‘Live with Kelly and Ryan’ Becomes ‘Live with Kelly and Mark’ on April 17

By Paige Albiniak
( Broadcasting & Cable )
published

Hosts made announcement on Oscars red carpet Sunday night

Mark Consuelos, Kelly Ripa and Ryan Seacrest at 95th Oscars.
(From l.): Mark Consuelos, Kelly Ripa and Ryan Seacrest on the red carpet before the 95th Oscars in Los Angeles. (Image credit: Frederic J. Brown/AFP/Getty Images)

Live with Kelly and Ryan will say goodbye to Ryan Seacrest on Friday, April 14, Kelly Ripa and Seacrest confirmed on ABC’s Countdown to Oscars 95: The Red Carpet Live Sunday night. Ripa’s husband, Mark Consuelos, who has guest-hosted the show many times, will become the official co-host on Monday, April 17, and the show will be renamed Live with Kelly and Mark.

Seacrest announced in February that he would be leaving the show after six years of coast-to-coast commutes while he did Live, his daily nationally syndicated morning drive-time radio show, On Air with Ryan Seacrest, and hosted ABC’s American Idol in primetime. He’ll continue to do those other jobs as well as host Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest and occasionally guest-host Live.

Seacrest joined Live in 2017, after the show spent a year looking for a new co-host after the departure of Michael Strahan in 2016. Strahan replaced the show’s founding host, Regis Philbin, in 2012 and left in 2016 to permanently join ABC’s Good Morning America. 

Live with Kelly and Ryan on Monday aired its “Live After Oscar” show, which has become an annual tradition for the syndicated talker. 

Live with Kelly and Ryan is daytime’s top-rated talk show, averaging a 1.6 live plus same-day national household rating, according to Nielsen, in the week ended Sunday, February 26. ▪️

Paige Albiniak
Paige Albiniak

Contributing editor Paige Albiniak has been covering the business of television for more than 25 years. She is a longtime contributor to Next TV, Broadcasting + Cable and Multichannel News. She concurrently serves as editorial director for The Global Entertainment Marketing Academy of Arts & Sciences (G.E.M.A.). She has written for such publications as TVNewsCheck, The New York Post, Variety, CBS Watch and more. Albiniak was B+C’s Los Angeles bureau chief from September 2002 to 2004, and an associate editor covering Congress and lobbying for the magazine in Washington, D.C., from January 1997 - September 2002.