60 Minutes Prepares for a High-Pressure Premiere After Its Turbulent Shake-Up

When the famous stopwatch starts its familiar ticking on Sunday night for the premiere of the 59th season of “60 Minutes,” the graphics will look a little sleeker.The correspondents roster will include fresh faces.

And a new segment will eventually cap the final minute of the broadcast.The tinkering is part of a promised overhaul of the program from the show’s new executive producer, Nick Bilton, who took over the most-watched news show in America in May amid a shake-up orchestrated by Bari Weiss, the editor in chief of CBS News.Much of the show’s leadership was purged, and some of its most recognizable correspondents either were fired or quit.While the core DNA of “60 Minutes” is intact, Mr.

Bilton has begun to put his stamp on the show with dozens of small changes designed to modernize it for its sixth decade.“Over the summer, we’ve made changes to every aspect of the broadcast to make it stronger,” Mr.Bilton, 50, said in an interview in his office across from the CBS Broadcast Center in Midtown Manhattan.

“While each of those changes represents a slight departure from the way it’s been done in the past, it will make for a new approach to ‘60 Minutes’ in its totality.”This summer, Mr.Bilton sat the camera operators down and told them to avoid “walk and talks” — run-of-the-mill TV shots featuring a correspondent and the subject.

He has done away with the fuzzy shadow under the “60 Minutes” logo, and replaced the giant “book” graphics that appear behind correspondents before each new segment with streamlined rectangular screens.Also in the works is a story using footage from a hidden camera, a throwback to stories from the famed “60 Minutes” correspondent Mike Wallace, who used them to expose fraudsters.Mr.

Bilton also has something new planned for the end of the show, launching later this season, though he won’t say what.(“You’re going to have to tune in for the new season,” he said.)We are having trouble ...