The Today anchor announced Tuesday night via Instagram that she would be broadcasting from home beginning Wednesday. Hoda Kotb will still be live from Studio 1A. “I’m staying home because I have a mild sore throat and runny nose,” Guthrie posted.
Today’s Al Roker and Craig Melvin are taking time off after a colleague on the third hour of the show contracted coronavirus. Anchors Savannah Guthrie and Hoda Kotb announced the news on Monday morning — while practicing social distancing themselves and sitting apart. The stars said Roker and Melvin will be off the air for just a day as a precaution.
A Today show employee who works at the 30 Rockefeller Plaza building in New York City has tested positive for the novel coronavirus, according to a memo sent out to staff. Noah Oppenheim, the president of NBC News, emailed employees late Sunday to tell them that the unnamed staff member, who works on the weekday third-hour show, was receiving medical care for “mild symptoms” and wished them a speedy recovery. The show would go on, but everyone who’s had close contact will have to isolate themselves.
In a memo issued Monday, NBC News Digital staffers were told that the company plans to explore streaming opportunities for Today and intends to shift some employees assigned to video “to focus on preparing for a streaming experience.” A person familiar with the matter says NBC News is mulling such an initiative, but cautioned that it is in its earliest days and is not guaranteed to come to fruition.
Exclusives
Savannah Guthrie on Wednesday called in to the Today show to reveal that her absence this week is due to an eye injury. The morning show co-anchor explained that the injury came while playing with her 2-year-old son, Charley.
Hoda Kotb’s return to Today boosted the NBC morning show’s ratings above competitor Good Morning America last week. Today topped GMA both in total viewers and in the key news demographic of adults 25-54 for the week of Sept. 2, according to Nielsen. Overall, Kotb’s first week back from maternity leave pulled in an average of 3.872 million live-plus-same-day viewers compared to GMA’s 3.835 million. In the demo, the numbers were 1.202 million to 1.150 million.
Today and ABC’s Good Morning America are locked in a neck-and-neck race for dominance among the eggs-and-O.J. crowd, and their split has been stratified for months. For more than three years, GMA has typically commanded more viewers overall, while Today consistently dominated people between 25 and 54. Yet for the past two weeks, the dynamic has gone topsy-turvy: GMA has won more viewers in that all-important category, while still maintaining its overall audience lead.
One of the on-air fixtures on NBC’s Today show will soon be returning to the lineup. Hoda Kotb, who has been out on maternity leave, said she will be back on the show on Tuesday, Sept. 3, the day after Labor Day.
LaMarca, a longtime Today staffer who left NBC News in 2017 after a long run, will return as the new head of the 10 a.m. hour that is now led by Hoda Kotb and Jenna Bush Hager. The hour is in the midst of a transition: Kotb’s long-time co-host, Kathie Lee Gifford, recently stepped down, succeeded by Hager. And on Monday, NBCUniversal announced that Tammy Filler, the fourth hour’s longtime chief, would move over to E! to help run an expanded news operation.
NEW YORK (AP) — “Today” show co-anchor Jenna Bush Hager is pregnant with her third child. The 37-year-old journalist shared the news with colleagues during Monday morning’s show. The announcement […]
NEW YORK (AP) — Kathie Lee Gifford wrapped up 11 years with NBC’s “Today” show Friday with laughs, tears, Scripture and — of course — wine. The 65-year-old host received […]
Jenna Bush Hager will join Hoda Kotb as the co-host of the fourth hour of NBC’s Today. She replaces Kathie Lee Gifford, who announced that she would step down in April.
Momentum at CBS This Morning, the most buzzworthy morning show for a handful of years, stopped dead with Charlie Rose’s firing. Last week CBS announced the exit of Ryan Kadro, the show’s top executive who had worked there since its 2012 launch, leaving an uncertain future. Today is hardly problem-free — remember Megyn Kelly? — but it has the steadiest audience of all three network morning shows. The elevation of Hoda Kotb into Lauer’s role is widely perceived as a winner.
NBC News chief Noah Oppenheim told staffers Tuesday morning that Kathie Lee Gifford will leave after 11 years on the morning show, most recently hosting the 10 a.m. hour alongside Hoda Kotb and sipping plenty of reds.
The third hour of NBC News’s Today, which has been broadcast from Studio 6A since Megyn Kelly began hosting the time slot in the fall of 2017, is moving to Studio 1A, the facility from which the program’s flagship two hours originate. The move is being made to streamline the production process and make the division between the two broadcasts more seamless, the spokeswoman said. The last broadcast of Today from Studio 6A will take place on Jan. 4, NBC News said, and the show will hold forth from Studio 1A starting Jan. 7.
The departure of Megyn Kelly from NBC’s 9 a.m. Today timeslot marked a setback for the anchor as well as the network paying her millions of dollars to host. But the split appears to be helping the morning franchise overall. Since Kelly’s exit from the third hour of Today, viewership in the key demographic favored by advertisers in that time period is up around 10%, according to Nielsen.
Two buying executives said their agencies had yet to hear formally from contacts at NBC about the future direction of the hour. But one suggested NBC would ” just go back to the extra hour of traditional Today.”
Peter Alexander is taking on more duties at NBC News, joining the network’s Today on Saturdays in addition to keeping his role as White House correspondent. Alexander joined the morning program Saturday alongside co-anchor Sheinelle Jones and weather anchor Dylan Dryer. He replaces Craig Melvin, who has taken up new duties on the weekday broadcast of NBC’s morning franchise.
Craig Melvin, who recently stepped down as co-anchor of Saturday Today, is moving to the weekday side of NBC News’ morning show as news anchor.
NBC’s Today was the No. 1 morning show across the board for the second consecutive week, and also got a solid ratings bump from NBC’s Olympics coverage. But compared to week one of the 2014 Sochi Games, Today was down double digits, including a 31% drop among adults 25-54.
NBC’s morning TV franchise has become adept at leveraging the network’s coverage of the Olympic Games. Every two years viewers can count on emotional athletes and their families and friends stopping by the remote set of the program on the Olympics site to share the glory. There is more on the line than usual this year due to a wrenching change Today went through Nov. 28, when longtime co-anchor Matt Lauer was fired over his alleged sexually inappropriate behavior with an employee.
After ceding its status as the most-watched morning show in the U.S. to NBC’s Today for the past seven weeks, ABC’s Good Morning America bounced back, winning the most viewers overall for the five days ending Jan. 19. Today continued its dominance, however, in the more important category, winning viewers between 25 and 54, the demographic coveted most by advertisers.
Former Today anchor Ann Curry says she’s not surprised by the allegations that got former colleague Matt Lauer fired and that there was an atmosphere of verbal sexual harassment at the NBC show when she worked there.
Seven weeks after Matt Lauer was ousted from NBC’s Today amid allegations of sexual misconduct, there has been another shake-up at the morning show. NBC said today that Don Nash, the show’s executive producer since 2012, would leave and would be succeeded by Libby Leist, a veteran Today producer, making her the first woman to hold the top producing job for the show’s first two hours.
It’s easy to compare Hoda Kotb’s salary to predecessor Matt Lauer’s and cite gender inequity. But TV thrives on paying new hosts less.
As far as hard-knocks origin stories go for television hosts, it does not get much better.
Ending the post-Matt Lauer period of uncertainty, NBC has named Hoda Kotb (right) co-anchor of Today, pairing with Savannah Guthrie. Kotb will continue her long-running teaming with Kathie Lee Gifford in the 10 a.m. hour of the morning show.
