Here is one for you "Foxy" people.
Wallace readies for a new role 'Fox News Sunday' host is on this week
By Peter Johnson USA Today
Chris Wallace says one of the ''little oddities'' about joining Fox News, which he did three weeks ago, is that his office in Fox's Washington, D.C., bureau is across from the makeup room.
''Anyone who comes on Fox during the day has to literally walk past my office.''
This little detail might not mean much to outsiders. But when you're set to anchor a public affairs show like Fox News Sunday, which Wallace does this week, replacing Tony Snow, it's a big plus: Booking newsmaker guests is Job No. 1 on his beat.
So far, he has bumped into the top strategists of the Democratic presidential campaigns and officials in the Bush White House; House Speaker Dennis Hastert; and Tommy Thompson, secretary of Health and Human Services, all potential guests.
Wallace, 56, the son of 60 Minutes titan Mike Wallace, left ABC's newsmagazine PrimeTime Live for his new gig. He knows he has his work cut out for him.
Sunday is a distant fourth in the Sunday news arena, averaging 1.7 million viewers -- 2.3 million less than NBC's Meet the Press, which Wallace himself anchored for two years back in the late '80s.
Wallace says Snow left him with a formidable roundtable: Fox's Brit Hume, National Public Radio's Mara Liasson, The Evening Standard's Bill Kristol and columnist Juan Williams.
And just as Snow, a newspaper columnist, ended each show with an essay, Wallace plans to bring some of his newsmagazine experience with him to Sunday.
Wallace will end each program with a three-minute ''mini-magazine'' profile of a Washington mover and shaker for a segment called ''Power Player.''
He won't say who this week's player is, other than to say that this person is a familiar name to anyone who follows Washington politics. To Wallace's amazement, his subject ''never in his life has done a sit-down TV interview.''
Wallace, whose show airs on Fox's broadcast affiliates, says that on his rounds in recent weeks he has confronted a ''perception issue'' that Sunday ''leans to the right,'' just as many people think sister cable channel Fox News does.
Wallace says he takes no sides. ''I am a straight newsman. I am going to treat everyone fairly and I'm going to take Fox up on its slogan and be tough but fair to all sides.''
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