Phil Ponce

Ponce is Host of Chicago Tonight. Ponce has an undergraduate degree in English from Indiana University and a law degree from the University of Michigan. He's been an award-winning journalist for more than twenty years. He first came to work in Chicago in 1982, when he joined WBBM-TV.

Ponce began at WTTW11 in 1992 as a correspondent for Chicago Tonight and as primary substitute for long-time host John Callaway. In 1997, Ponce was tapped by Jim Lehrer to serve as national correspondent for the Washington, D.C.-based NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. Two years later, he returned to Chicago to take over the Chicago Tonight anchor chair.

Ponce grew up in neighboring East Chicago, Indiana. He and his wife, Ann, an artist, live in Chicago; they have three children.

Carol Marin

Marin joined the Chicago Tonight team in January 2006 to host discussions on local issues and news stories. As a contributor twice a week, Marin will also conduct timely interviews with Chicago's newsmakers. Marin has worked as an anchor and network correspondent, has been awarded two George Foster Peabody awards, two National Emmy awards, and two Alfred I. duPont Columbia University awards. She has worked for NBC5, WBBM, and CBS on 60 Minutes, 60 Minutes II, The CBS Evening News with Dan Rather, and 48 Hours. In addition to her role on Chicago Tonight, she will continue her work as an investigative reporter for NBC5 and as a political columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times.

Elizabeth Brackett

Brackett is a correspondent and segment host for Chicago Tonight. Brackett gained critical acclaim for her work, winning a Peabody in 1988 for election coverage, and an Emmy in 1999 for hosting Chicago Tonight. She also won an Emmy in 1984 for her work on The MacNeil-Lehrer NewsHour (now The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer). Brackett also serves as a correspondent for The NewsHour where she covers stories about the Midwest, with a special focus on politics and urban problems.

Brackett began her television career as a researcher and weekend reporter at WBBM Channel 2 in Chicago and went on to general assignment reporting at WGN-TV Channel 9 and WLS-TV Channel 7.

Eddie Arruza

Arruza is a correspondent and segment host for Chicago Tonight. Eddie began his television career in Chicago working in a number of behind- the-scene capacities at two Spanish-language stations. He became a general assignment reporter for Chicago's former Univision affiliate, WCIU-TV, before making the jump to the English language market working at WABC-TV in New York City and then WGN-TV in Chicago. In addition to reporting for the WGN News at Nine, Eddie was also a substitute anchor and host of a Latino-oriented public affairs program for which he won an Emmy Award.

Joel Weisman

Weisman is Host and Senior Editor of Chicago Tonight: The Week in Review, winner of Chicago Emmy Awards for Outstanding Conversation Program Series and Outstanding Public Affairs Series. He has been with Channel 11 since 1973. His name is synonymous with no-nonsense, often inside information about Chicago politics and public affairs. In the weekly program, first aired in 1978, Weisman analyzes and assesses the Chicago impact of state, local, and national issues with a panel of journalists.

A Chicago native, he broke into journalism with the storied City News Bureau of Chicago, worked for the Gary Post-Tribune, was political editor and investigative reporter for the Chicago American(Chicago Today), reporter/columnist and Metropolitan Editor of the Chicago Sun-Times and Midwest correspondent for The Washington Post. He's won multiple Peter Lisagor, Jacob Scher, and Associated Press awards and was twice nominated for Pulitzer Prizes for his investigative reporting. His television career includes Emmy Award-winning commentary and news analysis for WGN Television.

Weisman is also an attorney, specializing in media and entertainment law. He represents journalists at stations and publications around the country and has lectured extensively on legal and journalism issues.

Ash-har Quraishi

Ash-har Quraishi is an award winning journalist with more than a decade of international, investigative and long-form reporting experience. Before returning home to Chicago in 2010, Quraishi spent more than six years serving as CNN's Islamabad bureau chief and correspondent. There he was responsible for the network’s coverage of Pakistan beginning just days after the 9/11 attacks. He reported extensively on the hunt for Osama bin Laden, the religious extremist movement in Pakistan and, in an award-winning five-part series, Pakistan’s first general elections since the 1999 military coup.

Back in the U.S., Quraishi served as the Chief Investigative Reporter for KCTV – the Kansas City CBS affiliate. His investigative reports there exposed corruption, imprisoned criminals and prompted change in city and state government. He is the recipient of three Regional Edward R. Murrow Awards and in 2004, Triangle Media Group named him one of the top 50 South Asian Global Achievers in Mass Media.

A native of Chicago’s Albany Park neighborhood, he is a joint-employee of WTTW’s flagship newsmagazine Chicago Tonight and the fledgling Chicago News Cooperative. He is also currently in post-production on a feature-length documentary on the Arab-American experience in Dearborn, Michigan post 9/11.

Mary Field

Field is Executive Producer of Chicago Tonight, WTTW 11's nightly live news and current events hour. She is also responsible for all news and public affairs production at the station, including Chicago Tonight, Chicago Tonight: The Week in Review and segments produced for The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer.

In more than 20 years in the news business, Field has been a William Benton Fellow in broadcast journalism at the University of Chicago, an investigative/special projects producer for WGN-TV, an assistant news director for WIND Radio and a reporter for the legendary City News Bureau.

