- Born
- Height6′ 2″ (1.88 m)
- Kent Shocknek typically portrays authority figures in film and on TV. His recognizability as a high-profile news anchor at CBS-TV in Los Angeles first led productions to cast him for authentic representations of broadcasters. Since stepping away from TV news, Shocknek also has been sought to play characters outside of broadcasting, including executives, attorneys, and a used-car salesman in his breakout role as the male lead in the 2014 short film, "The Six O'Clock."- IMDb Mini Biography By: MediaBios
- Gender / Gender identityMale
- Because of the length of his career, the duration of his newscasts, and breaking news events, Shocknek is believed to have logged more hours anchoring news than anyone else in Los Angeles.
- Shocknek was the original anchor of the first early-morning newscast in Los Angeles, KNBC's "Today in L.A.," starting in 1986. He continued anchoring morning newscasts at KNBC, then at L.A.'s "CBS2 News" without pause until late 2013, before moving to prime-time newscasts on Los Angeles' CBS TV-owned "KCAL9 News at 8 and 10 PM.".
- On January 10, 2014, the City of Los Angeles officially proclaimed "Kent Shocknek Day," in honor of his decades of dedicated service.
- Named one of L.A.'s top three anchors by L.A. Confidential magazine, Shocknek anchored the news at the CBS-owned television stations CBS2-TV and KCAL9 in L.A.'s Studio City from 2001 to 2014. Previously, he anchored and reported at cross-town rival KNBC-TV in Burbank.
- An avowed fan of James Bond movies, Shocknek's first non-news role was as an extra, playing a fisherman in the San Francisco Fisherman's Wharf scene of the 1985 007 film, "A View to a Kill." (Now) producer Barbara Broccoli recognized him near the filming site, and invited him to be part of the background action.
- Playing completely unrelated roles is a newer opportunity, but I'll never complain about appearing as a newscaster: after all, half the word 'typecast' is 'cast.'
- Shooting an episode of "The Purge" in New Orleans 20 minutes after a drenching storm, we waited for a water truck to respray the street and a jazz band on a nearby riverboat to stop playing, so I could deliver my lines about the... eerie quiet. I realized I'm in the craziest business in the world.
- I thought CBS provided a real service by having (Michael) Weatherly introduce the virus episode on-camera to explain it was filmed a month before the Corona Virus lockdown. The script was so timely and had so many parallels, it was eerie.
- "Very Close Friends" was so far out of my comfort zone, I've asked my friends not to watch it. But if I wanted to show the world I could act against type, I needed to do it; even if it meant shredding my image as a character who's always dependable and trustworthy.
- When I was whining to (Steven Spielberg's mother, Leah Adler) that he cut me from 'The Terminal,' she just looked at me and said "Honey, he cut me from 'Catch Me If You Can.' His own mother!" We shook our heads in unison and went back to eating lunch.
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