Up with Chris Hayes is a news and opinion television program

Television program

A television program , also called television show, is a segment of content which is intended to be broadcast on television. It may be a one-time production or part of a periodically recurring series...

 that airs weekends on MSNBC

MSNBC

MSNBC is a cable news channel based in the United States available in the US, Germany , South Africa, the Middle East and Canada...

 at 7:00 a.m. ET on Saturdays and 8:00 a.m. ET on Sundays. It is hosted by Chris Hayes, who gained popularity with his frequent appearances as a liberal commentator on various MSNBC programs including The Rachel Maddow Show

The Rachel Maddow Show (TV series)

The Rachel Maddow Show is a news and opinion television program that airs weeknights on MSNBC at 9:00 p.m. ET. It is hosted by Rachel Maddow, who gained popularity with her frequent appearances as a liberal pundit on various MSNBC programs. It is based on her former radio show of the same name...

and The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell

The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell

The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell is an hour-long weeknight news and political commentary program on MSNBC. The program airs live at 10:00 P.M. Eastern Time Monday-Thursday, and is hosted by Lawrence O'Donnell...

. It debuted on September 17, 2011.

Background

Prior to getting his own show, Hayes was a frequent guest host and commentator on MSNBC shows The Rachel Maddow Show and The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell. Prior to his position at MSNBC, Hayes was Washington D.C. Editor of The Nation. On August 1, 2011, MSNBC accounced that Hayes would host a two-hour morning show on Saturdays and Sundays on the network. The first airing of "Up with Chris Hayes" was September 17, 2011 and featured a live interview with former Speaker

Speaker of the United States House of Representatives

The Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, or Speaker of the House, is the presiding officer of the United States House of Representatives...

 and current House minority leader

Minority leader of the United States House of Representatives

The House Minority Leader is one of the party leaders of the United States House of Representatives. This title is currently held by Democratic Representative Nancy Pelosi of California....

 Nancy Pelosi

Nancy Pelosi

Nancy Patricia D'Alesandro Pelosi is the Minority Leader of the United States House of Representatives and served as the 60th Speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 2007 to 2011...

. The premiere of the Sunday program featured an appearance by MSNBC host Rachel Maddow

Rachel Maddow

Rachel Anne Maddow is an American television host and political commentator. Maddow hosts a nightly television show, The Rachel Maddow Show, on MSNBC. Her syndicated talk radio program, The Rachel Maddow Show, aired on Air America Radio...

. In addition to hosting "Up," Hayes will also continue to serve as a contributor to other MSNBC programs as well as continuing his work at The Nation as Editor-at-Large based in NYC.

Up is the most recent of MSNBC's rare attempts to place political opinion or talk shows on weekends; two other series, Jesse Ventura's America (aired in 2003) and Weekends with Maury and Connie

Weekends with Maury and Connie

Weekends with Maury and Connie is an MSNBC television news series featuring light-hearted take on news of the week.It was hosted by talk show host Maury Povich and his wife, television news anchor Connie Chung. Beginning in early 2006, it appeared every weekend morning on MSNBC until Dan Abrams was...

(aired in 2006), experienced short, months-long runs on weekend slots. According to Cenk Uygur

Cenk Uygur

Cenk Kadir Uygur , is the main host and co-founder of the liberal Internet and talk radio show, The Young Turks . A naturalized U.S. citizen, Uygur was born in Turkey and raised from age eight in the United States. He worked as an attorney in Washington D.C. and New York before beginning his career...

, a former host on MSNBC, he was offered a weekend slot in return for letting go of his early-2011 slot on weekday evening airings of MSNBC Live

MSNBC Live

msnbc Live is an American news / talk television program on MSNBC hosted by Thomas Roberts.Focusing on live news coverage, the program also consists of guest analysis and interviews around the stories of the day, in addition to feature-like stories, in-depth special reports, and The Weather Channel...

, but turned it down and left the channel due to managerial disputes (commentator Al Sharpton

Al Sharpton

Alfred Charles "Al" Sharpton, Jr. is an American Baptist minister, civil rights activist, and television/radio talk show host. In 2004, he was a candidate for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. presidential election...

 was eventually appointed to Uygur's former slot, renamed PoliticsNation with Al Sharpton

PoliticsNation with Al Sharpton

PoliticsNation with Al Sharpton is a one-hour political talk show broadcast on MSNBC and hosted by Al Sharpton. It began on August 29, 2011 on MSNBC's weekday 6 PM slot, the first time that the slot had been occupied by a branded series since January 2011...

in August 2011).

Format

From the beginning, "Up" has had a more panel-driven, opinion format than most traditional morning news programs and is more comparable to MSNBC weekday prime-time programming. The show is "slightly wonky, fairly serious, but without taking itself more seriously than the stories it covers". A typical show consists of a 4-person panel discussion of relevant topics as well as several segments detailing specific stories or interviews with newsmakers. Hayes has stated that, in general, the Saturday program will analyze the stories of the previous week, while the Sunday show will serve as a look ahead at the week to come. Hayes notes that "Cable news is very white, male and straight", and aims for a younger more ideologically idiosyncratic set of guests who are reflective of the diversity of the country.

Lighthearted segments are used to punctuate the show, and his debut show had an example displaying Hayes' style of blending the comical with the serious.

Up is broadcast from the same studio as The Rachel Maddow Show

The Rachel Maddow Show

The Rachel Maddow Show was a weekday radio show on the Air America Radio network hosted by Rachel Maddow. The show featured news items read by Maddow and her commentary on each of them as well as interview segments with politicians, newsmakers and pundits...

.

Special Segments

• Story of the Week: An editorial segment detailing a specific story from the past week or, in some cases, exclusive reporting from the "Up" team.
• Sunday Morning Talkers Pre-Game Show: Hayes and his panel ask questions they wish the moderators of the Sunday morning talk shows would ask their guests.
• Now We Know: On the Saturday edition of the show, Hayes details "what we now know" from the stories of the previous week. This consists of an opinion segment as well as the panel sharing what they have learned.
• Need To Know: On the Sunday edition of the show, Hayes details "what we need to know" about the week ahead and what viewers can expect the media to cover in the days ahead. This consists of an opinion segment as well as the panel sharing their thoughts on the week to come.

External links

• Up with Chris Hayes at msnbc.com
• Show video clips at TV Guide
• MSNBC video vault: Debut shows Saturday 9/17/2011 Sunday 9/18/2011
• Up with Chris Hayes Facebook page