Dan Abrams has the scars to prove it

When I walked into Dan Abrams’ office in New York, I had no idea what his abs looked like — a topic that often comes up in media profiles. By the time I got out, that was no longer the case. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Abrams, a court reporter turned businessman, has a resume that prints like a CVS receipt. He’s the CEO of content studio Law&Crime, which recently acquired Court TV, where Abrams got his start. He is the chief legal analyst at ABC News, founder and CEO of Mediaite, and host of the SiriusXM radio series The Dan Abrams Show (SiriusXM POTUS) and host and executive producer of the cable series Court camera (A&E) F In periodical: live (Rails).

When depicting a man’s workday, one could use a drink – and Abrams has me covered. The father of two is a vineyard owner (Ev&Em, named after his children), restaurateur (Danny’s American Wine Bistro in the Flatiron District) and purveyor of his Rotten Tomatoes-for-booze company The Daily Pour. “He was always looking for opportunities,” Abrams’ friend W.K GMA And “the energy to pursue it,” colleague George Stephanopoulos tells me.

Until a few months ago, Abrams also counted NewsNation Dan Abrams Live Among his concerts. He finally had to say ‘when’ though. “The truth is, NewsNation was taking up more than 50 percent of my day,” Abrams says. “The idea of ​​ditching a cable news show—A Peak time The show – it was never something I thought I would do.

As if he didn’t already make the rest of us look lazy, Abrams has also written six books — four of which New York Times Bestseller – and has at least one more in it.

“I’m thinking of a health and fitness book called Scars, brains and six packs at 60“Abrams told me.

I can vouch for the scar and the six pack. Abrams lifted his shirt to reveal a 12-inch surgical scar running from his chest to – well, he had to take his pants down because of that scar, and this He is It’s still a workplace, last I checked.

“It will be the cover that shows the huge scar,” Abrams says. (And the six-pack, of course.)

Abrams is a testicular cancer survivor (add that to his list of accomplishments). He was diagnosed in 2003 while working on air at MSNBC. Doctors at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center told Abrams that there was a 50 percent chance that the cancer — which he discovered himself (“Get your testicles checked; it could save your life,” he told me) — had spread to the lymph nodes in his stomach.

“I was 37 years old, single and completely terrified,” he recalls.

Abrams kept the diagnosis and treatment to himself for about a year. He shared his cancer journey publicly in just eight minutes today Clip after reading about the death of Sean Kemmerling, a weekend sports reporter at WPIX Channel 11 in New York City. Abrams and Kemmerling never knew each other, but they were in similar orbits. Not only were they both journalists based in New York City, but they were the same age, had the same type of cancer and were being treated in the same hospital at the same time.

“He looked almost like me, and he died of testicular cancer. That could have been me. I just happened to find it earlier, but he didn’t,” Abrams says. Abrams has been cancer-free for a long time. Stop needing annual presentations in 2013.

Abrams, who turned 60 on May 20, told me that he tries not to drink “at least” three nights a week. When he does, it’s either the wine or the bourbon he fell in love with during Live PD days. She remembers Live PD (A&E), strike In periodical: live A predecessor that was unexpectedly canceled after the May 2020 killing of George Floyd. Live PD Abrams says it was done to please employees at the basic cable channel. “I think even the people who made the decision to cancel Live PD He would later say it was a mistake. Now they will tell you that they didn’t have much of a choice, which means there was a lot of internal pressure. It felt like we were being hung out to dry.

He adds: “I was angrier at that time than I am today.”

Well, sure, he almost lost his Bourbon buddies.

“We started bringing drinks because, you know, we’re there until midnight, right? Nobody has a social life on the weekends if you’re doing the show on Friday and Saturday nights,” Abrams said. “So, every Friday night, I would bring some wine, and other people would bring some whiskey. I started experimenting with whiskey, and it has the layers of flavor that wine has.”

Abrams’ flair is on display at Danny’s Restaurant, which opened in October and sells what Danny calls “elevated comfort food.”

The restaurant has “exploded,” Abrams said, and is “one of the hardest reservations to get in New York right now.” It’s worth it, Stephanopoulos asserts.

On opening night, he dined there with his wife, Ali Wentworth, and another journalist/actress, Peter Latman and Isabel Gillies. “We had fried chicken, which was excellent. We had a burger,” Stephanopoulos said. “It was great. We just split a bunch of stuff.”

When I asked Stephanopoulos to share a story that happened only in New York about Abrams, he thought for a moment, then advised me a better one: “Well, you don’t get more New York than opening a restaurant named after you, in the city’s hottest restaurant district.”

Typical Dan Friday

7:15 amWake up and check newsletters from Axios, Politico, and Punchbowl and scan the front page of Mediaite. Send feedback to my SiriusXM producer.

8 am Go to the kitchen to sit with my daughter before she goes to school.

4:30 pm Get your pick up to go to Jersey City In periodical: live. There’s a lot of traffic, so I usually get there around 5:30

This story appeared in the May 20 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.

Subscribe subscription