Gayle King is a rising star at CBS: NPR

Gayle King is a sensational sensation overnight.

CBS hired the veteran local news presenter for the first time seven years ago and is now ready to rely more on it.

At a time of scandals and ratings struggles for CBS, King emerged with a colossal new deal at CBS News. She is now at the center of a new team for the re-imagined CBS this morning, who debuted this week. And it must play an even more central role for the network news division.

"My advice is always the same for everyone: keep going and be yourself," said King in an interview conducted for NPR & # 39; s About. "The public can always tell if you are pretending.I do not like this fake happy speech that I see some people doing it.If you have nothing to say about something, you don 't like it. do not have to talk. "

King is not known to keep his thoughts for her.

When House Speaker Paul Ryan, a Republican, granted an interview to King the day after the announcement of his resignation, she urged him to take a picture taken with President Trump and Republican leaders. "Mr. President, I must say that I do not see anyone who looks like me, in terms of color or sex, so when I look at this picture, I have to say that I do not feel very celebratory.

"Well, I do not like the fact that you have that feeling," Ryan said, clearly disconcerted. "I focused on this type of recruitment."

King also asked tough questions to Virginia governor Ralph Northam, a Democrat, about the Blackface directory scandal.

And King can also project serenity in the middle of the intensity, as she did in an interview with a senseless R. Kelly, who faces many charges of sexual abuse. When the musician stood up to end the interview, after facing his difficult questions, King repeated Kelly's first name, Robert, in order to make him sit down again.

"I did not want him to leave in the middle of the interview so I thought that if I sat next to me and just told him his name – I established visual contact with him and eye contact with the president – this would send a subtle message to him that I'm not going anywhere. "The tactic worked and the exchange became viral.

King, 64, is one of the most prominent African-Americans in the news. Yet in recent decades it has been defined relative to others.

During a stay as a junior producer at WJZ-TV in Baltimore, King becomes friends with Oprah Winfrey, then a young anchor. Both have been friends for decades. (Winfrey once dubbed King "the mother I never had … the sister that everyone would like" in an interview with Barbara Walters of ABC).

The rise of the king began years ago. She had been a host in local news for years and had a recurring concert on MSNBC. Joe in the morning before CBS first looked for it in 2012.

When she was appointed co-host of CBS this morning, King was considered a complement to Charlie Rose, around which the show was created to take Hello America and Today & # 39; hui. (A previous version was not considered successful.)

CBS had adopted a strategy in its morning programming of re-emphasizing the hard news. This role fell on Rose, at 7 o'clock of the show. King's role was then to follow with a gentler hour at 8 o'clock.

Former White House correspondent Norah O'Donnell quickly joined Rose and King. The chemistry on the tray creaked. And the odds have gone up.

King even proposes to talk about his own network, as she did at the end of 2017 when The Washington Post published multiple sexual harassment charges against Rose, her co-host at the time. The network has fired.

"I'm really still in shock," King said the next morning. "I slept an hour and 42 minutes last night … I'm not fine."

King told viewers that Rose had remained her friend and was sick at the same time.

"The women who did not speak because they were afraid – I hope that now they will take the plunge to speak too, that it will become a moment of truth," King said. .

Earlier this month, O Donnell was named the main anchor of the CBS Evening News. And Rose's replacement, John Dickerson, is heading to 60 minutes become full time correspondent.

King said kind things about the two colleagues – each of them heading for a plum position. But she stepped away from the script to say uncomfortable truths about her network.

"It's a matter of ratings," King said after helping to announce these changes. "And when assessments do not work, they bring changes, and they bring changes that they hope will lead to better things."

King's new co-hosts are Saturday morning host Anthony Mason and his correspondent Tony Dokoupil. Dokoupil said the CBS show would continue to focus on harsher news and more stories than his peers on ABC and NBC. He was particularly interested in the celebration of the good grace given by Rose to celebrities, diplomats and heads of state.

"I'm not interested in giving Champagne glasses to everyone as a guest – and to Charlie [Rose] Dokoupil tells NPR: "When journalism has to be contradictory, and some will always say it, I'm much more willing than Charlie Rose at the end." (Rose declined to comment on Dokoupil's comments to NPR.)

The notes faltered after Rose's shot. They also hung out for the CBS Evening News with Jeff Glor, who only took office at the end of 2017.

The new president of CBS News, Susan Zirinsky, has promised to get things moving, calling for the decision to raise King on CBS this morning a significant part of the network "reset".

"Gayle has made CBS a preferred destination for exclusive interviews," Zirinsky said. "People trust him and want to talk to him about sensitive and important topics."

"We think you can announce the news, inform and – if I dare say – entertain and have fun without being comic," said King. "We like to call that news with a heart, I like it."