Lesley Stahl’s ‘60’ Debrief & The Times-Platner Saga

Jun 8, 2026

Design’s Bull Market, N.I.L. on the Hill, Prada Futurism

Welcome back to The Daily Courant, your afternoon guide to Puck’s best new reporting. Here’s what you need to know… and stick around for Bill’s exclusive interview with 60 Minutes’s Lesley Stahl.

Dry Powder: After the firing of several top 60 Minutes journalists and producers at the end of May, legendary correspondent Lesley Stahl faced a difficult choice: stay with the storied newsmagazine, or let this be the end of the line. Bill Cohan sits down with Stahl to discuss the hardest chapter of her 50-year career and the behind-the-scenes conversation at CBS News. [Read More]

In the Room: Just before the weekend, Stahl and fellow correspondents Bill Whitaker and Jon Wertheim announced they would return to 60 Minutes—though their leaked memo was hardly a vote of confidence in the Weiss/Bilton administration. Dylan Byers reveals an earlier draft that was even more critical. [Read More]
Wall Power: After years of slumping sales, the enduring strength of the design market is looking less like an anomaly. Marion Maneker tours the season’s premier design sales, from Barbara Gladstone’s art-meets-design estate to François-Xavier Lalanne’s poolside frog fountains. [Read More]
Wall Power: Between a London mini-retrospective, a $2.5 million pinup headed to Art Basel, and strong auction results, a Francis Picabia moment is underway. Marion Maneker chats with Hauser & Wirth’s Sarah Allen about the style-switching provocateur and the dawning appreciation for his late works. [Read More]
Line Sheet: The fashion industry is overexposed and no longer steering culture, but designers and brands can still win—or lose!—the media game. Malique Morris sizes up Victoria’s Secret’s teen-fueled comeback, Prada’s five-day futurism conference, and more. [Read More]

Meanwhile, on the pods…

The Varsity: John Ourand and Eriq Gardner unpack how Capitol Hill and an army of lawyers are reshaping college athletics—from the fight over the Sports Broadcasting Act to the usual N.I.L. mishegas. [Listen Here]
The Powers That Be: Peter Hamby and Jon Kelly weigh in on the 60 Minutes soap opera before digging into the New York Times oppo drop on Senate hopeful Graham Platner, and whether the lawyers watered it down. [Listen Here or Watch Here]

Finally…

Thanks to the Solana Policy Institute for their partnership on our latest Puck Power Breakfast, in which Leigh Ann Caldwell sat down with Rep. French Hill to discuss the stalemate over crypto, housing reform, his position on Ukraine, and much more. Read here or listen here.
Tomorrow evening, June 9, Bill Cohan will sit down with Lloyd Blankfein at the Whitby in NYC to discuss his book Streetwise: Getting to and Through Goldman Sachs as part of a literary series in partnership with Mayer Brown. Please email MPhillips@puck.news if you’re interested in attending—space is limited.

And now, a little more on Lesley Stahl’s ‘60’ decision…

MEDIA

Lesley’s Choice

Shortly after Black Thursday—the moniker 60 Minutes veterans have applied to the late-May firing of a half-dozen top producers and journalists—legendary correspondent Lesley Stahl had to make a difficult decision: fly to Madrid to report a fall segment, or step away from the storied newsmagazine where she had worked for decades. Yes, she was furious over Bari Weiss’s decision to terminate executive producer Tanya Simon and her team, and surprised by the installation of Nick Bilton, a journalist with no broadcast or management experience. But she still loved the institution, which was entering its 59th season. In the end, she got on the plane.

On Friday—shortly after announcing, along with her colleagues Bill Whitaker and Jon Wertheim, that she was staying—Stahl gave Bill Cohan a candid account of the whole saga: the still-gnawing questions around why her colleagues were fired, her dinner with Bilton about the program’s future, and the new two-year contract she’s negotiating at age 84. But she’s clearly still rattled by the purge and the mysteries around it. “It’s been over 50 years,” she said of her career. “This was by far the worst experience I’ve been involved in, or even witnessed.”

Click here to read Bill’s full story.

MEDIA

Dylan Byers

Lesley Stahl & The 60 Minutes Guys Are Staying

In a brief manifesto, Stahl, Bill Whitaker, and Jon Wertheim acknowledged deep frustrations with the new leadership of the show, but worried that leaving now would make things even worse. An earlier draft of the memo was even more critical.

ART

Marion Maneker

Sotheby’s Object Lessons

The latest design sales commingle art and design objects in a way that offers everyone a teachable moment: They educate art collectors on the potential value of design objects, while giving the design people a greater appreciation for high-dollar contemporary artworks.

ART

Marion Maneker

Picabia’s Final Frontier

The yacht-owning, sports car–loving artist Francis Picabia defied the odds in nearly all aspects of his life and career—and only now are his striking pinup works being taken seriously.

FASHION

Malique Morris

Fashion Attention Wars (And How Prada Gets Away With It)

News and notes on an industry drowning in content, and the brands that broke through, for better and for worse: Victoria’s Secret’s teen charm campaign, Patagonia’s drag infringement suit, Lululemon’s customer confusion, and how Prada pulled off the rarest trick in luxury.

SPORTS

John Ourand

Full Court Press!

Puck legal guru Eriq Gardner joins John Ourand to explain how Capitol Hill and a veritable army of lawyers are reshaping college athletics: the fight over the Sports Broadcasting Act, the usual N.I.L. mishegas, the Sunday Ticket time bomb, and much more.

MEDIA

Peter Hamby

Jon Kelly

The Powers that Be Daily, Starring Peter Hamby

Media Monday: Too Scott to Handle!

Besties Jon and Peter weigh in on the latest developments in the 60 Minutes soap opera: the firing of Scott Pelley, the Nick Bilton showdown, and the newsroom murder-suicide pact. Then they dig into the media meta-narrative surrounding the New York Times oppo drop on Senate wannabe Graham Platner, and whether the lawyers watered it down.

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