Starting Monday, KARE-TV’s getting a different look at 6:30 p.m. Gone is the familiar celebrity dish of “Entertainment Tonight,” which will air in an earlier time slot. In its place will be “Breaking the News,” a new half-hour show hosted by Rena Sarigianopoulos and Jana Shortal, two familiar KARE faces, who describe their new endeavor as a “conversation not a newscast.”

Sitting in a cozy conference room at KARE last month, the two talked about how passionate and excited they were about the work they’ve put into “Breaking the News” and how it won’t be like a traditional weeknight newscast. Instead of headlines, weather and sports, the reporters will dive deeper into the stories that people are talking about.

“No house fires, no car crashes on our show,” Sarigianopoulos said. “A regular news show is 30 minutes long with 25 to 30 stories, sports and weather. Our show is 30 minutes long and probably has six stories, no sports or weather. The only time sports or weather would make the show is if they were creating conversation in the community. Not everything on the show is stuff that is already creating or will create conversation — a lot of it’s just thoughtful TV, thoughtful journalism that we don’t have time for in a newscast where we’re given a minute to tell a news story. We have the ability with this show to go beyond and dig deeper.”

Stories will be delivered in a variety of forms including through social media interaction, going behind the scenes of a big story with a reporter on the beat, opinion and editorial pieces from both hosts and community members, and man-on-the-street interviews.

SNEAK PEEK

During a sneak peek of the show on Dec. 3 (it aired after “The Wiz Live!” and before the 10 p.m. news), Shortal kicked things off talking about a social media post by KARE that received thousands of responses. The station posted the single word “enough” after the shooting rampage in San Bernardino that killed 14 people on Dec. 2. Shortal expanded on the social media conversation by explaining what the word meant to her and her colleagues through a thoughtful op-ed piece. It was followed by reporter Chris Hrapsky asking people on the street their interpretation of the word.

“I put it (‘enough’) on my Facebook page and explained why I did that,” Shortal said. “When KARE did it, they just put the word out (on Facebook). It was interesting to see the comments on my pages versus KARE’s. I didn’t say, ‘Hey, don’t get mad at us.’ I explained it. Obviously, that wouldn’t go in a newscast.”

WORKING AND WORKING TOGETHER

Shortal says working on the show has been one of the hardest things she’s ever done in her career and called the experience leading up to Monday’s launch “emotionally and physically exhausting.”

“I don’t know if viewers are going to watch this and say, ‘It’s so different from traditional news,’ but it certainly feels that way to us,” Shortal said.

When talking about working with each other, Shortal says Sarigianopoulos is a hard worker who keeps her in check, while Sarigianopoulos describes Shortal as the creative one.

“She’s so talented and doesn’t give herself enough credit,” says Sarigianopoulos, who gets emotional talking about their relationship. “Every day I feel blessed that I learn from how good she is. She has strong contacts in this community and great ideas. She’s the perfect person for this show.”

AUDIENCE REACTION

The two are also anticipating plenty of feedback from the audience — including Internet trolls.

“We did talk about when people start saying mean things about us (and) having our moms come on and reading the mean tweets,” Sarigianopoulos said. “Or having a segment called ‘Say it to My Face.’ Come on our show — let’s have a conversation about it and you can say it to my face.”

KARE news director Jane Helmke calls the duo of Shortal and Sarigianopoulos “smart, fun and engaging.” She said the show is one that will keep evolving and growing with its audience.

“Obviously television news continues to evolve just like everything does,” Helmke said. “We have all these amazing tools and ways to connect with an audience that we’ve never had before and those keep changing every day, too. Where 50 years ago, when television news got started, it was all presenting the news, presenting the news, presenting the news. Now we have the ability to connect with the community in different kinds of ways.”

FYI

What: “Breaking the News”

When: 6:30 p.m. Monday-Friday

Channel: KARE-TV

Other changes: Starting Monday, “Entertainment Tonight” moves to 4:30 p.m. weekdays, “Jeopardy!” will air from 3 to 4 p.m., and “Hot Bench” can be seen at 11:30 a.m.