CEO of NBC Universal
On February 6, 2007, Zucker became president and CEO of NBC Universal. In 2010, in response to a public controversy over the network’s reported rescheduling of late-night hosts Jay Leno and Conan O’Brien, Los Angeles Times reporters Meg James and Matea Gold wrote that Zucker’s tenure had led to “a spectacular fall by the country’s premier television network” and dubbed the intra-network feud and subsequent public relations fallout “one of the biggest debacles in television history”.
Jeff And Caryn Zucker Photo
They stated that under Zucker, NBC fell from being the number one rated network to the lowest rated of the four broadcast networks and was occasionally being beaten in the ratings by programming on some of the more popular cable channels.
Days later, Maureen Dowd New York Times columnist, wrote that in Hollywood “there has been a single topic of discussion: How does Jeff Zucker keep rising and rising while the fortunes of NBC keep falling and falling? …many in the Hollywood community have always regarded him as …a network Napoleon who never bothered to learn about developing shows and managing talent.” She explained that Zucker was a master at managing up with bosses and calculating cost-per-hour benefits, but even though he made money on cable shows, he could not program the network to save his life.
Dowd further reported that an unnamed “honcho at another network” stated that Zucker was a case study in the most destructive media executive ever to exist… “You’d have to tell me who else has taken a once-great network and literally destroyed it.”
On June 2, 2010, the New York Post reported that he would be paid between $30 million and $40 million to leave NBC Universal shortly after Comcast completed its 51% acquisition in the company.
Before being the president of CNN Worldwide, Zucker worked with fellow NBC alum, former Today host Katie Couric, producing her daytime talk show for Disney-ABC Domestic Television, Katie.
President of CNN Worldwide
On January 1, 2013, he became president of CNN Worldwide. His appointment was widely welcomed by the network and its anchors. Anderson Cooper told colleagues that Zucker was “the first CNN president to actually watch CNN”.
In December 2013, he stated that his goal for the channel was to offer an “attitude and a take” to viewers, with a larger focus on reality-style documentary series (expanding upon the success of its documentary acquisition Blackfish, and new series Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown).
He further explained that he wanted CNN to appeal more to regular viewers of factual networks (such as A&E, Discovery, and History), and make larger investments into the network’s digital properties. With the 2014 cancellation of Piers Morgan Live, CNN experimented with airing factual programming in primetime as an alternative, with Zucker stating that it would cater to younger demographics than pundit-oriented programs. However, he still insisted that news remained CNN’s first priority and that these programs could be preempted for continuing coverage of breaking news events when needed.
2014 saw an increase in the daytime and primetime viewership of CNN; by October 2014, CNN had overtaken MSNBC in primetime key demographic viewership, placing second behind Fox News Channel.
During the 2016 presidential election campaign, a large focus was placed upon on-air debates between partisan pundits surrounding issues relating to the candidates (including, in particular, Republican candidate Donald Trump).
In an interview with The New York Times, he stated that aspects of its election coverage were influenced by sports channels (with the Times citing, specifically, debates between pundits reminiscent of shows such as ESPN’s First Take, and large outdoor “pre-game” show for the presidential debates), explaining that “the idea that politics is sport is undeniable, and we understood that and approached it that way.”
In 2016, CNN reached a monthly average of 105 million unique visitors to its web and mobile properties.
In March 2019, CNN parent Warner Media announced a reorganization in which Zucker would become chairman of the company’s news and sports division, overseeing Turner Sports, Bleacher Report and AT&T Sports Net, in addition to maintaining his role as head of CNN.
Jeff Zucker Net Worth
He is the former president and CEO of NBC Universal and spent more than two decades at NBC, assuming the top position in February 2007. The current president of CNN Worldwide has an estimated net worth of $40 million.
Jeff Zucker Height
He has a height of around 1,73m. And a weight of 67kg.