ABC News has promoted a pair of executives charged with wrangling tough interviews. Eric Avram has been promoted to Senior EP of division-wide interviews, reporting to ABC News president Ben Sherwood. In that role Avram will be in charge of interviews for ABC’s Medical, Business and Law & Justice teams as well as the Woodruff unit and the investigative units.

Santina Leuci, “Good Morning America’”s chief booker, will become executive editorial producer, while retaining her “GMA” duties. She will continue to report to “GMA” senior EP Tom Cibrowski.

Avram has been the man charged with booking big guests for many of ABC’s primetime specials. As the network moved away from paying for interviews via license fees, it has been able to book big guests by promising maximum exposure on multiple platforms and shows. Leuci has been at the forefront of “GMA’”s revival, particularly during Robin Roberts‘ absence from the program, when a number of big names stepped in to help fill her shoes.

Sherwood’s note to staff, after the jump.
Read more

• Fox Business Network has hired Jo Ling Kent as a business reporter, based in New York. Kent joins FBN from NBC O&O WVIT in Hartford, CT. Kent previously worked for ABC News, CNN and as an embed for NBC News during the 2012 election.

• Speaking of FBN, Lou Dobbs is profiled by the Palm Beach Post. Dobbs has a home in the Palm Beach area. He talks about Palm Beach, but also his show on FBN.

• Newsweek/The Daily Beast has released its “125 Women of Impact” list, and a few TV personalities made the cut, including ABC’s Robin Roberts,  former CNN anchor Soledad O’Brien and Oprah Winfrey.

• “Good Morning America” co-anchor Robin Roberts will be filling in for Kelly Ripa on “Live with Kelly and Michael” next Monday. Roberts will join Michael Strahan in interviewing Laurence Fishburne, among other guests.

• Fox News anchor Bret Baier talks to Delta Sky magazine (you know, the free one you get on Delta flights). His topic of discussion: political hotspot Naples, Florida.

• Al Jazeera is pushing back against the report yesterday that they would be shipping dozens of jobs from London to Doha. Rather, the company says a handful of jobs in the UK will temporarily shift to Qatar, which is short-staffed as they launch Al Jazeera America. Staffers will move back to London in a few months.

The “Today” show can’t catch a break. The NBC morning show, which has seen an endless stream of stories about the show’s troubling year, was expecting to win last week in the younger demo — in fact Nielsen fast nationals put the younger viewer win at its biggest since December.

But with the Nielsen final ratings out this morning, it turns out ABC’s “Good Morning America” has won in both total viewers and the A25-54 demo. “GMA” was up +5% in total viewers compared to the same week last year, while “Today” was down -5%. Both shows were down in the demo, ABC by -2% and NBC by -12%. “Today’s” gap with “GMA,” by 18,000 demo viewers, was the closest since January.

But perhaps the biggest news about the morning news is “CBS This Morning.” Despite being a distant third, the show is up +17% in viewers and up +9% in the demo year-over-year.

The averages for the week of March 18, 2013:

• Total Viewers: ABC: 5.078M / NBC: 4.723M / CBS: 2.776M

• A25-54 viewers: ABC: 1.918M / NBC: 1.900M / CBS: 1.059M

With two awards each, CBS News, ABC News and PBS led the way in George Foster Peabody Awards this year.

Both of CBS’ awards were for “60 Minutes” reports — “Deception at Duke,” an examination of the failure of an experimental cancer treatment at Duke University, and “Joy in the Congo,” a report about a Congolese orchestra that “sounded a note of hope for a war-ravaged nation.”

ABC News won for coverage of Hurricane Sandy and for “Robin’s Journey,” reports on Robin Roberts‘ MDS that “inspired hundreds of potential  bone marrow donors to register.”

PBS also won two awards, for an eight-part examination of poverty through the ages and for a report on a nomadic family in Tibet.

• Related, TVSpy: KNXV, WTHR, KMGH and WVIT Win Peabody Awards

CNN, Univision and Al Jazeera also won Peabodys. CNN won for its coverage of the civil war in Syria and Al Jazeera won for a documentary about a Palestinian teenager evicted from East Jerusalem. Univision won for “Rapido y Furioso,” a piece about the human impact of the ATF’s gun-tracking program.

