Matt Lauer Could Be Fired Over ‘Today’ Ratings

Ann Curry and Matt Lauer

What goes around comes around, Matt Lauer. Radar reported that Alexandra Wallace, the newly installed executive overseeing the troubled morning show, had informed her bosses that she might have to fire Matt Lauer if ratings for the show continue to lag behind “Good Morning America.” It was not a report that made much sense — Lauer was just signed to an extremely lucrative new contract earlier in the year — but Wallace spoke on the record to the New York Post to rebuff it.

“There is absolutely no truth to this,” she said. “There have been some recent outrageous claims regarding Matt and the ‘Today’ show, and an awful lot of piling on from nameless, faceless sources. These stories are wrong and irresponsible.”

The show has defended itself on the record several times before. Lauer hit back at critical pieces in the Post and Daily News in September, and several NBC executives, including NBC News president Steve Capus, have backed him in interviews. Capus also lashed out at the tabloid stories, telling the Daily Beast –in an oddly similar statement as Wallace’s — that “there has also been a lot of mean-spirited piling-on, which has been manufactured by many anonymous sources.”

Meanwhile, we’ve enjoyed watching Ann Curry on Rock Center with Brian Williams.

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‘Today’ Show Suffering Because of Matt Lauer

Matt Lauer is so yesterday.

TV industry insiders say no amount of NBC executive reshuffling can save the embattled “Today” show — until its longtime co-host throws in the towel.

Lauer has been blamed for the show’s ratings woes, which intensified in June when co-host Ann Curry was suddenly ditched and replaced by Savannah Guthrie.

“This problem is not going to go away until Matt Lauer does,” a prominent former NBC News exec told the Daily News on Tuesday. “He’s great, but fairly or unfairly, his brand is damaged.”

The sentiment comes just as a new production team is poised to take over “Today,” which has fallen into second place this year behind archrival “Good Morning America” in the cutthroat ratings race.

Many in the television news industry believe that the show lost its dominant place in morning TV because it became stale under Bell’s watch.

“You look at ‘GMA’ and they’ve got it going. They come across like a family, and the approach is appealing and feels fresh,” a high-ranking TV news insider told The News on condition of anonymity. “They’ve got that morning TV chemistry, which the current regime at ‘Today’ just seems to have let slip away.”

Former co-host Katie Couric recently told The News that she believed another issue with “Today” was that the show had gotten too soft and lost part of its focus on hard news.

A good example of that was how, on this year’s anniversary of 9/11, Bell chose to air a mindless interview with Kim Kardashian’s mom, Kris Jenner — in which she rambled on about her breast implants — rather than air a moment of silence at Ground Zero.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/tv-movies/lauer-brand-damaged-ex-nbc-news-exec-article-1.1201673#ixzz2CUnoxyXk

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Ann Curry Tweets ‘Despair’

Ann Curry has been keeping a low profile since her departure as co-host of the “Today” show but she broke her relative silence in an intriguing way on Wednesday.

Curry tweeted, “When I despair I remember that throughout history, truth and love have always won,” she wrote, referring to the Gandhi quote as “one of [her] favorites.”

The message followed her initial tweet of the day, “Good morning Twitterverse. Your unbelievable kindness resonates. You have made me love YOU even more.”

Note to Ann: Since you left we’ve been tuning in to Good Morning America!

Curry returned to the network in mid-July to cover the tragic mass shooting in Aurora, Colorado, and was supposedly going to cover the Olympics with the “Today” show gang live in London, though she has not yet appeared on air. Curry was replaced by her “Today” colleague Savannah Guthrie, and was renamed “Today” anchor-at-large and an international and national correspondent for NBC News.

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Is The Rosie Show Moving To New York To Save Ratings?

Rosie O’Donnell’s TV history is repeating itself — and, as in the past, it’s getting ugly.

O’Donnell’s talk show, “The Rosie Show,” is imploding just five months after launching on Oprah Winfrey’s little-watched OWN cable network.

Not only is “The Rosie Show” a ratings disaster — it averaged just 150,000 viewers last week — but O’Donnell is selling her $2.5 million mansion in Chicago, where the show tapes, and reportedly wants to move the production to New York. That would leave producer Harpo with empty, expensive, unused studio space it might not want to surrender so easily.

Adding fuel to the fire are reports in the Chicago media that “The Rosie Show” is plagued by a lack of focus, a cranky, erratic, disinterested host and a backstage power struggle between Team Rosie and Winfrey loyalists who worked on the now-defunct “Oprah” and are at odds with O’Donnell.

It now seems that what’s worked for  Rosie O’Donnell in the past isn’t working anymore.

I like Rosie O’Donnell. She’s smart and funny and probably one of the most generous celebrities on the planet. Plus, she loves theater and goes out of her way to support it!  She seems to be trying everything she can to save her talk show. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to be working. Imagine yourself in her shoes. How would you deal with the pressures of fame?