Categories: OLD Media Moves

Claman is the "crazy girl" at Fox Business

Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post profiles Fox Business Network anchor Liz Claman, who moved to the network from CNBC so that she could become a top personality.

Kurtz writes, “‘I’m not a BusinessWeek reporter who knows how to perfectly distill a balance sheet,’ Claman says. ‘But I know a good business story when I see it.’

“A year ago, the self-described ‘crazy girl’ took what some might have deemed a crazy step, giving up her CNBC anchor job without a new gig lined up. Claman soon signed with Fox‘s fledgling business channel, which reaches a fraction of the audience, and is enjoying her underdog role as an anchor during a three-hour afternoon block.

“Part of the reason she rejected CNBC’s offer is her ‘California free-spirit personality,’ Claman says, but also because she carried the baggage of having started there as a temporary freelancer. She felt the same way earlier in her career when ‘I never got the nod to be the main babe, the 6-and-11 [p.m.] holy grail of local news.’

“Claman, 45, was stuck in the middle of the pecking order at CNBC, where Maria Bartiromo and Erin Burnett were getting the lion’s share of the attention — and appearances on NBC — lavished on female anchors. At Fox she is an unquestioned star, albeit in a far smaller constellation, and her experience provides a glimpse of how Rupert Murdoch‘s year-old start-up is faring.”