It's been nine months since Ann Curry bid a very tearful goodbye to the TODAY Show, with viewers noticing a palpable tension between Curry and former co-anchor Matt Lauer. As the NBC morning show's ratings continued to decline after the arrival of Curry's replacement Savannah Guthrie, Lauer, 55, remind silent about the show's struggles and talk that he was responsible for Curry's ouster.
So why did Lauer finally open up about the mess this week in a frank interview with The Daily Beast's Howard Kurtz? "He wanted to wait until significant changes had taken place at the Today show," Kurtz explained to The Hollywood Reporter, adding that he had pursued Lauer since last fall.
"It was a hard time for everybody," Lauer admitted. "We were getting kicked around a lot. Some of it was self-inflicted and perhaps deserved…I don't think the show and the network handled the transition well."
Author Kurtz added to THR that the news veteran was not "opposed to talking about what happened over the last year, but he wanted to look forward and talk about how the show could make a comeback."
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Indeed, Lauer told Kurtz that lagging behind Good Morning America in ratings "makes you hungrier … I don't think it's a bad thing to have a fire lit under your ass."
