'CBS Saturday Morning' taps Gessner

By VARIETY STAFF

NEW YORK --- Hal Gessner has been named exec producer of "CBS News Saturday Morning," the new two-hour weekend show bowing in mid-September.

Gessner will shepherd the new show, which promises a blend of lifestyle and light news segments and will be co-anchored by current U.S. Rep. Susan Molinari (R-N.Y.), who's leaving Congress this month to take the CBS post. Molinari's co-anchor will be named shortly.

Gessner, most recently senior producer at CBS's "Coast to Coast" newsmag, also was a producer at the Eye web's "Street Stories" and "Face to Face with Connie Chung," and has worked at ABC's "Day One" and the FX cable network, where as an exec producer he created the "Home FX" daytime series.