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Paula Zahn

Paula Zahn interviews Barbara Bush in 1992.
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Paula Zahn interviews Barbara Bush in 1992.

Paula Zahn (born February 24, 1956) is a news anchor for CNN.

Zahn spent 10 years at CBS News, co-hosting CBS's morning show. She was then the anchor for Fox News's The Edge, but was fired when Fox discovered that she was in contract negotations with CNN. Paula Zahn began her new position at CNN on September 11, 2001, hosting a new program called American Morning with Paula Zahn. Over the first weekend of January, 2002, CNN ran an advertisement of American Morning that called Zahn "sexy" and paired the adjective with the sound effect of a zipper opening. The ad was quickly pulled after the network received significant criticism for what was considered an undignified or even sexist portrayal of a serious journalist. CNN attributed the ad's content to a lack of oversight.

In 2003, during the War against Iraq, Zahn moved on to prime time (originally meant as a temporary term during the Iraq war) eventually becoming prime time anchor permanently; beginning by hosting a show entitled American Evening with Paula Zahn. The 2-hour program would be shortly renamed Live from the Headlines when Anderson Cooper took over the first hour of the program; Zahn meanwhile continued to anchor the second hour. This lead to the 2-hour Live from the Headlines to be subsequened into two shows on 09/08/03: Cooper's hour of the show was renamed as Anderson Cooper 360, and Zahn's hour was renamed Paula Zahn Now .

Zahn is also a concert celloist, and first played at Carnegie Hall in 1992 with the New York Pops Orchestra .

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Last updated: 09-03-2005 18:37:12