ACED MEGYN Matt Lauer is left reeling

EXCLUSIVE

All eyes were on Megyn Kelly as she worked the room at a bash honoring media’s elite. She stopped for a quick photo op with her new NBC colleagues Savannah Guthrie and Lester Holt, then beelined it to a group of pals from her old stomping ground, Fox News. “She was laughing and joking and was very much the center of attention,” says an eyewitness at the April 13 party, held at NYC’S The Pool restaurant. “Everyone was watching her.” Megyn was there to celebrate being named one of the 35 Most Powerful People in New York Media and, adds the eyewitness, “she definitely looked the part.”

And her power is only growing. NBC News chairman Andy Lack has tapped Megyn for a history-making joint sit-down interview with Russian president Vladimir Putin and American president Donald Trump. He picked her over 25-year network veteran and superstar Matt Lauer, even though Megyn’s yet to make her Peacock Network debut. “Megyn has been getting the undivided attention of execs, who are attempting to pull off the biggest interview get in a generation,” a network insider tells In Touch exclusively. The move makes it clear that barely four months after NBC hired the corporate-lawyer-turned-tv-host away from Fox News, Megyn is the network’s new star. “Matt has been replaced, and he’s furious,” says the network insider, adding that he’s taking it personally. “In the past, he would have gotten that interview. She’s not only replaced him in the interview but as top dog at the network.”

The shift is easily explained: Major executives’ jobs are at stake.“Ratings are down, and something has to be done,” says the network insider. While Today is still ahead with some key age groups in the ratings, when compared to ABC’S Good Morning America and CBS This Morning, it has had the biggest loss of total viewers overall year over year.

Co-host Jane Pauley, 66, left Today not long after execs added Deborah Norville, 58, as news anchor in 1989. Deborah then took Jane’s place but faced harsh accusations that she’d engineered Jane’s ouster. Upset by how NBC handled it, she left barely a year later. Billy Bush was fired in October 2016 after audio surfaced from a lewd conversation he had with Donald Trump during a 2005 Access Hollywood shoot. On April 18, Billy said he was “trying to get back on TV” in an Instagram video. After 14 years as Today’s news anchor, Ann Curry, 60, was named co-anchor alongside Matt in 2011. Her tearful 2012 exit (above) and replacement by Savannah Guthrie, 45, is widely believed to have been orchestrated by Matt. Matt and his wife, Annette Roque, briefly split in 2006, around the time allegations surfaced claiming he got too close to Natalie Morales while covering the Winter Olympics. Both denied affair rumors, and Natalie moved to Today’s LA bureau in 2016.

That’s caused panic at the network. Adds the insider, “There’s desperation at NBC. They’re really banking on Megyn, and Matt has been cast to the side.” Execs responsible for bringing over Megyn shelled out a fortune, and they know that if she doesn’t work out, their jobs are on the line.

Falling ratings aren’t the only thing plaguing NBC right now. Behind the scenes, the network is in turmoil. In February, 10-year NBC News veteran Tamron Hall, 46, opted not to renew her contract after learning she was being bumped from Today’s third hour — which she led alongside Al Roker, 62, for the last three years — in favor of Megyn, 46, who’s set to join the morning lineup as well as host her own Sunday night program. Tamron’s exit caused an uproar among fans and media-watchers and even led the National Association of Black Journalists to condemn NBC’S decision to “whitewash” the network. All that came less than four months after the Billy Bush debacle (see sidebar) that saw the former Access Hollywood host, 45, fired from a new gig at Today following his Trump hot-mic scandal. “NBC needs to turn things around,” says the network insider, “and fast.”

Matt thinks they’re treating loyal network stars like him with disrespect. “He has continuously stayed at NBC even though there have been offers from other networks. It was always understood he would do all of the high-profile interviews,” says the network insider. “It’s making him beyond angry that Megyn is waltzing in and getting the biggest interview of all time. It’s being spoon-fed to her. Plans are even in the works for her to make a trip to Russia to meet with Putin soon. Yet she has done nothing to prove herself at the network, while Matt has been there for over 20 years.” Matt, 59, actually likes Megyn personally, sources tell In Touch, but as previously reported, he is livid that Megyn is making $20 million a year, just $5 million shy of his salary.

Paying her almost as much as him, then handing her the TrumpPutin interview is the ultimate slap in the face to Matt. But he isn’t the only one who’s angry behind the scenes. “The staff of Today is very unhappy after being told that Megyn will still be featured with her high-profile interviews on a regular basis even though she won’t have a formal role in the first two hours of Today,” says the network insider. Meanwhile, all the internal strife is “sending shivers down the spines of folks at NBC News,” says an NBC source. “People at Today are afraid they will lose their job if they talk negatively about Megyn.”

The Putin-trump interview is a game-changer. The network hasn’t secured it yet but is throwing all its resources at making it happen. The interview — where both men would undoubtedly be asked if the Russians interfered in the U.S.’S recent presidential election — would guarantee Megyn huge ratings, and that would only lead to her getting more big interviews over Matt, says the network insider. But many believe Megyn isn’t the magic bullet, despite being the No. 2–rated personality in cable news during her Fox heyday. (She was behind recently disgraced former colleague Bill O’reilly — see box at right). “Megyn’s replacement, Tucker Carlson, has been crushing her old numbers in her time slot at Fox,” notes another source, pointing out that in recent months Tucker was averaging 775,000 viewers per night compared to Megyn’s 398,000. Plus, it’s no secret that NBC has a different audience than Fox. “There are obviously people who want Megyn to fail, but she has the support from the top brass at NBC and they are doing everything possible to set her up to prosper,” explains the network insider. “If Megyn can bridge the ratings gap and help Today overtake GMA in the morning news ratings race, well, everybody at the network benefits.”

That hardly takes the sting out of it for Matt. Megyn is expected to take over the third hour of Today starting next fall. And she’s determined not to fail. “She’s absolutely relentless and driven and dogged in her pursuit of getting the huge newsmakers and will do whatever it takes,” says the network insider. Even some of NBC’S own are well aware of her reputation. “She knows how to get in there and do her thing,” Today’s West Coast anchor (and Matt’s close friend) Natalie Morales, 44, told In Touch at the Women’s Guild Cedars-sinai annual spring luncheon on April 20. “She’s a pit bull.”

Unfortunately, Matt is finding that out the hard way. “A year ago he never would have imagined the biggest interview in years going to someone else at NBC,” says the network insider. “But then they hired Megyn, and everything changed. She’s in, he’s out.” ◼