( 4UMF NEWS ) Ann Curry To Quit:
Ann Curry will call it quits as co-host of the “Today” show on Thursday even as she says she deserved more time to work out “the kinks” after a rough rookie year.
In an interview with USA Today, the 55-year-old newswoman sounded close to tears as she talked about how tough it will be to step down from her dream job Thursday.
“I’m going to have to tell our viewers. That’s what makes me more emotional than anything. I don’t want to leave them. I love them. And I will really miss them,” she said. “I have called the co-host job at the ‘Today’ show my dream job, and I would be lying if I said it was easy to leave that job.”
In her first public remarks since news broke that NBC was trying to evict her from the “Today” couch after just a year, Curry said she isn’t leaving 30 Rock.
Instead, she’ll remain “Today” anchor-at-large and head up a seven-person unit to produce hard news specials and segments for other shows.
She bristled at suggestions that she didn’t mesh with co-host Matt Lauer and was to blame for the cracks in the show’s ratings supremacy.
“You know, Matt and I have had great on-air chemistry for 14 years, been part of the No. 1 winning team for a history-making number of years,” she told the paper. “That said, I just finished my freshman year as co-host. In every single co-host’s first year, there have been kinks to be worked out, and perhaps I deserve as much blame for that as anyone.”
Asked whether she was given enough time to get settled, she said she was not. And she said she was “deeply hurt” by leaks about negotiations over her future. She noted that although ABC’s “Good Morning America” broke NBC’s morning-show ratings streak in April, “Today” is still No. 1.
“I know I am not to blame for the ratings worries,” she said.
Curry and NBC News President Steve Capus did not reveal who will take her place next to Lauer. Savannah Guthrie, who anchors the third hour of the show, is widely thought to be her successor but likely would not start until later this summer.
Curry’s new contract is for more than a few years, she said, shooting down reports that she would paid as much as $10 million a year.
