Thursday, April 08, 2021

Hope it wasn't my fault

Just a week after my piece featuring Jon Hansen in the Illinois Entertainer, the TV station pulled the plug on his show. From Robert Feder's column today... Friday will mark the final airing of “The Jam,” the low-rated evening talk show on WCIU-Channel 26.2/WMEU-Channel 48.1, the digital subchannels known as The U. Launched as a two-hour morning show in 2017 and hosted most recently by Felicia Lawrence, Jon Hansen and Amy Rutledge, “The Jam” was cut to one hour and moved to 6 p.m. weeknights when the pandemic shut down in-studio production. “Through very difficult conditions for the last 13 months, the team has produced live shows with a completely at-home team and featured important discussions on the key issues of our time,” Steve Farber, senior vice president of operations at Weigel Broadcasting, told staffers Wednesday. “Going forward, we are working on other Chicago-based content that we can scale differently.” Syndicated programming is expected to air at 6 p.m., starting Monday. Farber declined to say how many positions were affected, but insiders said as many as 10 jobs could be cut, including Steve Bailey, who was architect of “The Jam” as head of local programming and creative.