See the full list of winners, who will be honored in New York City in May at an event emceed by CBS’ Scott Pelley, after the jump. Read more

ABC News “Good Morning America” co-anchor Robin Roberts is set to receive a pair of high-profile honors this year. Her old employers at ESPN will be presenting her with the Arthur Ashe Courage Award at the 2013 ESPY Awards in July. Roberts worked at ESPN from 1990 to 2005, when she joined “GMA” full-time.

Roberts will also be receiving the “Lifetime Leadership Award” from designer Diane von Furstenberg.

Roberts returned to “GMA” in February, after having been off-the-air for more than five months to receive a bone marrow transplant.

Read more

“Good Morning America” has won its first February Sweep in 20 years and had its biggest Sweeps win over NBC’s “Today” show in more than 21 years, since November 1991.

Now a solid #1 in the mornings and with an added boost brought by the Oscars and Robin Roberts‘ return, “GMA” was up +7% vs. the November 2012 Sweep.

#3 “CBS This Morning” also improved from the February 2012 Sweep: up +15% in Total Viewers and up +6% in younger viewers.

Compared to the same week last year “GMA” was up +4% in Total Viewers and up +9% in younger viewers. “CBS This Morning” was up +11% in total viewers and up +1% in younger viewers. And NBC’s “Today” show was down -13% and down -19%, respectively.

The averages for the week of February 25, 2013:

• Total Viewers: ABC: 5.835M / NBC: 4.814M / CBS: 2.863M

• A25-54 viewers: ABC: 2.241M / NBC: 2.010M / CBS: 1.079M

The averages for February, 2013 Sweep:

• Total Viewers: ABC: 5.669M / NBC: 4.821M / CBS: 3.012M

• A25-54 viewers: ABC: 2.130M / NBC: 2.033M / CBS: 1.146M

Both “Good Morning America” and “CBS This Morning” saw impressive year-over-year growth last week. Robin Roberts‘ much-hyped return to “GMA” put the show over the 6 million total viewer mark, making it the most-watched week in more than 19 years. “GMA” was up +23% in total viewers and up +11% in younger viewers for the week. Wednesday’s show, which saw Roberts’ return, drew 6.58 million viewers, the most since the royal wedding nearly 2 years ago.

No. 3 “CBS This Morning” was also up +11% in the younger demo and up +16% in total viewers.

NBC’s “Today” show continues to struggle, down -8% in total viewers and down -11% in younger viewers. However, “Today’s” year-over-year viewer losses have slowed to single digits, from losses of -22% last fall. For the week of Sept. 17, 2012, “Today” drew 4.08 million viewers, last week the show pulled in 4.95 million.

And to give you a sense of overall growth for the three shows: five months ago (week of Sept. 17, 2012) the combined average was 11.58 million viewers. Last week, almost 14 million viewers tuned in to one of the three morning broadcasts.

The averages for the week of February 18, 2013:

• Total Viewers: ABC: 6.008M / NBC: 4.953M / CBS: 3.020M

• A25-54 viewers: ABC: 2.195M / NBC: 2.103M / CBS: 1.130M

The winners of the 2013 Gracie Awards have been announced.  ABC News leads the way with five Gracies, including for outstanding reporter/correspondent Martha Raddatz, outstanding anchor Robin Roberts and outstanding news/non-fiction producer Keturah Gray. Brian Ross‘ investigation on Medicare fraud also won for outstanding investigative feature.

CBS News notched three awards, for reporting on “CBS This Morning,” “CBS Evening News” and CBS News Radio. NBC wins one, for Natalie Morales‘ “My Kid Would Never Do That” series on “Dateline.”

CNN won two awards, including for outstanding breaking news coverage for its coverage of the Gaza-Israel conflict.

MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski won for outstanding host and Univision’s Maria Elena Salinas was named outstanding anchor.

The winners (view the full list here) will be honored at the Gracies Gala at the Beverly Hilton Hotel on May 21.

“Good Morning America” had its most-watched show since the day after the 2012 election yesterday as Robin Roberts returned from medical leave.

“GMA” drew 6.121M total viewers, +24% better than the “Today” show’s 4.933M. That’s the largest total viewer gap since Nov. 28, 2012, the day after the “Dancing with the Stars” finale.

The two shows tied in the A25-54 rating with a 1.9, while “GMA” had the edge in A25-54 viewership: 2.276M vs. 2.240M. And for the week so far, “Today” has the lead in demo viewership.