Cooper was also a fill-in co-host for Regis Philbin for the TV talk show Live with Regis and Kelly in 2007 when Philbin underwent triple-bypass heart surgery.
Cooper left The Mole after its second season to return to broadcast news in 2001 at CNN, commenting: "Two seasons was enough, and 9/11 happened, and I thought I needed to be getting back to news."[10] His first position at CNN was to anchor alongside Paula Zahn on American Morning. In 2002 he became CNN's weekend prime-time anchor. Since 2002, he has hosted CNN's New Year's Eve special from Times Square. On September 8, 2003, he was made anchor of Anderson Cooper 360°.
Cooper covered a number of important stories in 2005, including the tsunami damage in Sri Lanka; the Cedar Revolution in Beirut, Lebanon; the death of Pope John Paul II; and the royal wedding of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles.
Cooper marching on January 11, 2007, in New Orleans against violenceDuring CNN coverage of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, he confronted Sen. Mary Landrieu, Sen. Trent Lott, and the Rev. Jesse Jackson about their perception of the government response. As Cooper said later in an interview with New York magazine, "Yeah, I would prefer not to be emotional and I would prefer not to get upset, but it’s hard not to when you’re surrounded by brave people who are suffering and in need."[6] As Broadcasting & Cable magazine noted, "In its aftermath, Hurricane Katrina served to usher in a new breed of emo-journalism, skyrocketing CNN's Anderson Cooper to superstardom as CNN's golden boy and a darling of the media circles because of his impassioned coverage of the storm."[14]
In August 2005 he covered the Niger famine from Maradi. In September 2005 the format of CNN's NewsNight was changed from 60 to 120 minutes to cover the unusually violent hurricane season. To help distribute some of the increased workload, Cooper was temporarily added as co-anchor to Aaron Brown. This arrangement was reported to have been made permanent the same month by the president of CNN's U.S. operations, Jonathan Klein, who has called Cooper "the anchorperson of the future." [15] Following the addition of Cooper, the ratings for NewsNight increased significantly; Klein remarked that "[Cooper's] name has been on the tip of everyone's tongue."[16] To further capitalize on this, Klein announced a major programming shakeup on November 2, 2005. Cooper's 360° program would be expanded to 2 hours and shifted into the 10 p.m. ET slot formerly held by NewsNight, with the third hour of Wolf Blitzer's The Situation Room filling in Cooper's former 7 p.m. ET slot. With "no options" left for him to host shows, Aaron Brown left CNN, ostensibly after having "mutually agreed" with Jonathan Klein on the matter.[17] In early 2007 Cooper signed a multi-year deal with CNN, which would allow him to continue as a contributor to 60 Minutes as well as doubling his salary from $2 million annually to a reported $4 million.[18]
In October 2007 Cooper began hosting the documentary, Planet in Peril, with Sanjay Gupta and Jeff Corwin on CNN. In 2008 he, Gupta, and Lisa Ling from National Geographic Explorer teamed up for a sequel, Planet in Peril: Battle Lines, which premiered in December 2008. In 2007 he also began hosting CNN Heroes: An All-Star Tribute, a show which honors and recognizes Warner Bros. and Telepictures announced in September 2010 that Cooper had signed an agreement to host a nationally syndicated talk show. The New York Times' Brian Stelter reported on Twitter that the new Warner Bros. day time talk show will be named: "Anderson,"[19] due to begin September 2011. As part of negotiations over the talk show deal, Cooper signed a new multi-year contract with CNN to continue as the host of Anderson Cooper 360°.[20][21]
Cooper has been a correspondent for the CBS News program 60 Minutes since 2007 while concurrently serving as a CNN correspondent.
BroadwayCooper will be providing the voice of the narrator for the upcoming Broadway Revival of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying starring Daniel Radcliffe.
(Wikipedia, 2011)
