Daytime talk is fading, but Drew’s been renewed

In the dwindling land of syndicated TV talk shows, Drew Barrymore (shown here) offers an exception.
Her show, already in its sixth season, has just been renewed for two years.
That’s a counterpoint to the current trend: Two shows — Kelly Clarkson and Sherri Shepherd — will stop at the end of this year, with others wobbling.
Back in the Oprah/Phil days, such shows were potent. They were syndicated to individual stations, serving as important lead-ins to local newscasts.
At the peak in 1993, a Forbes report said, there were 17 of them. In 2021, there were still 12. But there are only eight now, with two of them leaving.
The survivors also have far fewer viewers. The top show (“Live with Kelly and Mark”), Forbes said, has less than half the audience of the top one a decade ago (“Dr. Phil”) … which was a fraction of shows in the old days.
The decline came partly with the end of shows led by Phil Donahue (1995), Oprah Winfrey (2011) and Ellen DeGeneres (2022).
With more double-income families, there were viewer daytime viewers. They had fresh choices on TV (with the expansion of network morning shows and syndicated court shows) and more on cable, streaming and the internet.
Clarkson’s show has done well, while winning four Daytime Emmys for best talk show. But after her ex-husband’s death from cancer, she said she wants to spend more time with their children.
Shepherd’s show, the successor to Wendy Williams, is in its fourth season. It’s ending syndication now, but could resurface somewhere else.
Kelly Ripa and her husband Mark Consuelos remain atop the syndicated-talk ratings, in a show that has been around since Regis Philbin started it in 1988. Barrymore has moved up to No. 2; this past season, she got her first Daytime Emmy as best talk-show host.
CBS has made her the centerpiece of its “Hollywood Squares” (10:30 p.m. Wednesdays). It also says her show will get better timeslots in Cincinnati, Seattle, Minneapolis, Cleveland, Charlotte, Baltimore and Kansas City.
The only other survivors — for now — are hosted by Jennifer Hudson, Tamron Hall, Steve Wilkos (formerly of Jerry Springer’s show) and Karamo Brown (formerly of Maury Povich’s show).