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.
I want to share great news about Eric Avram and Santina Leuci, whose contributions distinguish every program and platform at ABC News.
Reporting to me as Senior Executive Producer of Division-wide Interviews, Eric will oversee all ABC News booking teams and work closely with me to implement our strategy for centralized booking. In addition to overseeing the Medical, Business and Law & Justice teams and the Woodruff unit, he will now oversee our tremendously skilled investigative units.
Eric has transformed the way we secure and produce big interviews by creating an editorial strategy that leverages our enterprise reporting on every program and platform.
He has been instrumental in securing and co-executive producing some of our most distinctive primetime specials and major newsmaker interviews for Diane Sawyer, Barbara Walters, Robin Roberts and virtually all our anchors.
He has played an important role in nearly every major story in his 19 years with ABC News, and his contributions have been recognized with Emmy, DuPont and Peabody awards.
Santina, who has led GMA’s booking team for almost a decade, has been elevated to Executive Editorial Producer for the news division, reporting to Eric. She won’t be leaving her GMA home. She will continue report to Tom on all things GMA.
Those of you who have worked with Santina know she is a hard-charger who loves the hunt, chase and exclusive “get.” She’s led one of the strongest booking departments in the business, covering court cases, politics, entertainment, health and every single major breaking news event worldwide.
Santina was a field producer for 20/20 and PrimeTime Live, where the excellence of her work was recognized with major industry awards – a National Headliner Award for Connie Chung’s exclusive sit down with embattled Congressman Gary Condit, an EIC Gun Violence Award for a critically acclaimed piece on girl gangs and a NAACP Image Award for an interview with the FBI’s KKK informant for the 16th Street Church bombing.
Now Santina will apply her many skills to all our platforms, wrangling the biggest newsmaking interviews.
Under Eric’s and Santina’s leadership our booking resources will work together for the entire division to field the strongest team on the biggest stories.
Please join me in congratulating Eric and Santina on their expanded roles at ABC.
Ben