Katie Couric Gets One-Hour Daily Daytime Show
Credit: Jason Kempin/WireImage for The Association of Magazine Media
Katie Couric is switching networks -- and time slots!
The 54-year-old journalist (who left CBS' Evening News on May 19) has inked a multi-year, multi-platform deal with Disney/ABC Television Group on Wednesday to host and produce her own nationally syndicated daytime talk show and to join the ABC news team.
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"I'm very happy to be returning to the network where I began my career as a desk assistant in 1979. It is tremendously exciting to have the creative freedom to develop my own show with Anne Sweeney, the Disney/ABC TV Group and Jeff Zucker, and to contribute to such a vibrant, innovative news division," Couric says in a statement. "I can't wait to be part of this incredibly talented, visionary team."
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The former Today co-anchor's as-yet-to-be-titled show will premiere in September 2012; it will be executive produced by Zucker, a longtime Couric pal.
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"It was a blast working with Katie at Today and I'm excited to do it again," Zucker says. "And besides, it should be more fun spending time with Katie at 3 or 4 in the afternoon than at 3 or 4 in the morning."
Couric was was the first woman to anchor a network evening news show solo; 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley, 53, was named her replacement in May.
