Hollywood Week: CBS Bari Weiss, 60 Minutes Overhaul, Matthew Perry Assistant Sentenced, Sonny Rollins

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Category: Entertainment News

Published on Saturday, 30 May 2026 11:12

Written by Janet Walker

CBS News Division Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss continues her effort to renovate the news programming of the third place network, concentrating on the crown jewel, 60 Minutes, hoping to transition the division into a competitive position.

60 Minutes Undergoes Overhaul

In an effort to attract the next generation of viewers, Bari Weiss has begun the renovation of the 58 year-old news magazine show 60 Minutes, including hiring a former New York Times Technology print journalist and documentary filmmaker, Nick Bilton, as the show's executive producer.

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Bilton, will become only the fifth executive producer in the show's 58-year history. The replacement of recently appoint Tanya Simon, daughter of long-time 60 Minutes correspondent Bob Simon, who held the coveted position for only one year, was due to the continual shift in the show's direction, and Weiss, who also had no traditional broadcast experience when Paramount-Skydance CEO David Ellison handed her the reins, praised Simon for her ability to lead the Sunday evening program through a tumultuous season.

Simon said, according to The Washington Post, "While leadership has decided it is time for a new chapter — I want to be unequivocally clear about one thing: it has been an immense privilege to lead this broadcast, and I could not be prouder of what we have built, fought for, and delivered together over the last year," Simon wrote in the email, which The Post obtained. "60 Minutes has always been more than just a broadcast: it is an institution built on independence, grit, and rigorous search for the truth."

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Bilton, who has few ties to the traditional broadcast world, has worked with CBS Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss throughout their careers at various publications. As the news magazine show is traditionally built on segments of reporting, short documentaries, the British-American Bilton has developed a successful reputation, over the past five years, as a documentary producer working with famed documentarian Alex Gibney and other tell-all true crime episodic docu-dramas.

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As Weiss has control over the news division, she has the authority to hire and fire with impunity. While the news magazine has undergone a makeover, the troubles appear to have begun after President Trump filed a lawsuit over editorial decisions in an interview with former Democratic candidate Kamala Harris, which he believed defamed him. The lawsuit was settled and the merger followed shortly after.

The appearance of impropriety by the network caused many longtime staffers to rethink the freedoms they held in presenting the story without bias, and the changes began with the resignation of Bill Owens, who served as executive producer for six years, alleging he was "no longer able to run the show with editorial independence." His perception of the changing situation appears to be accurate.

Weiss has made major changes in the news magazine show, even as the strategy is focused on the long term, not simply retaining the current viewership but growing the audience by boosting both the programming and the presentation.

In a particular bloody week for Weiss, terminations were across the board. Veteran CBS reported Shari Alfonsi was also terminated over a simmering feud with Weiss over a story on El Salvadorian prisons, which she "refused to sanitize."

"Alfonsi and Simon weren't the only dismissals Thursday. "60 Minutes" correspondent Cecilia Vega and executive editor Draggan Mihailovich were also fired, according to three people familiar with the decision who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters. Anderson Cooper recently left the show after two decades, citing his desire to spend more time with his family," The Washington Post reported.

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Matthew Perry's Assistant Sentenced

In perhaps the most contentious and damaging sentencing hearing in the death of Matthew Perry, who died in October 2023, Kenneth Iwamasa, Perry's live-in personal assistant, and pleaded guilty to administering the fatal dose received three years in prison.

Throughout the sentencing hearing, revelations regarding Mr. Perry's apparent magical hold on Iwamasa, which is the celebrity mystic, in which Iwamasa who lived a posh life, underwritten by Perry, and essentially lived the life of a celebrity, in the actor's Pacific Palisades home, with full access and privileges to the actor's earned lifestyle.

At one point, the judge, Sherilyn Peace Garnett of U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, interjected, disagreeing that Mr. Iwamasa lacked agency in the relationship. He was "unwilling" — not "unable" — to say no, Judge Garnett said. [. . .] Iwamasa's attorney Alan Eisner, "was insistent, asserting that Mr. Perry had instructed Mr. Iwamasa to break the law. "Mr. Perry was not a bystander here," he said, adding, "Mr. Perry was not blameless,"' The New York Times reported.

Matthew Perry, who starred in the 1990's sitcom "Friends," struggled for decades with addiction. During the last year of his life he marked his memoir, "Friends, Lovers, and The Big Terrible Thing," in which he detailed with blatant honesty his addiction, and pinpointed his struggles by suggesting which drug of choice dependency coincided with which season of the show.

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Ketamine, which is a dissociative painkilling drug with hallucinogenic components used for mental health conditions and chronic pain, became Perry's drug of choice and as the evidence included facts that Iwamasa had injected Perry, in the days leading up to his death, with more than 27 Ketamine shots including three on the day he died, October 28, 2023.

