As far as hard-knocks origin stories go for television hosts, it does not get much better.
In 1986, Hoda Kotb — the high-energy television personality who made history this week after she was named co-host of “Today” — was motoring around the Southeast, sleeping in her mother’s car and repeatedly striking out. The recent Virginia Tech journalism graduate was hoping to land her first job in front of a camera. But every time she walked into a television station with her audition tape, she walked out disappointed.
