Katie Couric: CBS Future in Question, Seeks Daytime Talkshow?

For Katie Couric, CBS Evening News may soon be a thing of the past. Earning a whopping $15 million per year for her show, losses in ratings will likely force the broadcasting network as well as the show’s host to go in a new direction in 2011. Get the full story, pictures and video below!

Once just thought of as a hard-line news reporter, the Evening News anchor is now being looked at in a new light: daytime talk-show host. With the end of Oprah Winfrey’s market-dominating talk-show this year, most think she couldn’t have picked a better time.

Some supporters have been waiting for years for a daytime talk-show hosted by Katie Couric. CBS, however, shifted the female-friendly host over to evening news in 2006 in the hopes of beefing up ratings. Unfortunately, while the program won multiple awards, it still trails 3rd in national viewership behind ABC’s World News, and NBC Nightly News. Now, industry experts think her $15 Million price tag may be too high for the network to continue. Still, no official announcement has been made from either side.

“Katie is enjoying herself at CBS and is proud of her award-winning show,” her spokesman told Bloomberg.

What is certain is, if she does decide to go daytime, she should have stations lining up at her door to make an offer.

“Stations aren’t going to decide to spend more money on programming because they have the revenue,” says one syndicator. “They are going to spend more money because someone comes up with a show that forces them to spend more money. Katie Couric could be that show.”

Would you like to see a daytime talk-show hosted by Katie Couric? CBS still retains the option of either continuing her evening news contract or shifting her to a 4pm time-slot. No one could ever replace Oprah, but do you think this anchor could be the next big daytime hit? Let me know your thoughts in the comment section after you check out pictures and video of the show’s most important work below!

Photos: www.wenn.com/ Apega, Adriana M. Barraza, PNP

This entry was posted on December 21, 2010 at 2:40 am and is filed under Talk Shows, television. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.