Kelly Ripa has come out on top in her battle with ABC.
In a manner of speaking.
The long-time Live! co-host took most of last week off after learning that colleague Michael Strahan would be departing the program in September for a full-time gig on Good Morning America.
Ripa was reportedly irate that she learned this news right around the same time as the public.
She believed she had earned far more respect and professionalism from the network after having been a key part of the show since 2004.
In response, Ripa did not appear on last Tuesday’s Live! episode and then took off for a pre-planned family vacation, leaving Strahan to host with guest anchors such as Erin Andrews and Shay Mitchell.
Kelly will be back on Live! this morning… and we now know that she’ll be back with an apology in hand.
In news broken by CNN Money, multiple ABC executives have expressed regret for the way the Live-GMA reshuffling was handled.
They’ve issues a statement of apology to Ripa in the hope that this will mend fences between her and Strahan, considering they still need to co-host together for another few months.
“We had a plan which obviously did not go as planned,” an insider told CNN Money.
Talk of Ripa’s dissatisfaction with how the information was relayed to her was clearly more than just idle chatter.
On April 22, Ripa sent an email to Live! employees, telling them she planned to return after departing the set two days earlier than expected for her trip.
“I wanted to thank you all for giving me the time to process this new information,” she wrote in the email.
“Your kindness, support, and love has overwhelmed me. We are a family and I look forward to seeing you all on Tuesday morning.”
Oh, we’ll be seeing her on Tuesday morning, alright!
With rumors also floating around that Ripa and Strahan dislike each other, we’ll be watching this return with a close eye on every facial expression and a close ear on every syllable.
If there’s any real tension there, we’re determined to pick up on it!