The celebrity mystic, an undefined but very real magnetic power, which allows celebrities to secure anything they desire, also acted as an intoxicant to Mr. Iwamasa, who clearly understood he was breaking the law, but understood the celebrity mystic would shield him from prosecution should the purchase of illegal Ketamine become known.

"Prosecutors have asserted that he was well aware of his boss's yearslong struggle with drug addiction, even being cautioned by a doctor about renewed concerns regarding the actor's drug use. They also say Mr. Iwamasa ignored warning signs, noting that he had twice found Mr. Perry unconscious inside of his home and had witnessed him "freeze up" after a large ketamine injection, losing the ability to speak," The New York Times reported.

Perry's addictions were not new, and as his family stated they could have been informed by Iwamasa, the world was informed with the memoir. Perry's buildup of Ketamine tolerance, and his addiction, even while he insisted he was clean, the Ketamine was simply substituting one drug for another, and his addiction drove him to excess

Matthew Perry will not be the last celebrity to die of an overdose. And the questions that followed Perry's death will follow the next one also. The celebrity mystic and the money train keep the machine running. After decades of placating the needs of the celebrity for the revenue they produce, it caught up to him.

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Jazz Great Sonny Rollins Dies

Saxophone jazz great Sonny Rollins died this week at his home in Woodstock, N.Y. He was 95.

Driven for the majority of his career with a passion to find what he called the "ultimate sound." "He continued to explore — to search for, as he put it in an interview with The Times in 1984, "the ultimate sound." "That's why I keep practicing," he said. "I'll know when I find the ultimate sound, because I'll be completely fulfilled just by the sound of it and by what I'm able to do with it instrumentally,"' reported The New York Times.

Unless one is a jazz or saxophone aficionado the name Sonny Rollins may seem familiar, but unpacking the history and life of Sonny Rollins, who at 95, had nearly 75 years of contribution to the jazz world, can hardly be covered in a few paragraphs of tribute.

Even the most storied obituaries, cannot give praise or credit to the man who changed the saxophone sound, and for those who were fortunate to live on Manhattan's lower east side, in the days when the Lower East Side was an avant garde collection of artists, painters, musicians, a place where the lost could congregate, Rollins would play his open air sessions, to no one, and everyone from the steps of the Williamsburg Bridge, because as he explained, he "liked the acoustics."

The bridge sounds were long before the changes in the city, and even before Rollins had made a real name for himself. Soon, however, he was becoming, and with that playing with many of the greats, whose names are more familiar like Miles Davis. A fan of John Coltrane, Rollins, would only play with him on one occasion, on the 1956 album Tenor Madness.

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The life of the musician, like many in his peer class, was subject to the expanding drug culture, and Rollins was no different. His addiction to heroin sidelined him for some time, but eventually he was able to wean himself from the drug and resume his pursuit the sound.

His sound was unique, and many times improvised infused by "the feeling," the moment when the world goes blank and the soul takes over, these moments rarely leave a memory for one to reflect on and pinpoint the notes or the transition. As the musical sound changed Rollins also changed in the 1980's he played on three tracks with The Rolling Stones for the 1981 studio album Tattoo You.

Rollins was perhaps his worst critic, and was never able to rest in a moment of brilliance or perfection. He believed he could always be better.

"The criticism he received — which continued beyond the 1980s — was often marked by an unusual mixture of admiration and regret. Reviewing a concert in 1993, Peter Watrous of The Times praised Mr. Rollins as "one of the greatest improvisers walking this earth," but also called him "a man bent on misspending the capital of genius" who "plays music that rarely challenges his own historical achievements, and that in its simplicity seems to pander to his audience." Mr. Rollins, he wrote, "seems unable, or unwilling, to present himself in a context that would give dignity to his great ability, or even just acknowledge it."' The New York Times reported.

Rollins was the recipient of numerous awards, multiple Grammy Awards, a Kennedy Center and National Medal of Arts Awards and National Endowment for The Arts Award.

He is survived by generations of fans.

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Janet Walker is the publisher, founder, and sole owner of Haute-Lifestyle.com. A graduate of New York University, she has been covering international news through the Beltway Insider, a weekly review of the nation's top stories, for more than a decade.  A general beat writer/reporter and entertainment/film critic, she is also an accomplished news/investigative news/crime reporter and submitted for Pulitzer Prize consideration "Cops Conspire to Deep Six Sex Assaults" in the Breaking News Category and was persuaded to withdraw the submission. Ms. Walker has completed five award-winning screenplays "The Six Sides of Truth," "The Assassins of Fifth Avenue," "The Wednesday Killer," "The Manhattan Project," and the sci-fi thriller "Project 13: The Last Day." She has also published "Unholy Alliances: A True Crime Story," a non-fiction narrative, "Days, Times, Seasons, and Events: A Collection of Poetry & Prose," and "Songs of Freedom: A Collection of Biblical Teachings," which can be purchased here. She is a member of the Authors Guild, the Los Angeles Press Club, the National Writers Union, and a member of the International Federation of Journalists.