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Earlier this month, Newsmax announced that morning host Rob Finnerty was moving to primetime in the 8 PM ET window for a new program.
Despite sticking with the same company he’s known since joining Newsmax in 2021, moving dayparts represents big changes — both personally and professionally — for Rob Finnerty. He’d grown accustomed to the lifestyle of being a morning television anchor. Working in the daypart for the past 13 years, at local TV stops in Bakersfield, Kansas City, and Tampa, among others before joining Newsmax got Finnerty into the routine of going to bed early and waking up even earlier.
But a move to primetime provided a change he was willing to accept in a heartbeat.
“It’s a no-brainer,” Finnerty said about the move. “I’ve kind of had this drawn up in my head for, really, as long as I can remember. And when you’re given a chance to do something like this, the worst that can happen is it doesn’t work out. That’s it. So I think you’d be foolish not to jump at a chance like this.
“And it doesn’t happen often, going from morning show to the 8 PM. The only person I know that’s done it is Tucker Carlson. He was on FOX & Friends Weekend and then they gave him the eight o’clock slot after Bill O’Reilly left. So it’s rare. Typically, that journey looks a little different. But in this business, no two stories are ever the same. So, when I was given the opportunity, I didn’t give it a second thought.”
“I think you’ve got to embrace change in this life,” said Finnerty. “And I think that change can be scary, as well. A lot of people are probably held back because they aren’t willing to change, and they are willing to kind of step out of their comfort zone. This is definitely not out of my comfort zone. But when you do 13 years in a row of morning TV, your whole life is calibrated around the oddness of that shift. And getting up? Here, it was 3:30 in the morning. In previous markets, at one point, it was 1:45 (AM) for five years. So your whole life is calibrated around that.”
Rob Finnerty admitted the sleep patterns — especially with a family that included young children — that come with working in morning television were no longer an ideal situation either personally or professionally. And despite now working in primetime, his body is still adjusting to the new schedule.
“It’s been odd to sleep in,” he said with a slight chuckle. “My body still wakes up — I don’t need an alarm clock — it still gets up early naturally. Then I try to roll back over because my body’s not used to be ready to roll at 8 PM. Normally at 8 PM, I’m literally in bed. So that’s been an adjustment.”
But the new daypart and work schedule isn’t the only amendment Rob Finnerty is making to his professional life.
In morning television, you’re often at the mercy of the news cycle. Which includes updating viewers on things that might have happened while they were asleep, and setting the plate for the day ahead.
By moving to primetime, Finnerty is now reacting to the news of the day, and providing more of his commentary to his viewers. And he admits that change is going to require exercising some different muscles.
“It’s a different setup. It’s all on you,” the Finnerty host shared. “On morning shows, you can lean on co-anchors and guests. A show that’s got your name on it, ultimately, the sun rises and sets with you, how you’re feeling, how ready you are, how prepared you are. And we’ve got to write a monolog every night. That’s an adjustment, but I’m somebody that has a lot to say.”
Rob Finnerty shared that he had spoken with other Newsmax hosts like Rob Schmitt and Greg Kelly about how they approach writing a daily monologue.
“I wanted to hear kind of what their strategies were for those nights when nothing’s really clicking,” the Newsmax host said. “You can rely on your staff and your team. But it was interesting to get some feedback and kind of learn more about what that looks like, creatively.”
When asked if writing a daily monologue is something that gets easier with time, the newest Newsmax primetime host said he wasn’t sure.
“I know that some people struggle with it every single day. I think for others, once they get in front of the keyboard, the news cycle moves so quickly every day, there’s always content, especially, right now so close to an election,” said Finnerty. “One thing that I have tried to do — limited experience, obviously — I think too many hosts look at what the headline is above the fold, The New York Times or The Washington Post, or look at what’s leading in a block on one of the other networks, or maybe our own network, and then try to go off that.
“My observation, right or wrong, is that the people that are really successful, they generate their own gravity. They generate their own media cycle, they see things a little bit differently. Maybe not five nights a week, but they certainly aim for that target every night. And that generates sort of its own media ecosystem around the way you view something. A good monologue can change the narrative of a story in five minutes. And that’s really powerful.”
Garrett Searight is Barrett Media’s News Editor, which includes writing bi-weekly industry features and a weekly column. He has previously served as Program Director and Afternoon Co-Host on 93.1 The Fan in Lima, OH, and is the radio play-by-play voice of Northern Michigan University hockey. Reach out to him at Garrett@BarrettMedia.com.