She has been honored with numerous journalism awards for investigative reporting as well as a Peter Lisagor Award for public service and a National Silver Gavel Award for legal affairs reporting.

Jay T. Smith

Smith is Supervising Producer for Chicago Tonight. In 20 years at Channel 11, Smith has served as the producer of Chicago Week in Review and The Cheap Show and produced a number of episodes of Chicago Stories. He also was the producer of WTTW's national (PBS) series HandyMa'am with Beverly DeJulio.

Smith has received numerous awards for his work, including 6 Chicago/Midwest Emmys and two Peter Lisagor Awards from the Chicago chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.

Smith is a graduate of Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana.

Jay Shefsky

Shefsky is Senior Producer for Chicago Tonight. In nearly 20 years at WTTW, his documentaries have been honored with numerous awards, including Emmys, Peter Lisagor awards, and a Cine Golden Eagle. His work has been broadcast nationally on PBS and on the ABCNEWS Nightline program.

Emily Whipp

Whipp is the Line Producer for Chicago Tonight. She joined WTTW in January 2008, when she began as a Newton Minow Fellow. Whipp received her undergraduate degree from Wellesley College, where she majored in political science. She received her masters degree in broadcast journalism from Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism. She has also interned for CNBC in London, WMAQ in Chicago and WTMJ in Milwaukee.

Jack Ginay

Ginay is a Director for Chicago Tonight.

Cynthia Malek

Malek is an Associate Director for Chicago Tonight.

Michelle McKenzie-Voigt

Michelle McKenzie-Voigt is an Associate Director for Chicago Tonight. She is the only member of the production staff to have worked on Chicago Tonight since its inception in 1984. She has been at WTTW since her graduation from Northwestern University, where she was a double major in Theater and Art History.

McKenzie-Voigt has also worked on such other notable WTTW productions as the original Sneak Previews (with Roger Ebert and the late Gene Siskel), Chicago Tomorrow, The Golden Apple Awards for Excellence in Teaching, World Stage Chicago, Soundstage, 30 Good Minutes, and Time Out!

Charceana Williams

Williams is the Assignment Editor for Chicago Tonight. She joined the Chicago Tonight team in August of 2007. She monitors breaking news events and assigns camera crews to cover stories in and around Chicago and the suburbs among other assignment duties. She also produces talk segments for Chicago Tonight. Williams received her undergraduate degree from Oklahoma State University, where she majored in Broadcast Journalism. She received a Masters degree in journalism from Columbia College Chicago. Williams is currently working as the Associate producer for the upcoming WTTW documentary, "DuSable to Obama: Chicago’s Black Metropolis."

Paris Schutz

Schutz is a Segment Producer for Chicago Tonight. Schutz produces studio and packaged segments. He also produces and helped develop Chicago Tonight's live music segments on Wednesday nights. Schutz began in the winter of 2005 as an intern after graduating Magna Cum Laude from the Newhouse School at Syracuse University. He is a veteran of Chicago theater, having taken the stage at Drury Lane Oak Brook, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, and the Lyric Opera of Chicago – and he can be seen around town rocking on the piano – thrilling his adoring fan(s).

Alexandra Silets

Silets is a Producer for Chicago Tonight. Alex joined WTTW in 1997. She has worked on a variety of award-winning shows at WTTW including Chicago Tonight, Chicago Tonight: The Week in Review, Chicago Stories and The Cheap Show among other programs.

In 2007, she co-produced a groundbreaking documentary on the history of Chicago's Lesbian Gay Bi-Sexual and Transgendered community, Out & Proud In Chicago which won a Peter Lisagor Award for Exemplary Journalism from the Society of Professional Journalists among other honors. She also produced the WTTW documentary "Schoolboy to Showgirl: The Alexandra Billings Story."  Silets received her undergraduate degree from Connecticut College and her master's degree from Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism.

Marc Vitali

Vitali is a Segment Producer for Chicago Tonight. The native Philadelphian is a 16 year veteran of WTTW/Channel 11. His stories and profiles have appeared on Wild Chicago, The Golden Apple Awards and Artbeat Chicago, for which he received the inaugural Emmy award in the category Best Magazine Segment. Vitali is also an Arts Journalism Fellow with the Getty Center and USC's Annenberg School of Journalism in Los Angeles. He has a goldfish named Batman and saw a UFO when he was three.

Nick Shields

Shields is an Assistant Producer for Chicago Tonight. He started his time at the show in September 2008, transitioning from a career in print journalism. Before joining the WTTW family, he worked as a news reporter for the Baltimore Sun and Los Angeles Times. Shields covered the 2008 Democratic and Republican national conventions for the suburban Daily Herald. He holds a master's degree in Public Affairs Reporting from the University of Illinois Springfield and did his undergraduate work at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Madeleine Martino Fox

Martino Fox is the Production Assistant for Chicago Tonight. She joined the Chicago Tonight team in October 2008 and produces the nightly "updates" portion of the show. Martino Fox is a graduate of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities with a degree in Broadcast Journalism and minors in Political Science and Religious Studies. She was nominated for an Upper Midwest Emmy award and an Eric Sevareid award for investigative journalism.